Jon Stewart Suddenly Not Looking Like the Nice GuyMEDIA
• Is Jon Stewart really the only late-night host not currently covering the salaries of his laid-off, non-striking employees? [Mixed Media/Portfolio]
• The key lines from the n+1 essay that helped convinced Choire Sicha and Emily Gould to quit: “The purpose of Gawker Media was always to improve on the print publishing business model. It was never, as the content of Gawker sometimes seemed to suggest, to produce critiques of the waste that model created. The content at Gawker, like most Condé Nast titles, is a service to the advertisers. … You could say that as Gawker Media grew, from Gawker’s success, Gawker outlived the conditions for its existence.” Joshua David Stein announced his own departure, due mostly to personal loyalty, on Saturday. [n+1, Media Mob/NYO]
• Meanwhile, Portfolio’s Jeff Bercovici proves that Condé and Gawker really are at the same level: “By the way, those who feel wronged by Gawker over the years can take some satisfaction in the uniquely terrible timing of the walkout for Denton, who is pumped full of painkillers after a recent back injury. Last week, the pain became so intense he needed an ambulance to get to the hospital. As he was being loaded into the ambulance, he says, his greatest fear was that he would be spotted by someone from Gawker, which is headquartered just down the block from his home.” [Mixed Media/Portfolio]
company town
Rove, Regan and Rather: Crazy? Or Crazy Like Foxes?MEDIA
• How did Judith Regan’s high-level lawyers let her bat-shit-crazy legal complaint get through? Oh that’s right, she’s Judith Regan. [Legal Pad/Fortune]
• CBS finally got around to filing their motion to dismiss Dan Rather’s suit. The network claims they are “mystified” by Rather’s “bizarre allegations,” and that the lawsuit amounts to a “regrettable attempt by plaintiff Dan Rather to remain in the public eye, and to settle old scores and perceived slights, based on an array of far-fetched allegations.” [NYO]
• Karl Rove signed on to become a regular contributor to Newsweek. Maybe they should consider changing their slogan to “fair and balanced”? [Mixed Media/Portfolio]
white men with money
Merrill Lynch Hopes John Thain Will Be the Piper Who Leads Them to Reason Mother Merrill’s devoted sons (and daughters) may be a little bit freaked that the board has named NYSE CEO John Thain, whose background includes a dozen years at their archrival Goldman Sachs, the new CEO of Merrill Lynch. “It’s shocking [they picked] someone from a Goldman Sachs background,” the bank’s former CEO Dan Tully told the Journal today. Tully also said Thain didn’t seem to be a “folksy” “people person” consistent with the culture of Merrill. “I understand he’s very cerebral,” he said. Au contraire, Monsieur Tully! You must have missed New York’s seminal profile of Thain back in January. “I did not grow up in an upper-crust, aristocratic background,” Thain explained. In fact, he grew up in Antioch, Illinois, where he went to public school and was on the wrestling team. It doesn’t get much folksier than that! Plus, it’s pretty much guaranteed that Thain’s risk-management skills will bring Merrill back from the brink of disaster, so … A note to folks over at Merrill, if you’d like to bond with the boss, here’s a tip: Zeppelin. Dude loves Jimmy Page — he even has one of his autographed guitars, from the day Warner Music went public. “He played the guitar section of ‘Whole Lotta Love’ and timed the final chord for the bell,” Thain told New York “with uncharacteristic enthusiasm.” So may we suggest a few rounds of Guitar Hero? Hey, it worked for Serena and Vanessa on Gossip Girl.
Merrill Taps Thain as CEO [WSJ]
Related: Who Is NYSE CEO John Thain? [NYM]