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YouTube Founders Challenge Pentagon Ban (AP via Freep)
YouTube's cofounders Thursday challenged the Pentagon's assertion that soldiers overseas were sapping too much bandwidth by watching online videos, the military's principal rationale for blocking popular Web sites from Defense Department computers. "They said it might be a bandwidth issue, but they created the Internet, so I don't know what the problem is," Chief executive Chad Hurley said. AP via Chicago Tribune: YouTube founders work on next step.

Imus Jockeying to Get Back on the Air (NYP)
Don Imus' lawyer, Martin Garbus, is trying to use the radio personality's impending lawsuit against CBS Radio, which hasn't been filed yet, as leverage for reinstatement. But CBS is unmoved, and has already prepared a countersuit that it plans to file the minute Imus starts the legal showdown, say sources close to CBS' legal division. DISCUSS: Was Opie And Anthony's suspension warranted?

Ads That Are Too Fast for a Fast-Forward Button (NYT)
The CW network will soon offer advertisers two more ways to try holding the attention of viewers throughout those commercial breaks that consumers love to hate. One idea is to run quickie commercials of only five seconds each. The other is to schedule a series with no commercial breaks at all, and instead incorporate sponsors' products into each episode. LAT: A year ago the CW introduced its two-minute commercials, called "content wraps," which progressively tell an entertaining story over a given night. The network had expected to run a limited number, but advertisers liked them.

Publisher and Authors Parse a Term: Out of Print (NYT)
When is a book out of print? A change in standard contract language at Simon & Schuster could effectively alter the answer to that question, and the Authors Guild, a trade group that says it represents about 8,500 published authors, is urging writers and agents to exclude the publisher from book auctions because of it.

Backpacker Sale Officially Announced (Folio:)
El Segundo, California-based consumer enthusiast publisher Active Interest Media announced its acquisition of Rodale's Backpacker yesterday. Terms of the deal were not disclosed but a Rodale spokesperson says earlier reports of a sale price of $14 million are accurate.

WPP Buys 24/7 Real Media (Guardian)
WPP has beaten Microsoft to buy global digital marketing agency 24/7 Real Media in a deal valuing the company at $649 million. WPP said its cash purchase — at $11.75 a share — would enhance its position in search marketing and digital media. "Our clients and therefore our industry are becoming more media and technology driven," said WPP chief executive Martin Sorrell.

Time Warner President Faces Fallout for Secret HBO Payout (LAT)
Time Warner Inc.'s shareholders learned last week that Jeffrey Bewkes quietly approved a settlement 16 years ago to keep under wraps an incident involving a prized executive accused of choking a subordinate. The nearly $500,000 settlement could raise embarrassing questions for Bewkes at the company's annual stockholders' meeting today in Burbank on the Warner Bros. Studios lot.

Jeff Bridges to Play Graydon Carter in How to Lose Friends... Film (WWD)
Vanity Fair editor-in-chief Graydon Carter's love of Hollywood is about to undergo a new test: Jeff Bridges will play Carter, renamed Clayton Harding, in the film adaptation of one-time Vanity Fair contributor Toby Young's book, How to Lose Friends and Alienate People. The book depicted Young himself as status-obsessed and wildly inept, even as it skewered the New York media and celebrity scenes.

Book Deal for Author of Fake Steve Jobs Blog (NYP)
For months, cyber sleuths have been trying to unmask the mysterious writer who has been spoofing the Apple co-founder on The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs Web site. The frenzy heated up earlier this week after BusinessWeek's Apple reporter John Burrows wrote that the fake Steve Jobs had landed a book deal with Cambridge, Mass.-based Da Capo Press, an imprint of Perseus Books.

College Humor Sophmoric? That's the Idea (BusinessWeek)
Jon Fine: College Humor is so focused that, aside from the snapshots of bikini-clad coeds, it may be wholly incomprehensible to the over-40 set. But it's also a bona fide business. Despite College Humor's frank raciness, it has helped make ads for its site with some of the biggest brands out there, including Ford and Procter & Gamble.

In India, Newspapers Are Likely to Be a Long Story (LAT)
Indian newspapers are blessed with propitious circumstances that their ailing Western counterparts can only dream of or recall with teary nostalgia. The country's expanding middle class and booming economy have fueled an explosion in consumer spending and advertising. At the same time, the illiteracy rate is gradually coming down. Meanwhile, Internet penetration remains marginal.

Can Top D.C. Writers Save Time? (Washingtonian)
The magazine's managing editor Richard Stengel has big plans for the three marquee Washington journalists he's hired. "All are best in their class," Stengel says. "They fit perfectly into my strategy." Stengel, who took over the reigns of Time earlier this year, hired David Von Drehle and Michael Grunwald from the Washington Post. He took Mark Halperin from ABC News.

YouTube's Little Loca Headed for TV Reality Show (LAT)
Stevie Ryan, the Los Angeles actress whose tough-chick character, Little Loca, emerged as one of the first stars of YouTube, is making the leap from the desktop to the small screen. Ryan will join a familiar online comedy duo, Rhett McLaughlin and Link Neal (Rhett & Link), and a relative newcomer, Joy Leslie, on the half-hour show, which will feature the best, funniest and most bizarre amateur Web video clips.

Growing Revolt Against U.S. News From Colleges (Inside Higher Ed)
In the two weeks since 12 college presidents started a challenge to the way U.S. News & World Report ranks colleges, the movement has gained numbers and may also be expanding beyond its base. At least 15 other colleges have now signed on, which organizers say is a major step forward.

400th Simpsons Episode Sunday (USAT)
With Sunday's two episodes, The Simpsons hits 400, a milestone reached by just four other prime-time scripted series. "It's so hard today to keep something on the air," says executive producer Al Jean, who runs the day-to-day operation. "It's immodest, but I think our achievement is unbelievable."