The third installment of our 2006 Summer Media Preview features some of the sharpest media minds young and old, including a Jossiper, Dealbreaker and “public intellectual.”

Here’s what they’re up to this summer:

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For FishbowlNY readers stuck in the city for the July 3rd holiday:

WHEN I DIE
directed by Wayne Ewing
60 min 2005 USA English Color
East Coast Premiere

Hunter S. Thompson stated in a 1978 interview that he wanted a 150 foot obelisk built in his backyard from which his ashes would be shot five hundred feet into the air over his beloved Owl Farm in Woody Creek, Colorado. When I Die documents the construction of the good doctor’s Gonzo Monument and the trials, tribulations & triumphs of his elaborate funeral production.

FIRST & THIRD MONDAY of Every Month @ 7pm FREE!
Brooklyn Independent Cinema Series
Barbes
376 9th St (at Sixth Ave)
Park Slope, Brooklyn
subway: F to Seventh Ave

Brooklyn Independent Cinema Series

Of late, we can barely be bothered to read the ever-thinning New York Press, which has become a shadow of its former self. But it was hard not to pick up this week’s issue, with its three somewhat-naked people on the cover and the tagline “The New Underground Monogamy.” Had we missed a major trend here? Since when has monogamy had to go into hiding?

A look inside at the article assured us we hadn’t been missing out on the “next cool thing” by gleefully flitting from one New Yorker to the next these past months. Turns out the piece is really not about monogamy at all, but a contrived trend piece about sex parties that are allegedly attracting “faithful” monogamous couples. And (whew!) near the bottom we find out that “rigid monogamy is as outdated as homophobia.”

Despite its poor case that swinging is any more a trend today than it was in the past (um, Plato’s pimpage?), the cover will likely generate a little single-issue bump for the Press — a couple fewer bales of unread papers to send back to pulp — as the city’s undersexed pore through the article to try and find out how to get to said parties. And hey, maybe it’ll even attract some more hooker ads.

While attempting some mild research on Star Jones, we found ourselves on Jones’ Web site — or, as she calls it, “the only dictionary that defines me.” But unless you’re willing to give Jones and/or her Webmaster your e-mail address — this dictionary is nothing more than a flash intro. You can’t even view her bio — making it about as useful as TimesSelect.

EARLIER: Video: Star Jones On Larry King
Star On Barbara On Today: She’s Still In My Heart

As you may have heard, the film version of A Devil Wears Prada opens today, facing box-office competition from another journalism-related film, Superman. As such, the Christian Broadcasting Network points us its review of Superman (“You don’t have to dig too deeply to realize that Superman is obviously a Christ-figure”) but we were more interested in its review of A Stich In Time, which, judging by its book cover and tagline (“Dee Decker is out to prove that a middle-aged Christian woman can be faithful, fashionable, and fabulous”) might be Christianity’s answer to Anna Wintour.

Which would give new meaning to the “blood” used for those PETA fur protests, now wouldn’t it?

EARLIER: The Devil Won’t See You Now

Parisian lawmakers want your iPod to be compatible with Napster.

Via AP:

PARIS (AP) — French lawmakers gave final approval Friday to legislation that could force Apple Computer Inc. to make its iPod and iTunes Music Store compatible with rivals’ music players and online services. Both the Senate and the National Assembly, France’s lower house, voted in favor of the copyright bill, which some analysts said could cause Apple Computer Inc. and others to pull their music players and online download stores from France.

The vote was the final legislative step before the bill becomes law — barring the success of a last-ditch constitutional challenge filed last week by the opposition Socialists.

Apple had called the bill “state-sponsored piracy” earlier this year.

• Tabloid Wars: Is almost here. [E&P]
• Bush Times: House’s condemnation of media. [NYT]
• Edge: Time Inc. quietly “testing” new title. [NYP]
• ‘Terri Schiavo Moment’: The Times and First Amendment need one, says William Powers. [National Journal]
• Confirm: USA Today can’t, as far accuracy of details of its NSA story go. [USA Today]
  

Bucky Turco‘s Animal refuses to die. Err, “grovel like Radar.” Having “finally scraped enough money together” to print issue #7 — the “Wildlife” issue to be released this weekend — Animal depicts Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie on its cover as a bird and full-lipped rhino, respectively. Turco and co. also use the occasion to coin the term “celebimal,” with Paris Hilton, George Clooney and Lindsay Lohan reimagined as human-animal hybrids.

Turco, however, grovels in another way: “As part of what we hope to be a spin off gimmicky marketing angle, we are asking for a $1 donation via pay pal if people download the PDF version (and happen to like it).”

Turco’s e-mail announcement of the issue:

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Yusef Jackson — the latest in the line Maer Roshan‘s starry-eyed backers for Radar, tells the Chicago Tribune today that not only does his backing of the twice-failed magazine place him “firmly in the media,” he’s still interested in buying the Sun-Times, the newspaper that he once tried to buy for reportedly $850 million:

“I have been interested in the media business for a long time … so I went after a big one first,” said Jackson, 35, a lawyer who is chief executive of River North Sales & Service, an Anheuser-Busch distributorship. “I learned a lot of lessons. I wish they had elected to sell it.”

Yusef Jackson Lands on Media Map with Radar [Chicago Tribune]

As Jossip notes, CNN is re-airing the interview at 11:00 AM today — opposite The View, which was previously recorded and features Star Jones.

EARLIER: Star On Barbara On Today: She’s Still In My Heart