Rachel Sklar Available for All Your Quoting NeedsThere’s already been much ado about Charlie Gibson’s refusal to play along with Stephen Colbert’s goofy “WristStrong” campaign, and the Times article that exposed the mini-controversy. Colbert asked the Gibson and Katie Couric and Brian Williams to wear bracelets on air in order to raise awareness of “wrist violence,” and Katie and Brian, the fun anchors, are playing along. In the article Huffington Post media editor Rachel Sklar said their participation shows “good humor” and “humanity,” and then Portfolio blogger Jeff Bercovici jumped on her for it — pointing out that the whole reason people like hearing the news from Charlie Gibson is because he isn’t fun, he’s serious. But our question is why was blogger Rachel Sklar quoted as a TV news expert in the first place? Why not someone with experience in the biz who could lend more insight — or an insider? Because the article was written by young Brian Stelter, a.k.a. the wunderkind behind the blog TVNewser, that’s why. Before he was recently hired by the Gray Lady, he was Sklar’s co-worker and buddy at Mediabistro. Silly Stetler — you can’t just quote your friends. This is the Times, not the Observer!
Two Out of Three Anchors Join Colbert in Wrist Stunt [NYT]
Charlie Gibson Only Cool in the Ratings [Mixed Media]
company town
Dow Jones, Mediabistro Play ‘Let’s Make a Deal’MEDIA
• The Dow Jones board approved Murdoch’s bid, but two of the four Bancrofts on the board refused to take part. The family is expected to meet Monday to begin deliberations. [NYT]
• Jupitermedia bought Mediabistro.com for $23 million, causing critics to smell a tech bubble. [NYT]
• The new issue of Portfolio will be out soon, and rumor has it that editor Joanne Lipman is ignoring Condé protocol by poaching other books’ staff. [WWD]
company town
Charney’s Lawyers Toss Around Casual Nazi ReferencesLAW
• One of Aaron Charney’s lawyers accuses Sullivan & Cromwell of having “adopted Dr. Mengele’s techniques to torture the facts and law of this case.” [Above the Law]
• More than twenty lawyers filed an objection against the $125-apiece BAR/BRI settlement. [National Law Journal]
• Summer associates at Pillsbury Winthrop practiced researching things in books this week. Next week: writing briefs by hand. [Law Blog/WSJ]
it just happened
Ann Shoket Named ‘Seventeen’ Editor, Despite Midwifing MediabistroThe Hearst Corporation — whose cafeteria, we’ll point out now that we’ve finally been to it, can kick the ass of Condé Nast’s Frank Gehry bauble any day of the week — today announced a new editor-in-chief for Seventeen, the teen title Atoosa Rubenstein abandoned in November for this newfangled Internet. (Indeed, Atoosa’s new venture was announced with a MySpace page, and she now has a whopping 42,487 MySpace friends; Seventeen has only 33,304.) The new Seventeen editor is Ann Shoket, who has been executive editor of Hearst’s CosmoGirl! Before that, Shoket was editorial director of CosmoGirl!’s Website, which was no doubt seen as a big plus by Hearst execs. But, then, people might want to think more carefully about the value of Internet experience: As we learned in August 2005, Shoket also “has the distinction of having come up with the idea for the original mediabistro.com web site way back in 1997.” What, Cathie Black must now be wondering, hath Shoket wrought?