Former LA Times staffer Scott Feinberg has just been picked up by The Hollywood Reporter to front the trade’s awards season coverage. Feinberg will be THR‘s awards season blogger and analyst–a job he’s quite familiar with. Feinberg was the author of  “The Feinberg Files” blog on the Times‘ “The Envelope” award season website. He left in 2009 to run his own site ScottFeinberg.com. He’ll now report to THR.com editor Joseph Kapsch.

Feinberg is the second former “Envelope” blogger to join THR in as many weeks. THR poached Patrick Day away from the Times just last week.  Both bloggers arrive in the midst of a complete revamping of the trade’s awards blog “The Race.” THR promises a re-launch of the blog in the coming weeks.

A man climbed up to the “A” of the KTLA tower last night, shutting down traffic on Sunset as police tried to get him down. He was eventually arrested. He later told police he climbed the tower because he “had a message to deliver.”

Yahoo! is about to make a big jump into the entertainment business. The Internet behemoth is poised to launch a slate of new TV-style shows, reports Variety–including one by Oscar-nominated documentarian Morgan Spurlock. Niecy Nash and Judy Greer will also be among a group of new hosts helming original shows online.

From Variety:

[Spurlock] will host and produce “The Failure Club,” which follows 10 adults as they try to get past their fear of failure and take on various challenges, such as a banker looking to break into standup comedy.

Greer, a character actor best known for comedic roles, hosts “Healthy Gal: A Work in Progress,” which takes a lighthearted approach toward exploring how best to stay fit while on the road.

Nash, meanwhile, will host a comedic, relationship-oriented show called “Let’s Talk About Love.” The topics of each show will apparently be mined from Yahoo!’s massive trove of user-gathered data.

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In 1993, The Player was a Golden Globe winner for Best Feature, Musical or Comedy. In 2001, one of the HFPA awards show honors went to Gene Hackman for his portrayal of Royal Tenenbaum.

Now, courtesy of Alex Ben Block in this week’s Hollywood Reporter magazine, we have a detailed breakdown of the royal Tinseltown ruckus at the center of an ongoing legal dispute between Dick Clark Productions (DCP) and the Hollywood Foreign Press Association over rights to the organization’s lucrative annual awards show. DCP claims that contracts from those two above-mentioned years are key:

DCP says the contract language, which grants it rights to produce the Globes “for any extensions, renewals, substitutions or modifications of the NBC agreement,” means it can work on the telecast as long as it remains on NBC. The company argues that it single-handedly built the Globes into the international showbiz event it has become, more than justifying its perpetual rights.

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Lit journal Slake throws a big to-do every time they launch a new issue, and the events are becoming something of a staple with the local literati. Friday night the mag took over the Atwater Crossing courtyard to celebrate issue #3, and FishbowlLA braved the weekend’s heatwave to work the crowd.

More pics from Friday’s festivities after the jump.

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It doesn’t get much stranger in terms of small town Southwestern newspaper coverage than the recent back-and-forth reported by the Arizona Republic about efforts to stage a U.S. style “running of the bulls” event this October in Cave Creek.

“Running with the Bulls USA” is the brainchild of Phil Immordino, a professional golf focused author, media personality, and motivational speaker. He wants to pick up where previous Pamplona-like stateside events in Mesquite, Nevada (1998-99) and Scottsdale (2002) left off, within the confines of a friend’s private arena. But the bull has now hit the fan.

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Forget the iPad. Researchers at this Fishie’s alma matter, Tulane, may have figured out a way to reinvigorate the newspaper industry–by using bacteria to convert old newspapers into butanol, a biofuel alternative to gasoline.

From CNET:

The bacteria, dubbed “TU-103,” was found when the folks in David Mullin’s lab in Tulane’s Department of Cell and Molecular Biology were weeding through the contents of some animal droppings one day. It turned out to be some lucky scat–TU-103 is believed to be the first bacterial strain from nature that produces butanol directly from cellulose, an organic matter found in everything from paper to Caesar salads.

Adult contemporary radio station KOST 103.5 FM fired longtime on-air personality Bryan Simmons on Friday evening, immediately following his regular weekday broadcast. Simmons, who was first hired by the station in 1982, was taken by surprise. He told the OC Register: “It’s been like a death in the family and feels very final this time. I’m still going through the process in my head, and it ain’t pretty.”

More from the OC Register:

Christine Martindale is replacing Simmons this week from 2 to 7 p.m., e-mailed KOST Program Director Stella Prado. Overall, KOST is usually in the top 5 among all stations in the Los Angeles-Orange County market.

In related news, DJ Kari Steele is returning to KOST after a decade at sister station KBIG 104.3 FM.

At the beginning of August, YouTube announced an official, curated Johnny Carson channel. For fans of the late night maestro, this was welcome news.

While 35,000+ channel views (and 2.2 million video clicks) at press time may seem a tad disappointing, the truth is that Johnny’s core audience has many other ways to revisit the master at work, including several massive DVD collections. In a recently uploaded Steve Martin bit from 1989, the comedian shares diary entries about his previous on-air experiences with the “sluggish” Johnny:

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In this week’s episode of 5 Things You Need to Know This Week, we give a lesson on human reproduction, talk about the U.S. Open, sit down with Julian Assange, and, oh yeah, cover that Irene thing everyone’s been talking about.

For more videos, check out Mediabistro.tv, and be sure to follow us on Twitter: @mediabistroTV