The 7th Annual ECNY Awards (you’ll recall that we covered the 6th annual ECNY Awards, much to everyone’s great delight) is now taking nominations for the best intentionally comedic performers in New York. In addition to categories like”Best Sketch Comedy Group” and “Best Host,” the ECNY Awards is adding four new categories, including Best Podcast, Best Storyteller, Best Comedy Event and Best New Category (Oh, comedy!).

The complete list of categories includes: Best Female Stand-Up Comedian; Best Male Stand-Up Comedian; Best Sketch Comedy Group; Best Host; Best Improv Group; Best Musical Comedy Act (Solo or Group); Best One Person Show; Best Comedic Video (Short or Series); Best Variety Show; Best Website; Best Book; Best Technician; Best Flyer or Postcard Design; The Emerging Comic Award; and, most importantly, Outstanding Achievement in the Field of Tweeting.

The ceremony will be hosted for the fourth consecutive year by Jon Friedman, of “Late Night with Jimmy Fallon” and The Rejection Show.

And, since you asked, here’s a bit of trivia, courtesy of ECNY producer Carol Hartsell:

We’re proud to once again celebrate excellence in the comedic performing arts in New York City… and we finally figured out what the acronym stands for, so stop bothering us. The acronym now stands for “Excellence in Comedy, New York City.” So stop bothering us.

Visit the ECNY’s website for rules and regulations on how to go about nominating your favorite arguably funny people.

— DIANE CLEHANE

Those corporate bean counters that put a crimp in expense accounts all over town must be loosening up a bit, because it was SRO today at Michael’s. A slew of magazine folks (See, print isn’t dead after all!), media mavens and the requisite flock of social swans were packed into the dining room. Jimmy Buffett showed up half way through lunch, and the place was so crowded I couldn’t even make out where he landed.

I had a dishy lunch today with MarketWatch columnist Jon Friedman. (Sorry, but most of the good stuff was off the record). Jon, who has toiled for USA Today, BusinessWeek, and Bloomberg, has been writing an online media column since 2005 that’s a must-read for the Michael’s crowd. These days he churns out an average of three columns a week. His recent piece on whether Brian Williams is the new Walter Cronkite generated plenty of buzz and sent HuffPost commenters into overdrive. Jon’s take: Williams is fascinating because, even after getting “the job of a lifetime,” he’s “the rarest case of success because he’s still ambitious.” We both agreed that Brian really came into his own once he loosened up a little off the set and let audiences in on his dry sense of humor and self-deprecating wit through appearances on The Tonight Show and SNL. “A classic!” says Jon.

Earlier this year, Jon launched a weekly online broadcast of Media Matters where he talks shop with media bigwigs. Hearst’s Cathie Black is scheduled for the June 21 broadcast. We’re tuning in.

Here’s the rundown on today’s crowd:

1. The ‘Imber Gang’: Dr. Gerald Imber, Jerry Della Femina, Andy Bergman and Michael Kramer. (Jeff Greenfield was absent.) I stopped by their table to chat with the guys about the fun piece in the Times‘ Style section last week covering their legendary lunches in the dining room. “It was great,” said the good doctor, who emerged as the star of the piece with some nice plugs for his latest book, Genius on the Edge: The Bizarre Double Life of Dr. William Stewart Halsted. Give that publicist a raise!

2. Peter Brown

3. Nick Simuneck (Terry Allen Kramer‘s hubby, in case you didn’t know)

4. The New York Observer‘s Jared Kushner

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— DIANE CLEHANE

It’s nice to see there are still plenty of writers who can afford to eat at swanky restaurants these days. Today, the dining room at Michael’s was brimming with scribes of every stripe and their fabulous friends. I was heartened to hear from a handful of fellow scribes that they’ve got lots of new projects in the works. Good news indeed!

