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UPN and WB Networks Unite (NYT)
CBS and the Warner Brothers Entertainment unit of Time Warner have joined forces to form a new, youth-oriented network out of the programs on UPN and WB. The new venture, called CW, will take the most popular shows from UPN and WB, each of which has struggled to turn a profit. NYT: Can two networks learn to live together? NYT: New CBS shows signs of Midas touch. NYP: The deal will cast adrift a number of UPN affiliates across the country, leaving them with no programming once their current affiliation deal ends before the fall season. NYDN: Future of NYC channel 9 uncertain. WaPo: Smackdown meets Gilmore Girls. LAT: Merger shrinks market for bad TV, writes Paul Brownfield. FishbowlLA: Will two losers equal a winner?

Disney Buys Pixar for $7.4B (WaPo)
Walt Disney Co. announced yesterday that it will acquire Steve Jobs's Pixar Animation Studios in a deal aimed at restoring the Disney magic in the age of computer-generated animation. NYT: Pixar creative chief wants to restore magic to kingdom. LAT: Lasseter's fans say he is Disney's best hope to rekindle a group that dominated film animation.

Google Will Censor Search Results in China (AP)
The online search engine leader has agreed to censor its results in China, adhering to the country's free-speech restrictions in return for better access in the Internet's fastest growing market. InformationWeek: Google has its vulnerabilities—excessive reliance on search advertising, lawsuits, eroding public trust, lack of focus, and the competitive threat from Microsoft.

Village Voice Publisher Replaced With New Times Insider (NYP)
The new owners of the paper gave veteran publisher Judy Mizner her walking papers yesterday and imported Michael Cohen, publisher of the Miami New Times, to take her place. FishbowlNY: V.V.'s internal announcements.

Publisher Offers Witnesses to Defend Frey Rehab Account (NYT)
Two men who say they attended a Minnesota drug and alcohol rehabilitation center with James Frey said in interviews that they believed his overall description of his experience was accurate but added that they could not corroborate many of the specifics in Frey's book A Million Little Pieces.

Could CBS Be Calling Diane Instead of Katie? (NYO)
Rebecca Dana: What if Sean McManus, instead of betting the bank on Couric like everyone expects, went after...Diane Sawyer instead? Yes, it's unlikely. It's borderline inconceivable. Perhaps "idiotic." But why not Sawyer?

Richard Johnson Working on Page Six Spinoff (WWD)
The Post's gossip-in-chief is working on the glossy magazine version of Page Six, due out next month. "It's a mix of all the stuff we have on Page Six," he said. "There's some gossip. We have a feature on Victoria's Secret, with pictures from a [catalogue] shoot..."

Sulz Knew Spy Story Would Dent Times (Marketwatch)
Jon Friedman: "We knew, either way, we'd get nailed," Arthur Sulzberger Jr. told me evenly during an hour-long interview Monday in his office. He added: "The decision to hold it never even got to me. It was made for good journalistic reasons." NYO: Sulzberger is scheduled to make his debut among the international power elite of the annual World Economic Forum.

Abramoff Shopped Pics of Himself With Bush (ThinkProgress)
Time magazine and the Washingtonian had both reported on five photos of President Bush with Jack Abramoff, but neither publication revealed its source. Last night, Newsweek correspondent Michael Isikoff reported that it was indeed Abramoff who floated the photographs. NYO: No media outrage over "Picturegate," writes Jon Conason. CJR Daily: Time pulls a big tease, writes Gal Beckerman.

Times Co. Profits Slide (WSJ)
New York Times Co. said fourth-quarter profit fell 41 percent, hurt mainly by costs associated with job cuts, but said it saw unexpected strength in advertising demand. NYT: The company announced that it was raising its rates for home delivery by about 4 percent, starting Feb. 6.

Navahoax? (LA Weekly)
Matthew Fleisher: Did a struggling white writer of gay erotica become one of multicultural literature's most celebrated memoirists—by passing himself off as Native American? Galleycat: Fake writers come in threes.

Steven Brill Donates Money for J-Students (NYT)
Brill—the journalist and entrepreneur who founded American Lawyer, Court TV and the defunct Brill's Content—and his wife are donating about $1 million in endowment money to Yale and additional operating funds for a program to train students interested in journalism.

TimesSelect Draws 156,000 Web-Only Subscriptions in First Four Months (E&P)
Those readers are among a total of 390,000 who have signed up for the web feature, which includes print subscribers who have free access to the online columns, but must register.

Bananas in Pajamas? (CJR)
Russ Baker: I was intrigued by what I'd heard about Pajamas Media, a for-profit company that gathered some 70 bloggers onto its megasite and raised $3.5 million as it prepared to elevate "citizen journalism" and "redefine journalism in the 21st Century and beyond."

Mags' Handling of Bode Miller as a Case Study (Folio:)
U.S. skier Bode Miller's recent admission to having raced "wasted" was big news. Several magazines profiled Miller on their covers, and their treatment of both the skier and his endorser reveal three approaches to handling an athlete's own product placement, and access to the athlete himself.

The Broadband Battle (MediaCitizen)
Timothy Karr: The battle for the future of the Internet has been joined by 220,000 Free Press activists who have launched a national campaign to preserve Net freedoms against the broadband hoarding schemes of Verizon, BellSouth and Comcast.

Winning Losers (WaPo)
Tom Shales: Vaudeville didn't die after all—it was only in a coma—and now has returned in a form suitably twisted to fit the times: American Idol, the Fox network's stupendously successful amateur competition.

Covering the Air War in Iraq (VV)
Syd Schanberg: Since air strikes cause a significant percentage of civilian casualties, the American press will have to push harder to provide more detailed and regular coverage of the air war.

Farewell President Bartlett (Guardian)
David Remnick: The president's opponents for the past six years have understandably flirted with political despair—and, for an hour a week, the escapism of the let's-pretend presidency of Josiah Bartlet on the West Wing. But now the escapism is leaving the scene.

—David S. Hirschman