Mo’guls, Mo’ Problems

The Hollywood media was abuzz this weekend over the news that Dan Harmon was being replaced as showrunner of NBC’s Community. Not that the TV execs wanted it that way when they announced the news on Friday evening after most reporters had gone home.

But Harmon’s not the sort of fellow to go quietly. Via Tumblr, he swiftly responded to the network spin with his typical frankness.

On the news he will remain on the show as a consulting producer:

I am technically “signed on,” by default, to be an executive consulting something or other – which is a relatively standard protective clause for a creator in my position.  Guys like me can’t actually just be shot and left in a ditch by Skynet, we’re still allowed to have a title on the things we create and “help out,” like, I guess sharpening pencils and stuff.

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Launch a social media campaign that will build your brand and deliver results in our online Social Media Marketing Boot Camp starting June 7. Speakers include Abigail Cusick (Bravo Digital), Gregory Galant (Sawhorse Media), Alex Leo (Thomson Reuters Digital), Jim Tobin (Ignite Social Media), and many more. Read the reviews.

When AOL acquired Huffington Post last year, Arianna Huffington was given editorial control of the company’s online properties, including Patch, MovieFone, PopEater, and TechCrunch. Since taking the reigns, Huffington has folded websites and eliminated journalists’ jobs while increasing the practice of utilizing unpaid bloggers leaving her with a critic or two.

Now it’s Huffington’s turn to face a downsizing, in the form of her job duties. She will now be solely in charge of the Huffington Post, according to a report by The Washington Post.

Huffington says the change was her idea. “What I asked for is for us to be more independent, to have technology, marketing and [business development] now into Huffington Post, so that we can accelerate all our growth, and for me to be freed up to just concentrate exclusively on HuffPost,” she stated at a conference Thursday.

The Huffington Post is continuing to grow, with a current focus on international expansion and the launch of a live video streaming network.

Full disclosure: This fishie blogs for the Huffington Post.

Just when Oprah Winfrey perhaps needed him most, homeless LA resident “Eddie” has come to the public relations rescue of the embattled media mogul and her fellow OWN executives.

This recent encounter at Beverly Hills’ Montage Hotel could have so easily gone the other way. But instead, as reported by the New York Post’s Page Six, it has led to the best bit of feel-good OWN branding since the network’s lofty launch:

Oprah joined four OWN executives on the patio at chef Scott Conant’s Beverly Hills hot spot Scarpetta… Spies say a passerby then approached, pleading, “Oprah can you help a homeless guy get a bowl of soup, please?”

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Matthew Inman of The Oatmeal breaks it down for us. The comic below is from Inman’s highly educational This Is The Web Right Now series, which also shares insights on Google +, Instagram, and Valve.

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The newspaper formerly known as the San Diego Union-Tribune just debuted phase two of its reinvention as a multi-media company: UT-TV. The U-T‘s newsroom will soon have a fully functional television station smack in the middle of it. So… how about that promo video?

Interestingly, sports radio host Scott Kaplan looks like he’ll be playing a major role at UT-TV. Which is a bit surprising since he publicly blamed the Union-Tribune for getting him fired from his last job at XX 1090 Sports.

Not sure if this is a score for the little guys, or just a big FU to the big guy, but either way we feel pretty good about it. U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Kevin Carey ruled this week that Sam Zell is officially last on the Tribune Company’s list of creditors as it emerges from Chapter 11 status–behind $759 million worth of claims from other holders of “Phones” notes.

From the Wall Street Journal:

Mr. Zell put only $315 million of his own money at risk in the deal. In recent litigation, his investment venture attempted to get equal footing with other low-ranking creditors when it comes to sharing recovery, on the basis of a claim for $225 million. The attempt failed.

Judge Carey’s conclusions, issued Monday in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Wilmington, Del., set the stage for a June 7 effort by the media company to win confirmation of a Chapter 11 plan and get out of bankruptcy after more than three years.

Couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy. Too bad someone couldn’t have put Zell in his place before he destroyed one of the most important media empires in America.

There has arguably never been a more dramatic juxtaposition at a Hollywood movie press junket and premiere event than the one that recently took place in London for the unveiling of the 3D version of Titanic. There was director James Cameron, explaining to reporters that he almost didn’t make it because of his record-setting dive to the Mariana Trench a few days earlier.

In terms of coverage of Cameron the explorer, the best outlet remains that of his scientific partner, National Geographic. In the magazine’s latest Web exclusive, the king of the underworld talked about his desire to return to the seven-mile bottom as well as his very measured view of the inevitable excursion glitches:

“The thing that I know from my experience of diving … is that unless you’re running a tourist sub that does the same dive every day, day in day out, you’re going to have technical problems.”

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When Nicholas Kristof of the New York Times starting asking questions about Goldman Sachs’s partial ownership of Village Voice Media, the investment firm got nervous. Village Voice Media, parent company of the LA Weekly, also owns Backpage.com, a site that’s taken some heat for running “escort ads” selling trafficked women and children. By Friday, Goldman Sachs had sold its 16% stake in the company.

And that, as Yosemite Sam would say, makes them lily-livered cowards.

If Goldman Sachs gave a damn about victims of sex trafficking, they would have used their 16% influence to shut down the adult services ads. Instead, the firm just attempted to cover their own ass by selling as fast as they could.

As Kristof himself noted, Goldman Sachs owned a significant chunk of the company for over six years, and served on the board for four. He writes, “There’s no indication that Goldman or anyone else ever used its ownership to urge Village Voice Media to drop escort ads or verify ages. Elizabeth L. McDougall, chief counsel for Village Voice Media, told me Friday that she was “unaware of any dissent” from owners.”

And why would owners object? The adult services section of Backpage.com takes in approximately $25 million a year. Goldman Sachs pocketed their blood money, then ducked out to avoid bad press.

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On March 8, Edmonton Journal reporter Cam Cole took a shot at former Oilers NHL hockey team owner Peter Pocklington in an article about the current movements of NFL star quarterback Peyton Manning. The third paragraph reads:

Pocklington, basically a small-timer trying to play with the big boys of NHL ownership, couldn’t afford to do that, couldn’t possibly make an exception even for the game’s most exceptional player without having his entire financial house of cards collapse.

Today, in the same newspaper, Pocklington responds, from Palm Desert, California. In his Op Ed, the former Oilers owner says his other businesses were not failing at the time he chose to trade Wayne Gretzky to the Los Angeles Kings. Rather, he insists it was only the operations of the NHL team that were challenged. Writes Pocklington:

Someone reading this might wonder why I bother to respond. Truthfully, I don’t have a problem with the fact sportswriters disapprove of me trading Wayne Gretzky 24 years ago, although I might suggest that’s a long time to hold a grudge.

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Sam Zell has been relatively quiet in the past year or so; his years of bravado helming the Tribune Company almost seem like a distant memory. Errr…almost.

You knew that couldn’t last.

Bloomberg reports that Zell officially wants a piece of all monies won by unsecured creditors in the Tribune bankruptcy case–including those of former employees.

The demand, made through the Zell-controlled company EGI TRB LLC, came in one of the disputes being heard in bankruptcy court over how to split any money creditors win in dozens of lawsuits over claims the buyout was a fraud on creditors. U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Kevin Carey began a two-day hearing today about the disputes.

“In the ultimate display of chutzpah, Zell and EGI are asserting that their tainted claims should now be treated on par with innocent creditors who had nothing to do with the LBO,” a group of about 185 retired managers and other highly paid former employees said in court papers.

We’d like to commend the group of former employees for their “ultimate display” of restraint in forgoing the use of any four-letter words in describing Zell.