As usual, there were also plenty of famous faces to liven things up. Kathie Lee Gifford was first to arrive with her pal Sunny Lucani. Despite the frigid temps outside, the Today show host was rocking open-toed Gucci heels (without hosiery, of course) and a jade sleeveless sheath. “I’m always hot!” she joked. I just had to compliment the seemingly ageless morning show vet on her longer, blonder locks. “The same woman (Jacquie Poldoro) has been coming to my house for years to do my nails and hair,” she told me. That’s quite a house call. As she does every Wednesday, Kathie Lee was having an early lunch before heading off to see a Broadway show with friends. (Her co-host and fellow Michael’s regular, Hoda Kotb, dished about their girls’ nights and meeting Kathie Lee’s mom in an interview with us last year.) This week, the gals were going to check out David Mamet ‘s Race. Kathie Lee tells me the hands down favorite of the season so far has been A Little Night Music with Angela Lansbury (“She’s incandescent!”) and Catherine Zeta Jones. “It was just fabulous!” We’re getting our tickets this week.

Here’s the rundown on today’s crowd:

1. ‘Mayor’ Joe Armstrong, enjoying a friendly lunch with pals, including author Chris Buckley, Jean Halberstam, Michael Clurman, and Sharon Hoge.

2. Patrick Murphy, Joan Jakobson, and Betsy Gottbaum

3. Kathie Lee Gifford with Today show co-host Hoda Kotb and pal Sunny Lucani

4. Barry Diller and a bespectacled gent we didn’t recognize

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We would have awarded the media fatigue prize last week to Condé Nast and all the speculation of what they’d cut next but, let’s face it, every week is a Condé Nast week.

Last week, the true speculation has been about Bloomberg LP‘s acquisition of BusinessWeek from McGraw-Hill: Who’s staying, who’s going, and who should step up to the plate and run the publication.

Read on for a recap of BusinessWeek news.

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Today on the mediabistro.com Morning Media Menu podcast, hosts Jason Boog of GalleyCat and AgencySpy‘s Matt Van Hoven chatted jovially about today’s biggest media headlines.

First on the docket, Fox News‘ big ratings week. “The craziest thing is Glenn Beck, who has been facing tons and tons of problems lately with advertisers…had his highest rated week ever,” Jason said.

“Just because you have high ranking programming doesn’t mean it’s going to necessarily earn you any money,” Matt explained, from an advertising point of view. “Now Fox can definitely turn around and sell these numbers to the next clients that come through, but whether or not they’re going to be able to sell the Glenn Beck program is yet to be seen. Sort of a strange situation for Fox to be in, where they’ve got more eyeballs than ever and maybe fewer advertisers to pay them.”

Also discussed: London’s Heathrow Airport’s decision to put “writer in residence” Alain de Botton at a desk in the airport, where he will interview travelers and write a short book about his experience. Heathrow hopes the book will help promote the airport, but is de Botton selling out by shilling for it?

And, Jason and Matt also commented on how Marketwatch columnist Jon Friedman used a tale about Hunter S. Thompson to draw readers into his article about San Francisco’s papers’ woes.

You can listen to all the past podcasts at BlogTalkRadio.com/mediabistro and call in at 646-929-0321.

TVNewser: Jon Friedman‘s Media Web turns 10 years old today.

AgencySpy: You can vote for a 3-minute video inspired by an AgencySpy story about a sex tape shot in New York-based ad agency Atmosphere. The short film is one of the top ten finalists in the NetflixFindYourVoice film-making contest. The winner gets to produce a feature length film.

Daily Intel: Swine flu hits another Conde Nast fashion mag, Glamour.

Folio: New Playboy CEO Scott Flanders is a self-proclaimed “believer in print”. “I don’t believe the magazine has lost its relevance,” he said of the men’s mag. “I believe the magazine will come back.”

PaidContent: IAC CEO Barry Diller defended The Daily Beast‘s lack of a business model and said running an ad early on during the Web site’s inception was a mistake. “When I saw it, I said, ‘how can you do this? This is terrible.’ I don’t want to take an ad now because it’s not going to produce revenue for us at this stage and until we conceptualize a manner of advertising that is different than standard display,” he said.

<img alt="ltlunch.jpg" src="/fishbowlny/files/original/ltlunch.jpg" width="400" height="255"
Pictured above, Jack Rotherham of Metacafe.

Watch now: mediabistro.com founder Laurel Touby talks shop with Magid’s Mike Vorhaus, Polaris Ventures’ Larry Kramer, and Metacafe’s Jack Rotherham during lunch at Michael’s on 55th and Fifth (Part One).

— LAUREL TOUBY

While Diane Clehane has her Lunch at Michael’s column, mine will be the redux version. I was sitting at Table 24, the very back of the room, just on the borderline of Siberia (aka the Garden Room). I had the pleasure of three men’s company (Jon Fine is home sick; sorry, Jon!). Mike Vorhaus, a consultant with Magid, Larry Kramer, uber media guru at Polaris Ventures (formerly with MarketWatch.com) and Jack Rotherham, senior vice president of Metacafe.

We had a wide-ranging discussion about journalism, media people, video, business models on the Web and more. Find out what we learned, and check out more video after the jump:

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— DIANE CLEHANE

These days, you just never know who you’re going to meet on Wednesdays at Michael’s. If we’d come yesterday, we would have been able to chat with Willem Dafoe. Oh well. This being New York Fashion Week, I was thrilled when Donna Karan came in. I was happy to catch up with my former boss (I once toiled as her flack during her heyday at Anne Klein) and add to the praise she’s been getting for her show earlier this week. When I asked her if she’s seen the glowing review Cathy Horyn wrote in this morning’s Times, she replied with a smile. “That was a surprise!” Not to her most fervent fans, though. Donna’s gorgeous jackets and draped skirts that are sure to be on plenty of well-dressed city gals come next fall hearkened back to her 80s heyday without looking at all retro. While everyone else is referencing the decade of giant shoulder pads (Is anyone really going to wear them again?) and DayGlo brights, Donna has managed to make everything look thoroughly modern and beautiful. Bravo!

I was lunching at the bar with fellow People scribe and soul sister Natasha Stoynoff when Ed Victor came up for a chat. Our favorite uber agent told us he was meeting Fugees producer/rapper John Forte and his lawyer Aarti Tandon. Here’s a tantalizing tale: John was one of 14 people who got a presidential pardon from departing President George W. Bush. John received a 14-year sentence in 2000 for drug trafficking when he was caught with two suitcases of liquid cocaine worth $1.4 million in Newark Airport. Carly Simon and Senator Orrin Hatch (now there’s an odd couple) both championed his release, says Ed. Now, he’s blogging about his experiences for Tina Brown on The Daily Beast, and Ed is shopping a book about his adventures in and out of jail. Sounds like a page-turner to us…

Here’s the rundown on today’s crowd:

1. Bonnie Timmerman and Richard Belzer

2. Peter Brown and a young bespectacled gent

3. ‘Mayor’ Joe Armstrong and Dorothy Kallins

4. My pal, Inside Edition anchor Deborah Norville and CBS Television’s Bob Madden. It’s been a while since I’ve seen Deb, so I went over to chat, and we laughed about how busy the dining room is despite empty tables all over town. “This place is the cafeteria for the LinkedIn set,” she laughed. So true ….

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Lists! They are everywhere you look at the moment. Over at MediaWatch Jon Friedman has chosen his journalists of the year (Politico gets a big nod).

CoverAwards.com has compiled a list of most memorable covers of the year — we have to imagine The New Yorker’s fist-jabbing cover has to take that cake in that category but they have divvied up the results.

Meanwhile everyone and their brother has a best book list and we’ve noticed that New York Times reporter Dexter Filkins has appeared on most of them for his book The Forever War. Those of you curious as to how the book came about may want to check out this American Prospect interview with Filkins.

The party for Michael Wolff‘s much ballyhooed official Rupert Murdoch biography The Man Who Owns the News was held last night at the stunning penthouse of Milk Studios on the West Side and, not surprisingly, attracted a whole slew of media big wigs (every style of horn-rimmed glasses appeared to be present — said one party-goer on knowing the room was packed with famous names but not recognizing the faces: “I wish there was an iPhone app for that.”). Sadly Rupe himself was noticeably absent. Turns out the last-minute party date switcheroo from Monday night to Tuesday was just…a mistake, and not actually a scheduling conflict with Wendi Murdoch’s 40th birthday party.

We eventually caught up with Wolff — the man knows how to work a room! — and asked him what, in the course of writing the book, had most surprised him about Rupert Murdoch?

That he takes an enema before a long-haul flight.

There you have it! To file in your TMI folder. We also managed to chat with Christie Hefner for a few minutes (full disclosure: we have written for Playboy) about her decision to step down as CEO from Playboy Enterprises.(Above: Michael Wolff; Right: Dan Abrams and David Zinczenko)

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