• Say it ain't so, Sue: WNBC may be planning to drop the 5 o'clock newscast, Live at Five, in favor of a "lifestyle show" of some sort. [NYO]
• Richard Branson does not want to buy Playboy. Sorry, Hugh. [Reuters]
• NBC ratings hit a new low last week. [AP/HuffPo]
• Naturally, NBC Universal chief Jeff Zucker painted a much rosier picture when he appeared on stage at the D7 conference yesterday. [ATD]
• Were you aware that some magazines Photoshop their pics? It's true! [NYT]
• If MGM doesn't come up with some cash quick, it could go bankrupt. [THR]
• Page Six's Paula Froelich took time from promoting her new novel, Mercury in Retrograde, to kick Michael Wolff's ass across the room. [BlackBook]

Sometimes we get a tip that's just so fun that we can't bear to check it and find out that maybe it was just made up by some loon and/or convicted sexual predator. Like this one about Fox 5 reporter Julie Chang's way of saying "thank you":

I sincerely hope you watched the premiere of Glee last night. Fox's new funny/sad series about a high school glee club was spunky, precocious, and sincere—normally things that are annoying. And yet, somehow on this show, they aren't at all.

• Union members at the Boston Globe will vote on the controversial concession package proposed by the New York Times Co. on June 8. [E&P]
• Last week's broadcast of Meet the Press earned the NBC chatfest its lowest ratings since David Gregory took over as moderator. [HuffPo]
• Supermarket tabloid smackdown: Us Weekly is standing up for integrity in journalism (and Brangelina) by waging war against In Touch. [TMZ, Gawker]
• Who says magazines are dead? The publisher of Interview is in the process of launching a quarterly design magazine called Modern. [Folio]
• Neil Patrick Harris will host the 2009 Tony Awards on June 7. [AP]
• The two American journalists who were first detained in North Korea two months will go on trial for "hostile acts" on June 4. [NYT]

Greta Van Susteren, an adult with a lucrative career as a famous journalist, writes the best blog in the world. She is terribly upset that someone called her a "handler."

• Execs at CBS, NBC, ABC and Fox are supposedly "seething" that the president's three news conferences have cost them $30 million in ad revenue. [THR]
• Is the New York Times Co. heading towards bankruptcy? [E&P]
• More budget cuts at the Star Ledger and San Francisco Chronicle. [E&P, HP]
• The LA Times introduces a new weekly magazine this Sunday. [Folio]
• Star Trek is off to a fast start. The pic grossed $7 million last night alone. [EW]
• It looks like television and radio advertising is rebounding a bit. [MLM]
• Former Radar editor Maer Roshan is now the editor of TheWeek.com. [NYP]
• The Simpsons got its own series of postage stamps yesterday. [Reuters]

"Sopresso." "Brie." "Porcini Dusted Petite Filet." "Mascarpone Polenta." Do those sound like the sorts of things men of the people eat?

Martha MacCallum used to be a CNBC hottie, but since 2004 she's been one of the Fox News blondes. Today Shepard Smith totally macked on her!

When Barack Obama made headlines by eating a hamburger this week, we were disappointed that he ruined his by ordering it medium-well. Sean Hannity, though, found something far worse.

Did you know Arianna Huffington's godson is so afraid of Gawker, he can't say its name aloud on Twitter? Or that Ruth Reichl can be bought? The things one learns from the media's Twitter addicts:

The president's its third televised news conference in as many months ended with ratings down 42 percent from their February peak of 49 million. The obstinate bastards at Fox win! Just look:

• William Morris and Endeavor have agreed to merge the two agencies. The new company will be called William Morris Endeavor Entertainment, or WME, which should not be confused with WWE, or World Wrestling Entertainment, although the testosterone and aggression levels are comparable. [WSJ, NYT]
• Is the New York Times Co. putting the radio station WQXR up for sale? [P6]
• David Hunke, who had been publisher of the Detroit Free Press, is the new president and publisher of USA Today. [PaidContent]
• The New York Sun is back! Sort of. [NYSun via Gawker]
• More coverage/ analysis of Portfolio's closing, if you're up for it. [NYT, TDB]

Are you excited for Barack Obama's network-bankrupting fourth prime time national TV address, in honor of his 100 days of Presidenting? Fox isn't! They will be playing their regular Wednesday programming.

• More on the decision by Condé Nast to shut down Portfolio. [NYO, Gawker]
• Newspaper circulation figures for the past six months show steep declines at most major papers, including the Times, Post, and Daily News. One bright spot: the Wall Street Journal, which experienced a tiny, 0.6% gain. [E&P]
• Phil Falcone's Harbinger, the hedge fund that battled for a piece of the New York Times Co. last year, may now be looking to unload its stake. [WSJ]
• CNN has fallen behind MSNBC and Fox News, as you may have heard. [NYT]
• PRWeek is going monthly. But it'll still be called PRWeek, so you know. [NYT]
• Obsessed starring Beyonce was No. 1 at the box office this weekend. [THR]

Roger Friedman got laid off by FoxNews.com this month for watching a pirated movie. He's already back in the game. You can't keep him down, in any sense of the word! Let's check in:

• The 2009 Pulitzer Prize winners were announced today. [Pulitzer.org]
• It's been six years since the release of The Da Vinci Code, but Knopf says Dan Brown's latest, The Lost Symbol, will hit stores in September. [AP]
• Hollywood agencies Endeavor and William Morris appear to have cemented a merger, although an official announcement is still forthcoming. [THR]
• With the radio business struggling, some commercial stations are now following the lead of public radio and asking for donations. [WSJ]
• 17 Again was No. 1 at the box office with a gross of $24.1 million. [THR]
• Fran Drescher says she's in talks to host a cable TV talk show. The program would cover politics, culture, and health issues, and she claims she's in discussions with MSNBC, PBS, and Oprah Winfrey's OWN. God help us. [USN]

Neil Cavuto has been at Sacramento's TEA PARTY protest for hours, and he thinks maybe the protesters were "playing to the media"!

Life in the media is rough. CNET's Natali Del Conte got stuck in the foot, while Fox's Nancy Loo suffered a wound in makeup. These and other reports of suffering from the twittering class:

In your finally Friday media column: the New York Times "eats crow" (funny joke LOL), the Newseum wins, ASME loses, and police charge Fox with being annoying:

• The publisher of the Los Angeles Times is defending his decision to put an ad disguised as a news story on the front page of the paper yesterday. [LAT]
• A Fox Entertainment employee has reportedly been arrested for stealing the personal information of other Fox employees. [TVN]
• NBC is developing a sitcom based on George Gurley's Observer column. [P6]
• Angelina Jolie, Victoria Beckham and Lauren Conrad were among the "most salable cover faces" for fashion magazines in 2008. The least? Nicole Kidman, Carrie Underwood, and Rachel Weisz. [WWD]
• Dylan Ratigan talks about his departure from CNBC and move to ABC. [BI]
• Speaking of covers, are struggling celebrity tabloids paying for them? [NYP]
• The Daily Beast, Tina Brown's website, will introduce ads shortly. [AdAge]
• Fox News chairman Roger Ailes and his wife, Elizabeth, have purchased another local newspaper in Putnam County. [Portfolio]
• NBC will air a "comedy showcase" featuring Jay Leno on May 19. [NYT]