Even before the recent collapse of Wall Street, the media was changing. Newspapers dying! Blogs exploding! But back then, in the halcyon days of a couple months ago, the difference was that there were winners and losers amongst the various media sectors. Now, there are only losers. And a few who will hold the line and claim success, because, hey, flat is the new up. After the jump, a brief guide to the important parts of the media, and how they're getting screwed by financial reality: Overarching point: 39 of the 50 members in the Admarket 50—the most important companies to the advertising industry—saw their stocks open at 52-week lows this morning. Ok!

Good news! We know it's been a tough day in voyeurism-land for some of you, but you can resume obsessing interminably over Sarah Palin, because as John McCain pointed out this morning, the fundamentals of the economy are still strong. And they'd be a lot stronger if said economy would sit still and take in a little more Sarah stimulus! So we made this fun tableau of the whole clan outside City Hall in observance of the upcoming nuptials. (I hope for everyone's sake they haven't really already tied the proverbial tattoo ink tongue knot so the Palins have the satisfaction of hosting the [con]descending members of the media Katrina-style in that $20 million stadium and pay off that leverage Mayor Palin left when she became Mother Eagle Palin! That would certainly be a service to the nation's jittery bond markets!) Anyhow, it's about time we caught you eaglets back up with the latest in baby name generators…1. Palin sometimes calls opponents "haters." 2. Anchorage conservative radio talk show host Eddie Burke…blasted the organizers of [an anti-Palin] rally during his talk show, calling them “a bunch of socialist baby-killing maggots.” 3. FOX News' Megyn Kelly asked McCain spokesman Tucker Bounds: "Why wouldn’t he just level with the voters and say, 'look, he’s going to raise taxes on the wealthy or whatever you consider somebody to be making over $250,000, it’s going to have a trickle down effect. That may not be good for the middle class.' But why say he’s going to raise taxes on the middle class when he’s not? 4. It turns out V.I.L.F. ≠ V.I.L.Vote For! In July, John McCain led Barack Obama among white women by 44 to 39 percent; now his lead is 53 to 37 percent. There was no shift among white men, just like we said, even though we didn't have any poll data to support the assertion at the time because we were talking out of our ass as usual duh. 5. Four months ago, a Wasilla blogger Sherry Whitstine, who chronicles the governor’s career with an astringent eye, answered her phone to hear an assistant to the governor on the line, she said. “You should be ashamed!” Ivy Frye, the assistant, told her. “Stop blogging. Stop blogging right now!”

Even false rumors can be revealing. It wasn't true that Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama was a secret Muslim, or that his wife hated white people, but the persistence of those claims in email chain letters, online comments and blog posts told you what a chunk of middle America feared, namely scary foreign terrorists in disguise. What to make, then, of the flood of conspiracy theories about Sarah Palin that are flooding the dark corners of the internet? We thought rumors about the Republican vice presidential candidate and her family were going to dry up last week, but since our last comprehensive factsheet they have just kept coming. There's some genuine scandal. But a fake pregnancy? Secret rehab stints? Maybe the Bush and Clinton years left the blue states dreading anyone who seems too country-fried. Or maybe the Palin's really do have this many skeletons in their closet! Trudge through the thickening swamp of Palin mud and decide for yourself, one rumor at a time, after the jump.

Lee Abrams looks like Dunkin Donuts' Fred the Baker without his hair dye. But Fred the Baker got up every day to make donuts, and that's the type of old-style thinking that Lee Abrams is here to destroy! Abrams is the "Chief Innovation Officer" (LOL) of the dying Tribune Company, and also the man who says the most mystifying (and sometimes infuriating) things you will ever hear about the newspaper industry. All the time. Seriously. ""I just try to inpsire people to rethink things," Abrams declared yesterday. "There's no reason we can't create a newspaper renaissance." Ha. Here are ten of Lee Abrams' stupidest "NOT IRRELIVENT" inspirational messages:

Controversy: A magazine has published a list of "Overrated" things! Is their analysis correct? They certainly hope you will argue about it a lot! Blender's list of the most overrated things in music ends with a typically "provocative" #1: Deceased rapper Tupac. Former Gawker columnist Tionna Smalls has already started an online protest campaign! Problem, though: Tupac is the most overrated thing to hit music since the synthesizer craze. It's the mythology that did you in, Pac:

