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Rupe Tested Beijing's Limits (Time)
News Corp. may have crossed the legal boundaries in China, using a shell firm that took in illegal payments from cable operators who wanted the company's programming. NYT: The long-held optimism of Western media companies about venturing into the Chinese market has suffered several setbacks recently.

Maximum Martha (NYT)
Two years after trying to scrub Martha Stewart the person out of Martha Stewart the brand, Martha Stewart the business has a new strategy: Martha Stewart every day. Chicago Sun-Times: New TV shows to test acceptance of post-incarceration Martha. Mediaweek: Random House, Stewart cut full-episode placement pact.

Knives Out in D.C. for Binn (Lowdown)
Lloyd Grove: Supporters of Washington Life appear to be gunning for glossy-mag mogul Jason Binn, a brash New Yorker who's stirring up rivalries with his soon-to-launch Capitol File magazine.

Bush's Secret Press Dinner (WaPo)
About 50 members of the White House press corps went over to President Bush's ranch in Crawford, ate his food, drank his booze, hung around the pool—and promised to keep it all off-the-record.

Iraqi Reality Show Does Makeovers of Bombed Houses (E&P)
Producers of the show, which is called Materials and Labor, provide money and expertise to Iraqi home-owners whose homes have been destroyed in the war.

The Sound of One Hand Clapping (BBC)
A new BBC show, No Sex Please, We're Teenagers, has challenged 12 teenagers to stay celibate for five months, to teach them to "swap casual sex for old-fashioned courting rituals."

Survivor: Burbank (B&C)
Will NBC's Jeff Zucker and Kevin Reilly keep their jobs if the network's ratings stay in the cellar?

Longtime Baltimore Sun Editor Mattix Dies (Baltimore Sun)
Paul Rhodes Mattix III, a night news editor whose career in newspapers spanned nearly three decades, died this morning from complications of lymphoma.

Belt-Tightening Time (Crain's New York Business)
Time Inc. has imposed a hiring freeze and told employees to cut back on travel and expenses as the publisher tries to shore up its bottom line.

Reality Show Writers Detail 'Sweatshop' Conditions (CSM)
"We would work from about 9 a.m. to midnight, and often 2, 3, 4 a.m.," says one scribe who was denied meal breaks and told to submit false time cards.

New York Mag to Launch Major Ad Campaign (NYT)
Almost eight years after its last advertisements, the mag plans to launch a new campaign that will include the daily replacement of posters at five subway stations in Manhattan.

Telcos Gird for TV Battle (BusinessWeek)
Jon Fine: The next few years will likely bring an extraordinarily expensive battle for consumers' living rooms, as telephone companies spend billions to update their networks and leap into next-generation television.

So You Think You're Omarosa... (Newsweek)
A new Friendster-like site, RTVStar.com, will help reality-TV wanna-bes make their dreams come true. For an annual $24.99, members post profiles that are then reviewed by casting professionals.

A Condé Biz Mag: Finally! (Marketwatch)
Jon Friedman: At their worst, business magazines act like cheerleaders for companies and executives in a way that's unique compared with the tougher coverage of politics and sports.

Shape on the Up and Up? (NYT)
Magazines often blur the line between advertising and editorial content. But Barbara Harris, the editorial director for Shape, calls the latest issue simply a common example of "synergy."

Goodbye to All That (Slate)
Ben Yagoda: The indignities of freelancing are often outweighed by the good stuff: freedom, no commute, funny war stories, the periodic ego boost of appearing in print, and the chance to eat caviar with Uma Thurman.

New Fox Show 'Pitifully Awful' (WaPo)
Tom Shales: An old industry cliche maintains that "no one sets out to make a bad TV show," but it's certainly the easiest explanation for Fox's new series Prison Break.

Brits Tune in to Daily Show (Reuters)
Comedian Jon Stewart's popular deconstruction of U.S. nightly newscasts has struck its first full-scale overseas syndication deal with UK broadcaster Channel 4.

Reality Show's Backstage Bacchanal (Radar)
While the on-screen debauchery of E!'s Kill Reality series has already earned the series impressive ratings, a source claims the real action took place at the stars' Malibu beach house.

—David S. Hirschman

IN FRIDAY'S MB BLOGS:

NBC/Aruba: We Were Journos Doing Our Job [TVNewser]
NBC source: "We were respectful -- all of our actions were above board. Some of our competitors seem to be jealous that Michelle Kosinski and team did some hard work that paid off with a good story. Other journalists, to THEIR credit, have defended us for simply doing our jobs..."

Blythly going where she went two days ago [FishBowlNY]
Myrna Blyth says 'star' editors are history -- and just in case you didn't hear her two days ago, she's telling you again. It's pretty much a graf-for-graf rendering of her similar column two days ago for the New York Sun...

Crawford Dining [FishBowlDC]
We haven't paid much attention to the Crawford press corps this month, although even in D.C. you can hear them complaining about standing outside in the sun covering Cindy Sheehan.

Maybe Zaha Should Stick To Weddings and Furniture [Unbeige]
A friend, high-profile, just wrote us from Denmark, purging his Pattern Recognition-esque reaction to Zaha's latest, the Ordrupgaard museum expansion.

Announcing the First Annual Mediabistro Fellowship in (Media-Related) Screenwriting [FishBowlLA]
Mediabistro is sponsoring the First Annual FishBowlLA Los Angeles Media Screenplay Scene Contest. To enter the FAFLAMSSC, send us a scene from a screenplay featuring one or more Southern California media people.