Finke: Huffington Post ‘Blows’

It almost feels like a ritual: Major Hollywood media figure makes big play, Nikki Finke tears into major Hollywood media figure. So, Finke’s hot-off-the-press web column blasting Huffington is predictable, yet deeply satisfying, like the climax of a Greek tragedy. I’m tempted not to excerpt, because I don’t want to deny anyone the bracing pleasure of reading the piece straight through. But here are the bullet-points:

- David Geffen never wanted to be involved and had to have his people “quietly tell Huffington to stop using his name as bait in her less-than-successful effort to fund the blog with Hollywood money.”

- Huffington didn’t tell her Hollywood pals that celeb-gadfly Andrew Breitbart would be running the content side, and they got upset when they found out.

- Despite public protestations to the contrary, Huffington pitched the site to investors as a Drudge-antidote.

- Various shenanigans were involved in the raising of capital.

- Best of all:

When I asked Huffington about these and the other problems that befell her during the blog’s planning, she kept trying to change the subject, especially when the conversation focused on her blogmeister, Breitbart. Finally, she resorted to a different ploy: She extended an invitation to me to join her blog. (“When we were conceiving this, we said to each other, ‘Do you think we could we get Nikki Finke?’”)

The funny thing is, Nikki Finke is exactly what the Huffington Post needs, as far as I can tell from Day One. Wouldn’t all the narcissistic chattering be a more interesting read with some internal heckling?

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