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ABC Planning Idol Bombshell (NYP)
A segment exploring the relationship between the Idol judges and the show's contestants reportedly will air on Primetime Live, most likely next month, and has been in the works "for several months."

Review Raps Reporter (AP via Boston Globe)
A fact-checking investigation commissioned by MIT's Technology Review magazine has raised further doubts about sourcing and accuracy in stories written by a freelance journalist.

PBS Scrutiny Raises Antennas (WaPo)
Some observers, including people inside the Public Broadcasting Service, say the organization is being forced to toe a more conservative line in its programming by the Republican-dominated Corporation for Public Broadcasting that provides it with about $30 million in federal funds.

Rollins Can Go to Elle (NYP)
John Rollins, co- founder of the suspended music magazine Tracks, is heading to Elle magazine at Hachette Filipacchi to be the new publisher.

TV Nets Go Blog (Boston Herald)
While networks have been offering deleted scenes and teasers on their websites for some time, they recently have cajoled the on-camera talent into writing behind-the-scenes blogs that give viewers a first-person perspective. Business Week: Blogs represent power, and your customers and rivals are figuring them out. E&P: Blogs aren't the answer to newspapers' disappearing-audience problem, writes Graham Webster. Marketwatch: Big city newspapers get blog friendly.

Source 'Hiccups' (NYP)
According to insiders, in recent months the hip-hop mag has defaulted on a multi-million bank loan and withdrawn from the Audit Bureau of Circulations, the chief auditor for circulation in the industry.

Glamour Ed Gets Used to 'Congrats' (NYT)
Cynthia Leive, the editor-in-chief of Glamour magazine closed on a Brooklyn townhouse on a Monday, accepted a National Magazine Award on Wednesday, and then gave birth on Friday.

'Climate of Fear' at Beeb? (Guardian)
Former BBC director general Greg Dyke will say in a radio interview that if he were still running the corporation he would not cut the 4,000 jobs his successor is planning to do away with.

Mag Publishers Expanding From Within (Folio)
CEOs from some of the biggest consumer and b-to-b publishing houses say they are focusing own growing their businesses through launches and brand extensions rather than acquisitions.

Bush's War on the Press (The Nation)
Eric Alterman: The Bush Administration and its ideological allies are employing every means available to undermine journalists' ability to exercise their First Amendment function to hold power accountable. In fact, the Administration recognizes no such constitutional role for the press.

Undisclosed Ads (WSJ)
In the past, people on the receiving end knew that they were being pitched to. They assumed that there was a clear line between news or honest opinion and paid hucksterism. In an age of near-ubiquitous product placement in TV sitcoms and movies, we've grown wiser and more cynical.

Journalism and the New Pope (FAIR)
Journalists should not let any pious proclamations intimidate them. When the policies of a president or prime minister result in suppression of human rights or fuel public-health disasters, the news media should not hesitate to expose the consequences. And the policies of a pope should be no less scrutinized.

Appeal on Gaza Killing of U.K. Journo (BBC)
Israeli army prosecutors are appealing against the acquittal of an officer over the 2003 killing of British cameraman, James Miller.

WaPo's Web Wish (Marketwatch)
Jon Friedman: By banking on the Internet, the paper is hoping it can find a way to attract new readers and maintain the loyalty of its existing audience. Further, I suspect that Len Downie also wants www.washingtonpost.com to give the Post a leg up in its epochal competition against the New York Times.

CBSer Sought Unethical Press Perks (Honolulu Star-Bulletin)
An email received by the Hawaii Visitors & Convention Bureau last week from 60 Minutes producer Ira Rosen solicited discounted media rates for an upcoming family vacation.

Al-Jaz Upping Ante (Salon)
Corey Pein: The "Fox News of the Arab world" plans to take on Rupert Murdoch and friends with a new English-language service—unless the Bush Administration succeeds in squashing it.

Karmazin, Chameleon (Ad Age)
Sirius Satellite Radio's ad revenue will rocket from $1 million to $100 million by 2007, CEO Mel Karmazin predicts, turning one of the hottest consumer electronics segments into one of the fastest-growing advertising mediums.

Journos Fear Loathing of Traditional Media (Chicago Reader)
Michael Miner: Journalists are wide-awake and terrified that they're already on the wrong side of history and there's no way back. Economist: Is Rupert Murdoch right to predict the end of newspapers as we now know them?

Sun Spanked (E&P)
A month after Maryland Gov. Robert Ehrlich issued his controversial ban on state employees talking to two writers at The Sun of Baltimore late last year, the governor met with the paper's editors and submitted a list of 23 complaints he had about the paper's coverage of his administration.

EW Exaggeration? (LA Weekly)
Nikki Finke: Entertainment Weekly suspended its usual pabulum-spewing to piss on celebrity perk packages in its recent article "New Age of Greed." But it's the moguls' perks that are out of control, not the stars'.

New England's Richest Homes Get Mag (Boston Herald)
In August Don Kaplan will launch New England Home, showcasing the region's most impressive family estates, oceanfront compounds, and cutting-edge urban lofts.

War Photogs on Shooting Under Fire (NYT)
Three war photographers shared their views about the futility of war this week without always agreeing on the state of combat photography today.

Albom Stained (LAT)
What elevates Albom's discretion into the realm of celebrity scandal is that his fame goes way beyond the world of newspapers.

—David S. Hirschman