Media

It's quitting time at Blackbook.

On the heels of the major departures of its managing editor and photo director, Blackbook has now lost its publisher, Joe Landry.

Mr. Landry is returning to his old stomping grounds and will become group publisher of both Out magazine and The Advocate, replacing Jay Adams, who was fired earlier this week. Mr. Landry worked with both Out and The Advocate for years before he ditched them for Blackbook two years ago.

"It's an opportunity to go back to the brand that I built," said Mr. Landry to Media Mob. "The new owners are very passionate about the brands that I bought."

"We’ve been bought by a company that primarily deals with television and film and therefore lacks some of the experience in publishing that Joe will bring to the company when he returns," said Aaron Hicklin, the editor of Out, in an interview. Last month, Out and The Advocate were purchased by Regent Publishing for the tiny sum of $6 million (five times less than what they were purchased for 2.5 years ago).

And so what in the world is happening at Blackbook? Within the last month, the magazine has lost both its managing editor, Una LaMarche, and its photo director, Shannon Hall.

Journalista: The Comics Journal Weblog is reporting that Will Elder, the famed illustrator and one of the founders of Mad Magazine, has died at 86. (This comes via boing boing.) Elder was considered a major influence on artists like Robert Crumb and Daniel Clowes.  read more »

CBS has just announced plans to acquire online media company, CNET, in a deal worth $1.8 billion.

The press release says: "The acquisition will make CBS one of the 10 most popular Internet companies in the United States, with a combined 54 million unique users per month, and approximately 200 million users worldwide."

Most of you probably know CNET.com, the Web site that breaks news about online and tech industries.

They're also the purveyors of ZDNet, GameSpot.com, TV.com, mp3.com, CNET news.com, UrbanBaby, CHOW, Search.com, BNET, MySimon and TechRepublic.

Full press release after the jump, and thanks to PaidContent.org, where we first read the news (you can find some more analysis of the deal there, and we'll come back to this when we've had a chance to think it through a bit).  read more »

The Media Mob has learned that longtime New York Times editor Mike Oreskes is leaving the company for the Associated Press.

Mr. Oreskes, who is currently the editor of the Times-owned International Herald Tribune, has been working in one capacity or another under the Times umbrella for the past 27 years. Before he took his position as executive editor of IHT in 2005, he was the deputy managing editor of The Times for Bill Keller, and an assistant managing editor under Howell Raines before that.

At the AP, he'll become the managing editor of the wire service's U.S. News department, a newly created department there.

Update! AP has confirmed our report with a press release. Follow the jump to read it ...  read more »

And another one drops at the Washington Post! Michael Calderone at Politico is reporting that legendary writer David Broder is the latest to take a buyout from the paper, though he'll remain on contract. The 78-year-old Broder told Calderone there were two reasons he's leaving: (1) he can get off the newsroom budget, and help them save a little dough and (2) they're giving him a "generous" package.

So with chief editor Leonard Downie apparently days away from taking a buyout of his own, and with loudmouth, thin-skinned Tony Kornheiser also taking one, let's do a quick round-up of everyone else. The rule of the land is you can only take a buyout at the paper if you're older than 50.

Patrick Gavin at Fishbowl DC has been doing an almost daily round-up lately, and here's our best attempt at compiling what they have confirmed:

Kathy Legg
Don Podesta (AME/Copy Desk)
Sue Anne Pressley
Joe Elbert (former AME/Photo)
JoEllen Murphy (Art Director, HOME)
David Broder
Tony Kornheiser
Linton Weeks
Mike Keegan
Deb Heard (AME/Style)
Steve Fehr (Assistant Virginia editor)
John Pancake
Belle Elving
Anne Groer.
Walter Nicholls
Peter Carlson
Bill O'Brian
Tom Ricks
K.C. Summers
Desson Thompson
Eve Zibart
Richard Harrington
Tamara Jones
Susan Schmidt
Tim Page
Maralee Schwartz

Ann Gerhart is not taking the buyout.

Gene Weingarten is not taking the buyout.

And Peter Baker left for the Times Magazine after his wife, editor Susan Glasser, was fired.
More here.

• 0 comments

Fashion Week Daily has confirmed that Nina Garcia has accepted an offer from Hearst Corporation and will be joining Marie Claire as its new fashion director in the fall. Meanwhile rumors about Marie Claire replacing Elle as Project Runway's sponsor still have not been confirmed, but a source tells FWD that "negotiations are just starting, if even that," and that Ms. Garcia's hire at the magazine is "completely separate from Marie Claire's possible interest in Project Runway."

An official announcement from Hearst is expected by the end of the week.

The rumors are running wild in D.C. that sometime later this week, Post editor Leonard Downie will take a buyout and step down. A short-list of candidates is making its way around, and Michael Calderone at Politico sizes it up.

Calderone believes it's likely that newly-named publisher Katherine Weymouth will go outside the paper to find Downie's replacement, and his list includes: Newsweek editor Jon Meacham, ousted Wall Street Journal managing editor Marcus Brauchli, former Post managing editor Steve Coll, New Orleans Times-Picayune editor Jim Amoss, and New York Times Washington bureau chief Dean Baquet.

Calderone reports that Meacham has met with Weymouth, but then such a meeting isn't really unusual-sounding considering the business partnership between the Post and Newsweek.

Dean Baquet, meanwhile, denies rumors that he's a candidate himself. “I know that's a rumor, but it isn't true,” he said to Calderone.

As for Marcus Brauchli, at least within the Journal, they think he's got a good shot at getting the job.

Who is Rivka Galchen, M.D.? The author of Atmospheric Disturbances, which according to Leon Neyfakh is, "a winding, psychological quest story involving weather control, quantum theory, and an intricately calibrated, radically counterintuitive conception of space and time..." She also may be the new Thomas Pynchon. PLUS: The return of Mark Leyner.

Choire Sicha bravely asks, "Why can’t men write anymore?" According to Mr. Sicha, "A little penis, it turns out, can be a dangerous thing. But it’s not crazy at all to feel bad for the young male writers of our time, despite all they have done to us with their books. There are these legends that loom; all women, all terrifying."  read more »

From the department of News You May Have Expected From an Unexpected Source, Perez Hilton has posted a press release announcing that Bonnie Fuller, AMI's Executive Vice President, Chief Editorial Director is stepping down from her management role as of May 14 and will become "editor-at-large" of AMI's Star magazine.  read more »

In an inevitable, perhaps even overdue collision of reality and lifestyle, this morning MTV announced it has green-lighted the 21st season of The Real World. It will be filmed in Brooklyn, the reigning home turf of post-teen drama, and broadcast in 13 one-hour episodes in early 2009. No word yet regarding in which neighborhood the attention-seeking hopefuls will reside and manufacture identity-based conflict. We are hoping for the corner of Smith and Carroll but will also settle for Bedford and North Sixth. We would also like to see The Real World: East New York, where things start getting really real, and surely City Councilman Charles Barron of that neighborhood would assist with locations. God speed, young funny-haired applicants.  read more »