Remember how Barack Obama gave that inspiring speech in which he pointed out that what William Faulkner wrote back in 1951 — "the past isn't dead and buried. In fact, it isn't even past" — was still totally true today? Obviously he was totally right. The past isn't past; but it is (if you have been watching cable news anyway) most emphatically post-. We are post-feminist, post-political, post-Sex & The City, post-9/11. I am almost tempted to call it the "OMG So Over It Already! Election," except we are venturing into a post-OMG era. On Monday night we watched the "fresh" new MSNBC anchor Rachel Maddow get props from some obsequious guest for coining the term "post-rational" to describe all this madness. That was ridiculous enough to seem "post-"something in itself, so we took the opportunity to put together a post-linear, post-chronological (and, of course, post-rational) post giving you a brief history of our favorite "post-" terms of this campaign (and all time.)

Hey there, proud parents of exceptional teens, you can end your search for a learning experience that does justice to your child's special gifts RIGHT NOW because the new US News & World Report is up on the internet and they've found the place: Harvard University! And just how did the trusty trustees of Cambridge manage to nab the top spot away from Her RoyalHighness Academy Princeton* — on that shoestring endowment of theirs? The answer will enliven your loamy loins!By reducing average class size! Now a full 3/4 of Harvard undergraduate classes have fewer than 20 students. And you know what that means: more classes taught in intimate settings by younger instructors no doubt hungrier for brain sex. (I have anecdotal evidence of this, even. Earlier this year I met a young aspiring journalist from Harvard named Lena Chen, and she was traveling [to Julia Allison's house, in fact!] with an ex-teaching assistant in tow. I am pretty sure they were having traditional non-brain sex!) Now that you know that here is some information: it is the 25th anniversary of the journalism world's most pointlessly controversial listicle and still I am pretty sure Gawker has done the only actually funny (and crowdsourced) alternative ranking. Internet people, please put rub your A+ school for B student educated brains together and think us up a new concept. Unsafest Safety Schools? Fairly ridiculous names? *Ahem, Princeton would like you to know they still hold the top spot in several categories of the Princeton Review and also are beloved by Black Enterprise magazine despite that angry thesis penned by that alumni association Judas Michelle Obama. Vote For America's Most Annoying Liberal Arts College College & University Rankings Library Eating And Shopping In Cambridge [WWD] Campus Squirrel Listings

Yesterday we told you the nightmarish story of NBC's pooping intern. It was perhaps the perfect embodiment of a mortifying day at work. But we asked you, our employed readers, for your own stories of humiliation on the job, and you obliged. We've picked the five best (worst), which are printed in order of increasing terror. After the jump, read why you should never touch scissors at a library, make fun of hobos, joke about speed, pass out on a plane, or try to catch your boss' towel: 1. The Case Of The Clean Scissors [The following is an email sent out to employees at a library]:

Seriously, this is it. The nadir. Pack it in, Internet. Someone make sure to turn off Digg on the way out. It's time to go home. [L Magazine]

Ebay is not just for auctioning off books related to obscure literary feuds; it's also a good place for members of the working class to hustle mementos of the humbling moments when celebrities crossed their paths and acted like jerks. One item that you just missed bidding on: a receipt from an Atlanta-area restaurant signed by Outkast rapper Andre 3000. The meal cost $46.01. Andre's tip: $0. But the receipt sold for almost $15, so the waiter came out ahead. That said, let's segue into THIS: a look back at some other fabulous celebrity-related items that appeared on eBay in the recent past:

Perhaps you've heard the news that Nike has pulled its "That Ain't Right" balls-in-face ads after an outpouring of outrage sparked largely by this very website (though we weren't the first to address it). Are you proud of yourselves, commentariat? You are feared in all corners of corporate America. But the larger point here is that advertising is getting to be a very touchy business; companies are making fools of themselves nearly every week because of the crackheaded work of one of their ad agencies. After the jump, we look at five ads that had to be yanked recently, where they went wrong, and who came out ahead. Read and learn:

Michael Ian Black, comedian and VH1's go-to analyst of pop culture, has started an online feud with testosterone and beer-fueled guy blogger Tucker Max. Black challenged Tucker to a fight, Tucker accepted, and now they are both talking trash in a way advantageous to the promotion of Black's new book. This would all be cuter if Black didn't just try to start another online feud with David Sedaris, to promote the same book. These online publicity stunts are incredibly difficult to pull off without being annoying; below, a jaded look back at five that sucked the big one:

