Boa Opening B Grill at LAXParent company IDG is also opening with Gino Angelini in L.A. this fall, and adding an Abu Dhabi outpost of their steakhouse.
Steven Tyler: Quitter, or Just Moody?When you’re in a band with somebody who insists on staying in a separate hotel, it’s not so easy to know when they’ve decided to quit.
Sickos Behind Marketing for Airborne Were Lying to Us AllLEGAL
• Manhattan’s Tonic East restaurant will pay $35,000 to settle a lawsuit alleging that the eatery discriminated against blacks wearing hip-hop clothing and urban wear to a Super Tuesday event for Barack Obama supporters. [NYT]
• Office procrastinators might have to look for a new method for wasting time: Scrabulous is under fire. [DealBook/Alley Insider]
• Airborne, the cold-relieving drug of choice for many cube dwellers around the city, will pay $23.3 million to settle claims of false advertising. Says one critic, “Airborne is basically on overpriced, run-of-the-mill vitamin pill that’s been cleverly, but deceptively, marketed.” Holy wow. Anyone want to come together and ratchet this up to class-action against “second-grade teacher” founder Victoria Knight-McDowell? [CNN]
company town
Howard Stern Thinks Imus Will Make You HurlMEDIA
• Carson Daly is going scab! Good thing he doesn’t have any viewers, and unlike Ellen isn’t actually a member of the Writers Guild. [NYT]
• Howard Stern gets all collegiate about Don Imus’s return: “At this point, I don’t think he’s very relevant. People will tune out within a week. I defy you to listen. See how long you can keep listening. Time it. You’ll throw up. You’ll get sick. You’ll die.” [AP via Mixed Media/Portfolio]
• Knicks reporters — even bigger whiners than regular reporters. Daily News vet Frank Isola: “It used to be fun here. Now, there are some nights when you’re trying to talk your boss out of sending you here and maybe lie and tell him you’re sick or something.” [NYO]
company town
Ben Bradlee Believes in Rupert MurdochMEDIA
• Legendary Washington Post editor Ben Bradlee on Rupe’s play for the Journal: “I think Murdoch is a better journalist than the rest of you do. Well, I think because he’s smart, and he’s not going to fill it up with pussy stories. And he’s going to get good reporters. I think he does not want to fail on this.” [Radar]
• Ted Kennedy sold his memoir to Grand Central Publishing for $8 million, but the deal first has to be cleared by the Senate Ethics Committee. Something tells us the chapter on Chappaquiddick won’t be too long. [NYT]
• The Times bagged their first refugee from the Journal, though it’s not a very big catch: John Harwood, the veteran CNBC Washington correspondent and occasional contributor to the Journal, will now take his part-time work to the Gray Lady. [NYO]
in other news
NYU to Go Arabian
NYU is set to open up a full-fledged campus in Abu Dhabi, reports today’s Times. Negotiations over creating the school, which will be funded by the Abu Dhabi government, have stretched over a year. “We were extremely concerned that this be completely and fully an American N.Y.U. operation,” said one senior faculty member, “with the same values that apply here, and no discrimination on the basis of national origin, race, sex or religion.” We’re guessing the net real affect on undergrads enrolled there will be minimal — falafel in Abu Dhabi can’t taste that different from Mamoun’s.
N.Y.U. Plans a Branch in Abu Dhabi, Officials Say [NYT]
