• Oprah's interview with Sarah Palin aired today, as you know by now. [AP]
• The deal between GE and Comcast to give the cable giant control of NBC Universal could be finalized in the next few days/weeks, although approval from Washington could take some time. [DF, THR, WSJ]
• Lou Dobbs didn't walk away from $9 million when he departed CNN. He reportedly got paid $8 million in severance to walk out the door. [NYP]
• The largest gay newspaper publisher in the U.S. has shuttered. [NYT]
• Budget Travel may be the magazine to die. [Daily Intel]
• The cost-cutting McKinsey consultants have landed at Dow Jones. [Forbes]
• 2012 destroyed the box office this weekend, reeling in $65 million. [THR]

Getting an editorial job at OK! Magazine has proven to be similar to riding a merry-go-round where you get your head chopped off after one go-round. That said, we'd like to welcome OK!'s new editorial boss! We hear many things.

A tipster forwarded us this adios note that a Newsweek employee sent out today. Apparently the recent layoffs aren't proceeding so smoothly.

In your flippant Friday media column: everyone's very excited about Time's "Person of the Year," as always, Playboy may be sold, fashion magazines stay positive, and CNN decides to waste less money.

Bloomberg, the new owner of Businessweek, is dumping Maria "Contractually Obligated to be called 'Money Honey'" Bartiromo from her gig as a BW columnist, Business Insider reports. That's not the worst decision in the world.

In your misogynist Thursday media column: a college man uses journalism to ensure every woman on campus hates him, the Hartford Courant is counterproductive, Stephen A. Smith is BACK, and Katie Couric makes a listicle.

Final tally: ad pages dropped 32% (or 8,359 pages) at Condé Nast in 2009.

• Lou Dobbs is leaving CNN! Tonight's his last show! Happy Wednesday! [NYT]
• Condé Nast magazines have lost a collective 8,359 pages of advertising in 2009, which represents a 31 percent decline from a year earlier. [NYT]
• One thing that Hearst has going for it: lots of cash in the bank. [NYP]
• Banker-turned-media investor Jimmy Finklestein is reportedly buying the Hollywood Reporter, Billboard, Adweek, and a few other Nielsen titles. [Wrap]
• Current TV is keeping current with the times and laying off 80 staffers. [LAT]
• TV: Joss Whedon's Dollhouse has been canceled by Fox; meanwhile, ABC has decided that Kelsey Grammer comedy series Hank will exist no longer.
• Détente? President Obama has agreed to give Fox News an interview. [HP]
• The New Yorker sure has lots of writers and editors! [NYO]
• Reality TV is slowly killing us. So says Vanity Fair's James Wolcott. [VF]

In your woebegone Wednesday media column: Hearst gets money, layoffs at Current TV, Conde Nast gets internet religion, and Sesame Street characters are the swing votes in Fox News' war for righteousness.

For the second time this decade, the New York Observer's cobbled together the TOP SECRET masthead of The New Yorker. It sure has a lot of people working for it! A numerical summary, below.

In your typical Tuesday media column: Americans are zombie slaves to various screens, journalists will compromise for money like everyone else in the world, Indymedia tells the Justice Department to fuck off, and your comically mean reporter of the day.

Another month, another glossy fashion magazine spread for Marissa Mayer, this time in Glamour. We get it, already: the Google veep is a computer scientist in Oscar de la Renta; a nerd invited to prom. Why embellish her achievements?

• Another magazine has gone under: Hachette announced today that it's closing Metropolitan Home to "focus its resources" on Elle Décor. [AdAge]
• New York's profile of star Times reporter Andrew Ross Sorkin reveals he's one of the paper's highest-paid staffers and is beloved by the titans of Wall Street, but is not quite as popular with some of his Times colleagues. [NYM]
• Circulation is down—and losses are up—at the New York Post. [NYT]
• GE and Comcast have agreed on a valuation for NBC, which brings the parties one step closer to handing over control of the network to Comcast. [Reuters]
• Condé Nast may be trimming expenses and cutting jobs here at home, but the mag giant is busy expanding its presence in China. [NYP]
• Curb Your Enthusiasm is coming to basic cable. TV Land and TV Guide have picked up reruns of the show and will begin airing them next year. [LAT]
• Google has acquired the mobile ad company AdMob for $750 million. [NYT]
• Last night's Mad Men scored AMC its highest-rated finale ever, although considering it's AMC we're talking about, that isn't saying much. [B&C]
• A Christmas Carol was No. 1 at the weekend box office, although its $31 million gross was weak given it cost $200 million to produce. Meanwhile, Precious' $1.8 million take on 18 screens set a limited-release record. [LAT]

In your meritocratic Monday media column: Reporters suffer injustices unseen since Pol Pot's darkest days, The Week guarantees goodness, Esquire has a gizmo thingamajig that will save magazines, and Conde Nast gives up on America, finally.

Hachette is folding Metropolitan Home magazine. Its December issue will be its last.

Si Newhouse (pictured, above) canceled Conde Nast's famous Christmas lunch for the second year in a row, and then—uh oh—then he hired a crisis management flack. Did Details dump toxic waste in Peru?

• Is Oprah preparing to leave her syndicated show behind and take her act to OWN, her long-delayed cable network? That's the rumor anyway. [DH]
• The new editor of the Observer is Kyle Pope, formerly of Portfolio. [NYO]
• Cable meets kindergarten: Fox News will stop being mean to MSNBC only if MSNBC first stops being mean to Fox News, reports Rupert Murdoch. [NYT]
• Fortune and Time are expected to be hardest hit by layoffs at Time Inc. [NYP]
• Scripps has beat out News Corp. for control of the Travel Channel. [BN]
• Susan Plagemann has been named the new publisher of Vogue. Meanwhile, Tom Florio will now oversee Vogue, Bon Appétit and Traveler. [WWD]
• Bloomberg BusinessWeek (or BBW for short) has its new team in place. [NYT]

In your thumping Thursday media column: Glenn Beck does not die on the operating table, more rumor-details on the Essence layoffs, Fortune and SI get hacked, and a dying newspaper goes glossy, for unknown reasons.

• The cuts continue at Time Inc. Fortune Small Business was shuttered today. And as many as 500 employees may lose their jobs when all is said and done. Meanwhile, parent company Time Warner reported a drop in revenues and earnings in the third quarter, as expected. [NYT, WWD, AdAge, NYP]
• Profits were up at News Corp. thanks to its film, cable, and book units. [BN]
• The publisher of Marie Claire has jumped over to Vogue. [NYO]
• Fox News came out on top in the ratings with its election night coverage. CNN performed miserably, dropping down to fourth place. [NYT, Politico]
• WNET is giving employees off between Christmas and New Year's. It's not to be nice; it's designed to cut costs since the days off are unpaid. [Crain's]
• A theory as to why Tom McGeveran quit the Observer. [Daily Intel]
• Highlights from last weekend's Tribeca Film Festival, Doha edition. [Vulture]

Time Inc. carnage: Eleven layoffs at Entertainment Weekly, Business Insider reports. Know more? Email us.