· If companies like Time Warner are serious about a commitment to new media, then why can't Peter Bart get someone from TW on the phone who knows how to work his fucking TiVo? [Variety]
· In signing a new overall deal with CBS Paramount Network Television, CSI executive producer Ann Donahue reveals the softer side of CBS Corp.'s future galactic despot Les Moonves: "'Over the summer I had a family member (hospitalized) in grave condition,' Donahue said. 'Leslie, Nancy and Nina called me and not only offered their help, but they cut through a lot of red tape and saved a life. I will be at CBS for as long as they want me.'" [THR]
· NewsCorp is finalizing a deal to bring MySpace to China, but will have to make concessions to the government to bring the site in compliance with local regulations, like limiting each user to a single person in their friendspace (female friend requests must be immediately deleted) and requiring all profile comment to be approved by the Glorious Chinese Emoticon And LOL Censorship Board. [THR]
· Grey's Anatomy, which will finish the week as the number one non-Idol program on television, shows no ill Nielsen effects from the post-Globes Isaiah Washington fiasco, meaning that the slur-happy actor will probably still have a job once he completes his stint in network-ordered GayHab. [Variety]

• Maria Bartiromo: too palsy with her subjects. [NYT]
  

• Keith Kelly gets the "exclusive": Time Warner is selling its Time 4 Media properties to the Bonnier Group for a sum considerably less than the $300 million they wanted. Tough break for AdAge, which had the story yesterday but pulled it. [NYP]
  

• "Time Inc. has selected Stockholm's Bonnier Group as the winner of the auction for the right to buy 18 of Time Inc.'s magazines. There was no immediate word on the price that Bonnier will pay, but the terms are in place and a deal should close within a month." That's what AdAge said, but then they pulled it. So who knows? [AdAge]
  

• Remeber The Politico, that Allbritton politics website thing that hired away pretty much every decent political print reporter? It's live. [The Politico]
  

• Broad and Burkle talk to Tribune directors, who may not sell the company after all. Great, that's six months of our lives wasted. [LAT]
  

No need to panic, Hanks/Roberts fans and Universal executives! The above-the-title talent wasn't even on set when that anonymous special effects assistant was critically injured, greatly reducing the chance of the bodily harm seemingly threatened in the above headline supplied by the website of Toledo's News Leader. To their credit, they seem to have run the rest of the AP wire report unaltered, refraining from trying to create an additional hook for the story of the tragically injured assistant by combining it with the recent news that Hanks is currently the second most popular movie star in America and Roberts one of its richest famous ladies.

• Apparently, there were some layoffs at Time Inc. yesterday. [NYP]
  

• The axe falls today at Time Inc. Send your memos and stories here and we'll share them with the world. [NYP]
  

• Another hour of "Today" just means more Al Roker to love. And, you know, Ann Curry. [WSJ]
  

MediaPost's TV Board offers up a pretty interesting piece on the difficulties in accurately measuring television ratings and how the industry itself has very little idea as to how people actually consume the media. We were cruising along and enjoying the thing fairly well until we hit this:

• The Times takes a look at prospective Tribune buyers Eli Broad and Ron Burkle. The latter is "best known for his friendship with Stephen Bing, the film producer who fathered a child with both the actress Elizabeth Hurley and Kirk Kerkorian's former wife, Lisa." [NYT]
  

• Time layoffs: Here's who's already gone. [Mediaweek]
  

• Next week is layoff week at Time Inc. Also, every week thereafter. [WWD]
  

• Nobody watched "I'm From Rolling Stone." [WWD]
  

If we were a newspaper cartoonist drawing a cartoon about the state of the newspaper industry, we would currently be sketching another nail being driven into a coffin that we had helpfully labeled "newspaper industry." E&P reports:

• Conrad Black allegedly "engaged in insider trading and used anonymous Internet postings to pump his company's flagging stock." Say what you will about the guy, he's not afraid to get his fingers dirty. [NYP]
  

• Ravelston, the company through which Conrad Black controlled Hollinger International, plead out to fraud. [Guardian]
  

• What with everyone and their assistant editor decamping to that Allbritton online venture, the Times takes a closer look. And, at a quarter of a million dollars going to the two top slots, who wouldn't jump? [NYT]
  

• Ann Moore is about to fire about 150 of Time's people of the year. [NYP]