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Ousted Viacom Chief Freston Gets $84.8 Million Golden Parachute (Bloomberg)
Freston, who spent more than 20 years at Viacom, will receive $58.9 million in severance, the New York-based media company said in a regulatory filing. He also will get $7.4 million in deferred compensation, $5.7 million in a retirement-fund payout, and 90,141 shares of Viacom at a cost of about $10 million to the company. FBNY: Freston will also earn $1 million a year for three years as a "company advisor."

Bloomberg Says He's Not Selling Company (NYT)
Nearly as rife as the speculation about the political ambitions of Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg of New York has been talk about a possible sale of his multibillion-dollar financial information company. But Bloomberg said that while he had been approached by potential buyers, he had decided at this time not to sell the company, which could be worth as much as $12 billion.

NBC to Cut Jobs Amid TV Unit's Weak Performance (LAT)
Plagued by the weak performance of its TV broadcasting unit, NBC Universal is expected to announce a corporate restructuring today that could lead to major job cuts at several of its divisions. About one percent of NBC Universal's workforce, an estimated 600 to 800 employees, could be eliminated, said company executives with knowledge of the plan. B&C: NBC staffers fearing the worst.

Boston Globe Union Rejects Contract That Would Tie Raises to Company's Revenue (Boston Globe)
The Boston Newspaper Guild, which represents the paper's newsroom and other workers, said its members rejected by a 307-223 vote a four-year contract that would have tied raises to revenue increases at the newspaper. The proposed contract would have excluded revenues of Boston.com from that calculation, according to the guild. WSJ: Globe is on track for its first unprofitable year in recent history as the Internet contributes to losses. And the paper's woes are dragging down its parent, the New York Times Company.

With Online Downloads Available, TV and Film Writers Want to Revisit Residuals Formula (LAT)
Hollywood trumpets another round of ventures nearly every week making TV series and films accessible on the Internet. But with each splashy announcement, resentment builds among writers and actors who believe studios are ducking the issue of how to properly pay them when their work is viewed via the Web. Fears are growing that digital distribution could prompt a strike next year. Slate: A video history of YouTube. Slate: How YouTube is making life miserable for referees. Guardian: Universal, Sony BMG and Warner have taken small stakes in YouTube estimated to be worth around $50 million collectively. Guardian: The curious thing about YouTube is that the people who ought to be paid — individual content creators — aren't actually campaigning for it. NYT: Why the looming threat of video technology spells trouble for old media, Tom Cruise.

WSJ Reporter: How Hewlett-Packard Spied on Me (WSJ)
Reporter Pui-Wing Tam learns how H-P's investigators collected information on her for a year, scoping out her trash and compiling a dossier on her phone calls. "H-P collected information about me. H-P's investigators tried at least five times, he said, to get access to my home-phone, cellphone and office-phone records. In several instances, they succeeded."

Nielsen to Track Video Game Ratings (Mediaweek)
Nielsen announced plans Wednesday to launch GamePlay Metrics, designed to give the video game industry a precise system of electronic measurements to standardize the burgeoning market for the buying and selling of ads in its products. NYT: "Second Life" is a virtual world with real money.

Google Rivals Eye Facebook, Digg, CNET (Dow Jones/AP via SiliconAlley.com)
Google Inc.'s $1.65 billion acquisition of Internet video site YouTube Inc. has turned up the pressure on rivals to keep pace in a rapidly changing online environment. Many smaller Web companies offer growing communities of users and popular Web sites that Yahoo Inc., Microsoft Corp. and News Corp. may choose to nurture.

Layoffs in Philly at Inky, Daily News? (Philadelphia Weekly)
Philadelphia newspaper employees are mulling over a new memo warning that management threatened layoffs in a Tuesday meeting. One employee emailed it to staffers a second time with a subject line that referenced Philadelphia Media Holdings CEO and publisher Brian Tierney. "Remember that guy who said he was about to start the next great era in journalism?" it reads. "He was full of sh*t." Inky: Philly newspapers, unions at odds as contracts near end.

ElleGirl Getting a New Lease on Life (WWD)
Hachette Filipacchi Media shuttered the teen title after the June/July issue to focus on its online offering. Come Monday, the company will relaunch the Web site, Ellegirl.com, which now will have video content, daily mobile text alerts and other interactive bells and whistles that teen girls love.

New Primetime TV Look for Elections (AP)
Katie Couric and Charles Gibson will make their prime-time debuts as chief anchors for CBS and ABC next month during hour-long specials reporting midterm election results. Brian Williams is likely to do the same at NBC, but that network hasn't announced its Election Night plans.

Sites Try to Leverage 'Genius Factor' (WaPo)
A small number of Web sites are seeking to turn the wisdom of the Internet on its head by sifting through its vast number of users to identify a handful of experts. If this novel approach withstands scrutiny, the reverberations could extend well beyond sports betting to include stock trading, popular culture and other realms.

Reporter in the War Zone: When the Firing Stops (E&P)
Megan Stack's dispatches from Lebanon last summer during the 34-day conflict were filled with vivid and often graphic accounts of how the Israeli bombing campaign impacted civilians and government infrastructure. She says being a woman in fundamentalist countries has been a mixed blessing: "There are stories I can do that men can't."

Akron Beacon Journal, Ohio.com Leave Careerbuilder for Deal With Monster (Akron Beacon Journal)
The paper and its Web site are joining forces with online jobs recruiter Monster.com, replacing the newspaper's current online jobs partner, CareerBuilder.com. The move will expand the Beacon Journal's and Ohio.com's online help-wanted advertising footprint throughout Northeast Ohio, including the Cleveland market.

With Media Rules Relaxed, Australian Billionaire Packer Carves Up His Media Empire (Forbes)
James Packer, chief executive of Australian media giant Publishing and Broadcasting has shifted half the company's media assets into a joint venture with a private equity group. The deal came just hours after the Australia's parliament passed a law lifting constraints on foreign ownership and mergers.