Most of the time people say an ad campaign is "good," they just mean that it's funny. Less often, it could be poignant, or provocative, or straight-out informative. But there's always the "incredibly morbid" tactic, too. It works! Making your audience shudder means they remember what you said. Or are permanently scarred by it. Same difference. After the jump, five ads that get their point across by evoking death, disfigurement, or sex crimes:

Us Weekly's lead story right now is a rather substance-free bit on Dallas Cowboy quarterback Tony Romo shopping for a birthday present for his girlfriend, pop tart Jessica Simpson. But Us is doing its best to drum up something better; a reporter sent a vaguely ominous letter to Romo's dad encouraging him to talk, because "Jessica Simpson's side is controlling the media right now." Which is actually very good reporting! Any journalist worth his paltry salary knows how to use veiled threats, scary insinuations, and bluffs (lies) to get reluctant sources to speak up. We've compiled a handy translation guide; how to decode the most common threatening reporter doublespeak, after the jump:

There's a huge exhibit at the New York Public Library right now called "The Real Men and Women of Madison Avenue," dedicated to the greatest examples of advertising ever. Funny that the public library is one of the few public spaces left that hasn't sold all its wall space to advertisers (we think-haven't been in a library since they invented the internet), but ads got in there through the back door anyhow! The educational back door. But we're going to save you the trip; after the jump, five classic ads from the exhibit that sum up everything the ad industry has ever taught us:

"I don't want to die. I love what I'm doing," said Viacom chief Sumner Redstone on CNBC yesterday. My, what a positive and also extremely sad quote! Coming from an old, old man like Redstone, it's more of a last-ditch prayer to Father Time than a peppy statement of on-the-job satisfaction. After the jump, a complete guide to the top five elderly figures in media moguldom. They're a cast that could end up having spent decades in power—probably because the younger counterparts who should be overtaking them decided to go into the tech industry on the West Coast instead (except Nick Denton). May these old men all live, um, a lot longer:

A deliciously bitter ex-NYT reporter named John Darnton, who worked at the paper for more than 30 years, has a book coming out called Black and White and Dead All Over, which is murder mystery set at a thinly veiled version of the Times. The terribly-titled (but maybe well-written!) volume features a bunch of obvious allusions to real Times people, including a standards editor who gets murdered (take that, standards). Droopy-faced News Corp. overlord Rupert Murdoch figures prominently as an ominous character named "Lester Moloch." But this isn't the first time Murdoch has been flogged in fictional works. Oh no!

A common complaint among the olds—which is absolutely valid—is that companies discriminate against hiring them in favor of the youngs, despite their greater experience. This is certainly true in HIP fields like media, fashion, and marketing, where young people are not only perceived as having skills better suited to our wild modern internet world, but also come cheaper. What are the olds to do? The Wall Street Journal (appropriately) has the answer for them: take rad rock star pics of yourself! That, and other tips for getting hired past your prime, after the jump:

Neatly encapsulating the prevailing foodie conventional wisdom, science-fearing New York Times contributor Michael Pollan has famously advised America to "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants." He also believes we should eat like our ignorant, backward ancestors ("Don't eat anything your great-great-grandmother wouldn't recognize as food") instead of like modern human beings. But as regular Gawker readers know, heavily-processed, contemporary American fast food has preserved an inordinate number of its inventors and purveyors well past any reasonable life expectancy. This morning's Times brings word of the death of hamburger chain founder Wilber Hardee at the ripe old age of 89. Granted, he was felled by a heart attack. But he joins no fewer than four other fast food pioneers who have kicked the bucket over the past six months at extraordinarily advanced ages:

Totally irrelevant newsweekly-turned-listicle-magazine US News & World Report brings you a straight-talking list of ten tips for managing an office full of 20-somethings, according to old business dude G.L. Hoffman. His pointers include "Add value," "Let them use their media," "They want standards," and "Expect varied, non-chain-of-command type communications." Whatever that means. As an actual 20-something, I'm communicating up G.L. Hoffman's chain of command that this list is straight up crapola. You are old and your advice is dorky, Mr. Hoffman! And too long—we 20-somethings have no attention span (or respect for our elders), due to drug use. After the jump, five real tips for managing an office full of 20-somethings, should you ever find yourself in such an unlucky position: