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WebNewser: CNN.com has named Los Angeles Times managing editor, online Meredith Artley VP and managing editor.

BayNewser: The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal are both reportedly launching Bay Area-specific editions of their papers. BayNewser asks: five years from now, who do you think is going to be the go-to news source for Bay Area coverage?

AdAge: A new Nielsen report shows that ad spending dropped 15.4 percent during the first half of 2009 compared to the first half of 2008 — the biggest drop since the company first started calculating these figures in 2002.

Folio: Electronic Gaming Monthly, which was shuttered in January, will likely relaunch in December, says founder Steve Harris, who purchased the title back from Ziff Davis earlier this year.

ABC News: Jon Gosselin will be on “Primetime” tonight, speaking out for the first time about his divorce from Kate. He tells interviewer Chris Cuomo he “despises” Kate and claims he was verbally abused.

Our colleagues at FishbowlLA have a story today about Tina Brown‘s latest hire for The Daily Beast.

According to Dylan Stableford Brown has snagged Los Angeles Times television editor Kate Aurthur to serve as West Coast editor.

Aurthur will report to the Daily Beast’s West Coast Bureau Chief Gabe Doppelt, who Brown poached from W back in June. Brown also recently lured away our own editorial director Rebecca Fox. She’s joining the online publication later this month as director of editorial development and operations. Although Fox will be based in New York, she’s just one example of Brown’s recent quest to stock her staff — on the West Coast and here in New York — with talented journalists and editors with impressive resumes.

FishbowlLA: The Daily Beast Claims Another One

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FishbowlLA: The Los Angeles Times‘ James Rainey wrote an even-handed profile about Nikki Finke — after the Internet journo scared the crap out of him.

Unbeige: New York artist Dash Snow died Monday from a drug overdose. He gained notoriety in the New York art scene thanks to a lengthy profile in New York magazine two years ago.

New York Times: Thomson Reuters is in talks to buy financial commentary Web site Breakingviews.com.

Silicon Alley Insider: Online video start up Next New Networks laid off a “handful” of staff today as part of reorganization.

Cato Unbound: Clay Shirky predicts that in the future journalism will have to deal with changes in subsidy. “There are many shifts coming, but three big ones are an increase in direct participation; an increase in the leverage of the professionals working alongside the amateurs; and a second great age of patronage,” he says

Ever since New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman (left) publicly returned a $75,000 speakers’ fee earlier this month, Los Angeles Times columnist James Rainey has been hounding the NYT about their ethics guidelines pertaining to speaking fees.

In today’s column, Rainey published a memo sent to NYT staffers by executive editor Bill Keller and editorial page editor Andy Rosenthal, which instructed staffers who had earned more than $5,000 last year from speaking engagements to report the earnings to supervisors by June 15.

“We have been reviewing the newspaper’s policy on outside speaking engagements,” the memo said. “We believe that you are all adhering to the spirit of the guidelines, both for speaking on behalf of the Times and to promote books. But we have all become lax in complying with the parts of the ethics guidelines that require annual accounting of income from speaking engagements.”

According to the memo, any fees earned by NYT reporters are supposed to be accounted for by January 31 of the following year. Staffers are also required to ask for special permission if they are offered any one speakers’ fee over $5,000 and, if they are promoting a book, they must get proposed appearances pre-approved. And, as Rainey points out, the paper’s ethical rules also prohibit reporters from accepting fees from any group other than non-profit and educational organizations, which is why Friedman had to return his fee from the Bay Area Air Quality Management District.

These guidelines are imposed in order to make sure reporters and columnists maintain an unbiased perspective. But if that is the case, perhaps the Times should consider revealing what organizations are paying staff to speak.

The annual Polk Awards have been announced, and a number of the winners are being recognized for work done at newspapers currently struggling to keep their newsrooms alive.

Eric Nalder of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer won for his two-part series ‘Demoted to Private: America’s Military Housing Disaster’ and Paul Pringle of the Los Angeles Times was tapped for “unearthing corruption in the Service Employees International Union.”

The NYT‘s David Barstow has been tapped for his much discussed two part series about retired military officials working as on-air network analysts while still being paid to be defense industry consultants.

Meanwhile legendary writer Gay Talese has been named this year’s career achievement recipient. Talese, who began his career as a Times copy boy, and went on to work for many years as a reporter, is also considered on of the “pioneers” of new journalism. Full list of award winners here.

Choire Sicha interviewed Arianna Huffington for this weekend’s Los Angeles Times — turns out Huffington still loves newspapers! Also, (perhaps not surprisingly) she doesn’t see the proliferation of opinion onto the the front pages of newspapers as a bad thing at all.

It’s absolutely a good thing. Also, just the question presupposes there is something inherently wrong with a journalist or a newscaster having an opinion, which is a continuation, for me, of the misperception of the highest calling of a journalist being neutrality. In fact the highest calling of a journalist is finding out the truth, wherever the truth lies. . . . And that’s very different than we get from Sean Hannity and Bill O’Reilly, which is opinion completely disconnected from fact.

The part about Arianna loving the print (which didn’t make it to the article) actually comes from Sicha’s personal blog.

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Between all the layoffs and the disappearing sections it’s sometimes hard to keep track of all the upheaval going on at the Tribune Co.-owned Los Angeles Times. However some of you will remember how back in June, amidst all the announcements of sweeping cuts (many of which were put into place these last two weeks) there was a much-discussed article in the NYT, which reported that the beleaguered paper was also planning on shuttering its monthly magazine, sort of. The article disclosed that unbeknownst to top editor Russ Stanton the magazine intended to overhaul its entire editorial staff and transfer control to its business operations. Per the NYT: “The arrangement would flout the tradition at most newspapers, which keep business operations, like advertising and circulation, completely separate from the editorial department.”

The NYT also reported that Annie Gilbar, formerly of In Style and the Home Shopping Network, had been hired as the new editor. Shortly thereafter Stanton issued a memo to newsroom staffers, decrying the accuracy of the article:

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Rumors were flying this morning that Los Angeles Times publisher and CEO David Hiller was about to be shown the door by Zell and Co. and now it’s official. Randy Michaels (he of the more words, less reporters doctrine) just announced Hiller’s departure, effective immediately. FishbowlLA has the memo. Hiller was presumably preparing to oversee the sweeping cuts that were made at LAT last month, and which are apparently being put into effect as we speak (again, FishbowlLA has details here) Perhaps a trip to India will be included in all the severance packages.

Elsewhere in Tribune land Ann Marie Lipinski, who began her tenure at the Chicago Tribune as an intern thirty years ago, and was named editor shortly before 9/11, has announced her resignation in a memo to staff today. Lipinski doesn’t directly reference the recent staff cuts at the Tribune as reason for her decision but does tells the staff that “your new owners should have their own editor, compatible with their style and goals” (also, the same line of thinking used by departing WaPo head Len Downie). Gerould W. Kern, Tribune Publishing vice president of editorial since 2003 has been named as her successor.

— DIANE CLEHANE

Timing is everything. Just ask Hillary Clinton. If we’d come a day earlier we would have dined with Karl Rove. (Well, okay, we’d have been in the same room.) Our spy says the sight of ‘Bush’s brain’-turned-Fox commentator at table five had the joint buzzing (or was it hissing?). In any event, politics were still very much front and center today. My pal producer Beverly Camhe introduced me to Patricia Duff who had just yesterday hosted a lunch at the Friar’s Club with Paul Begala for her political think tank, The Common Good. According to Beverly, who says joining Patricia’s group has been “life-changing,” Paul told the crowd that he’s all but certain Barack Obama will win the Democratic nomination. Since Paul is a Hillary supporter his prediction carries some heft. Patricia, who has also hosted Henry Kissinger and economic advisor Robert Hormats, is sure to have more heavy hitters hold forth on all things presidential in the coming months. Check it out yourself. After all, you can’t spend all your free time watching Gossip Girl no matter what New York says…

Here’s the rundown on today’s crowd:

1. Kathie Lee Gifford, Hoda Kotb, Eduardo Verastegui, Sean Wolfington and his lovely wife Ana, Kathie Lee’s right-hand gal Christine Gardiner and my new pal Today show producer Brian Balthazar. Seems those new BFFs Kathie Lee and Hoda have a regular Wednesday date to take in a matinee and then talk about it on Today the next morning. Today the girls were off to see Crybaby. Tune in tomorrow to catch their review.

2. Nick Simunek

3. Ron Delsener and John Eastman

4. Stan Shuman with a fellow we didn’t recognize …

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