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Eating their analysis with a fork and a spoon: Dismantle the punditocracy in the Media area of
Table Talk
___________________ Want the story behind the story? Check out barnesandnoble.com's selection of books about the media
R E C E N T L Y
A battle for the soul of America Magazine racks Of Fallowships, Flynt, Republican phone sex and demon goddesses of love The century of the trial "Firing Line" ceases fire BROWSE THE
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------ Looking for a mate? The Wall Street Journal can help. Last month, a front page Journal story told the tale of Lesley Friedman, a 39-year-old woman who sold her business for $21 million, retired and set out to use her business skills to land a husband. The story netted Friedman suitors and good fortune in the form of a book deal, a movie deal and invitations from TV talk show hosts. "The article was a giant, high-class singles ad," says Friedman. "So many men phoned the journal looking for my phone number that, for a few weeks, [Journal reporter Robert McGough] had an outgoing message that said, 'If you're calling for Lesley Friedman, her number is ...'" Friedman narrowed the 200 calls she received to 60 attractive-seeming would-be dates. Her secretary requested photos and bios from these potential suitors; Friedman took measures to ensure none were ax murderers or stalkers. She is about to make contact with the 10 most terrific inquirers. That is, if she has time -- what with the book and movie deals the Journal piece occasioned. "Every agent called," Friedman says. Eventually she agreed to do a book about the peculiar situation facing a 40-ish woman who devotes her young years to her profession and then notices she forgot to find a husband or have a family. "Everyone wants to add their two cents on this. It struck a real chord," says Friedman, who, in addition to calls from interested men, received advice from hundreds of people who called from all over the country. The plight of a successful woman searching for love struck chords in Hollywood, too. Creative Artists Agency signed Friedman and is selling rights to her upcoming book. "I didn't want to work. I want to find a husband," Friedman says of the deals. In addition to the dates and deals, the Journal piece gave Friedman a bit of a media education. The Star picked up the story, she says, and ran a piece estimating her net worth as $125 million and claiming she'd offered a $100,000 reward to anyone who introduced her to a future husband. The magazine included a photograph of Friedman with a lot of visible cleavage. "I don't know where they got any of that," she says, "but now I understand what it's like to be a celebrity. And, I know now you can't believe anything you read about celebrities." Oh that the Journal's computer system were as swift and efficient as the paper's matchmaking services. After years of high-tech troubles, the paper plans to chuck its relatively new, $40 million computer system. The system was a bugaboo for editors from the start; introduced in the early '90s, before it was obvious the Internet would be the communications medium of the future, the Journal system doesn't afford reporters or editors Internet access. Editors hated it from the start and technicians reportedly deconstructed parts of the system so that the software could be transferred to usable systems. After the Journal's disastrous experience with TeleRate -- the financial news service the Journal sold at a huge loss -- the botched computer purchase can't be good news for CEO Peter Kahn. A 40-year-old looking-for-love angle on the blunder and perhaps the Journal can recoup some of its losses with a Hollywood package. Hirschorn out at Spin Ownership has its privileges. Apparently job security isn't one of them. When Miller Publishing bought Spin magazine for $43 million from Bob Guccione Jr. in 1997, Michael Hirschorn took over as editor and became a part owner. On Tuesday, over a croissant breakfast, Spin's majority owner, Robert Miller, let Hirschorn know his services were no longer needed. "Any time you put out a magazine that is ambitious and idiosyncratic, you have to be prepared to have your heart broken," said Hirschorn from his home on Wednesday. Hirschorn, formerly an editor at Esquire and at New York magazine, has been through this twice before. A Spin spokesperson said "creative differences" between editor and publisher prompted Hirschorn's removal. "Everything is up. The magazine is doing great: Ad pages are up, circulation is up, subscriptions are up," the spokesperson said. "For the first quarter of '99, ad pages up 12 percent, March issue is very, very large, one of the biggest in the history of Spin." Insiders say Miller Publishing brass found Hirschorn's Spin too clever, too smartass. Former Vibe editor Alan Light will take over at Spin effective immediately. Light, who tripled circulation during his tenure at Vibe, is expected to produce a straight-up magazine that won't ruffle any feathers. Despite its commercial success, Vibe is not regarded as a daring or original journalistic venture. "Maybe Miller wants to turn Spin into the snappy, sexy magazine Vibe has become," says a former Vibe staffer who remembers Miller brass directing art editors to "get more tits in the magazine." Hirschorn -- who reportedly wasn't terribly happy at Spin and was said to have repeatedly asked friends, "When will this be fun?" -- said his experience at Spin had made him unambitious. The deposed editor said there weren't many magazines out there that he'd like to edit. "It might be fun to figure out a way to do publishing, good publishing, on a small scale and on a level where it's possible to do good work without the sword of Damocles hanging overhead," he said cheerily. "Or maybe I'll go into an Internet business and make my first billion." Miller Publishing will buy out Hirschorn's less than 10 percent interest in Spin. Zuckerman does the right thing, maybe Majority ownership has its privileges. And killing unfriendly copy may be one of them. Wednesday's New York Post included a prominently positioned piece on socially connected plastic surgeon Dan Baker's possible suicide attempt. The Post piece notes that the story was first reported in New York magazine. As it happens, the New York Daily News had the story nearly a month ago. But Daily News owner Mortimer Zuckerman reportedly put the kibosh on the piece. Zuckerman, says a source familiar with the tale, is a good friend of Baker's in-laws, Liz Rohatyn and her husband, U.S. Ambassador to France Felix Rohatyn. Zuckerman kept a close eye on the story and made it known he did not want it to run, even as a blind item, according to a source. Zuckerman, who was traveling, said through a spokesperson, "This information is false." Admitting an intervention might actually have made Zuckerman look good: Keeping piffle about a friend's possible suicide attempt out of his paper seems an honorable use of power. Flynt's friends This week's New York Observer has an intriguing piece on Dan Moldea, the investigative reporter busily digging up Republican dirt for Larry Flynt. Moldea, according to the Observer, got to Flynt through Neil Livingstone, a Washington security consultant and freelance counterterrorism expert for NBC. If true, the Observer's report ought to silence those who insist the White House is behind Flynt's political striptease efforts. Why? Livingstone, hardly a Clinton flack, is an old pal of right-wing poster boy Oliver North. Truth, hair and the Times Magazine Who, according to the New York Times Magazine, "are the ones who
fascinate"? You guessed it. Jane, Linda, Liz and Anna. That's Jane Pratt,
Linda Wells, Liz Tilberis and Anna Wintour, editors of Jane, Allure, Bazaar
and Vogue, respectively. In an illuminating little piece about the four
Editors in Chic, writer Mary Tannen discovers that the fab fashion four
have one important thing in common: "loyalty to hair personnel." Linda, Liz
and Anna stick to classic styles, and Jane -- who tells the Times her
"attention span is not that long" and she therefore cannot endure
particular styles for long -- remains true to the same stylist. When
exactly did Pratt enter the grade along with the big fashion three? Pratt,
who has made a career of being simpatico with 20-year-olds, may
consider her inclusion on the Times' Editors in Chic list a descent into
grown-up life. Just be loyal, gentle reader, to hair personnel.
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