L.A. is still in the running for the 2016 OIympic Games. The U.S. Olympic Committee ruled out Philadelphia and Houston. And L.A. now just has to beat out San Francisco and Chicago to be presented to the IOC as the U.S. contender.

USOC Chairman Peter Ueberroth said, “of the three cities that were selected today, there are none that have an acceptable program that we could take to the International Olympic Committee. None.”

San Francisco and Chicago don’t have the right venues. And L.A.’s problem? We’re guessing we’d never pass the drug test.

<Coldplay? Oh! We Get It:
We were watching the trailer to Oliver Stone’s World Trade Center, wondering, “Why does this suck?” Now we know why.

The Day the (Illegal File-Sharing of) Music Died: The music industry and Kazaa reached a settlement, calling for Kazaa to pay $115 million to the recording industry and introduce filtering technologies to ensure that users can no longer share copyrighted music, film or software files.

Across the planet, file-swappers shrug and booted up BitTorrent.

Further Proof that the Future is Online: For the first time, a major studio brokered a syndication deal with the Internet.

And what did they use as their maiden sale? One of the best shows to ever air, Arrested Development.

True, Fox was constrained by the fact that the show filmed only half the number usually needed for a TV syndication deal. But we still maintain that all the best stuff is going online. Save this post, and in three years, you can call us geniuses.

Every now and then, we get a press release that just jumps out of the in-box. Such is this from the 1947 Project crew.

Was someone kidnapped, murdered or tarred and feathered on your special day?
Do you share a birthday with a serial killer? Is your wedding day also the anniversary of a notable execution? Crimebo the Crime Clown has the skinny, and he’ll share it with his unique brand of morbid glee.

I think to get your money’s worth from Crimebo, you need to pick an especially good day. Today, for
example would be a good day for Crimebo, if you really love French history.

We here at Fishbowl LA are declaring an official ban on celebrities seeking medical attention for thirst or exhaustion. If you’re hopped up on goofballs and wrapped in plastic, don’t tell us you’re dehydrated. Also, no one in Hollywood is ever again allowed to make a big deal about being gay. It’s 2006. We don’t care.

Los Angeles will no longer be a dustry little backwater as of August 3rd. The Los Angeles edition of The Onion will be available at over a thousand locations, according to the press kit. The initial run is only 50,000 copies–less than the Twin Cities (of Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota). So we’re not as hip as the home of Ole and Lena ? Don’t they know who we are?

We wonder if Zach Braff understands how important this is. Scrubs creator Bill Lawrence is slated to direct Fletch Won the prequel to the recite-every-line-by-heart-cult-favorite Fletch films. And he’s bringing along his sidekick and shining star Braff to fill Chevy Chase’s shoes.

These are big, big shoes.

Sure, like Fletch, Braff went to Northwestern University. And, like Fletch, Braff has pretended to be a doctor. But does he have the chops to appease the fanboys, who have been hungry for something to blog about since Phantom Menace?

Lawrence promises that he’s going to try hard “not to screw this up.” We’re hoping Braff does the same.

The sooner all Hollywood writers have WGA contracts, the better. Since reality shows are so cheap to produce, the networks keep throwing them at a cringing audience, hoping something will stick.

CBS has a pilot The Singing Office (why not Karaoke Office?), based, of course, on an existing show (in this case Dutch, and all those feeble Dutch treat jokes). EP Laurie Girion claims she’s looking at it

as a comedy show with music at its core, not than just another music competition show

Because we all know how lame those shows are.

And you’re not safe at home either–A & E is inflicting Rocco DiSpirito on the food-perplexed. Can’t figure out romantic dinner for two? Rocco will help out. Oh joy.

A & E ordered the pilot from 44 Blue Prods, producers of another series–Designing Blind. Designer Eric Bru-Slangard is an interior designer who can’t see the living rooms he’s re-doing, much less his own series. Which makes him one up on the viewers.

The only bright spot in all this is KAOS Entertainment’s America’s Cutest Puppy for WE. But I don’t get it–when the puppy is cast, it’s cute, right? But by air time, isn’t there a big risk that it won’t be as cute? I predict a huge wave of puppies lying about their age.

Any Place But Here: Film, television and commercial shoots on L.A.. streets have dropped 6.8% during the second quarter as TV production slows down and other states lure crews away with better incentives. Twice as many TV pilots this year were shot outside L.A. as last year.

If this keeps up, how will kids in Iowa know what Calabasas looks like?

Responding this sobering thought, the Los Angeles City Council Tuesday “approved a proposal pushed by Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa to waive fees for film and TV production taking place on most city-owned property.” Which is nice, seeing how virtually everyone else already does this.

Yippee-Ki-Yay, Mr. Falcon: Determined to go down fighting, Hollywood is pressing ahead with its sure-to-fail $300 million campaign aimed at teaching parents how to keep their kids from watching objectionable TV shows — in other words, how to be parents.

A Note of Triumph:
Cinemax on Thursday will broadcast the documentary On a Note of Triumph: The Golden Age of Norman Corwin that recounts the legendary V-E Day broadcast. The film, which won an Academy Award this year in the short documentary category, highlights just how far we’ve come from the poetry and power of radio to the meaninglessness of broadcast news. In fact, don’t watch this. It’ll just depress you. We’re sure there’s a Laguna Beach marathon on somewhere instead.

April Winchell causes trouble just by showing up. The voice of Cruella De Vil is now a finalist in the The Memorists Collective Get Published Contest. and some MySpacers aren’t pleased. April, whose voice is very familiar if you watch many cartoons, seems to have ticked off some other contestants by writing well and getting votes, the sneaky bitch.

The Collective was started by published authors Hillary Carlip, Josh Kilmer-Purcell, Maria Dahvana Headley, and Danielle Trussoni who all bonded on Myspace. Eager to drag more innocents into the hell of the book tour, the Collective’s stated mission is to introduce good writing to the right people.
And that’s pretty much the problem with April–she’d rather meet the wrong people.

The ever-gallant Tony Piece takes gossipy Perez Hilton to task for jumping the gun on People’s Lance Bass story. Or raher for how Perez told the story. It’s not gentlemanly, complains the LAist.
But calling Kathy Griffin a hag is well within the bounds of acceptable behavior, as it turns out.