A Little of the Old In and Out




Kevin Wall in the center of it all. (image via networklive)

In: Kevin Wall. Digital killed the radio star. And now, the network of the future lies doggo before us. Kevin Wall, the founder and CEO of Network Live, the lifeforce behind the groundbreaking Live8, is looking for the next big thing. And, he says, it won't be music. Says Staci Kramer of Paidcontent:

"Caught up with Kevin Wall after his session near the end of Billboard Mecca conf at CTIA. It's been more than 8 months since the success of Live 8 and almost that long since Network Live, a joint venture with AEG, AOL and XM went live with its first concert. What most people may not realize is Network Live was already in start-up mode when Wall took a leave of absence to produce Live 8. (Until then, he'd been out of the concert production business for ten years.) The deals with XM and AOL were "pretty much negotiated" before Live 8, says Wall.

"'There's no regularity to this yet. In a very short period of time we're doing great numbers in traffic, which I can't tell you. Revenue is way over what we projected. Expenses are less than I said. My headcount's less than I thought it would be. I've got a global infrastructure -- an office in London, an office in New York, this office in LA. We've produced about 35 shows in music. We're now hopefully going to accelerate our plans on our launch of our next big vertical, which will not be music, it will be the next big thing around the theory of live and I think that's probably going to be in the fall so we've accelerated that by six months. We are looking now to start to look at some strategic acquisitions to continue to drive this. We are here to build what is the new live pop-culture, multi-platform digital entertainment universe.'"

Download the interesting audio of the interview from Paidcontent here.



(image via observer)

Out: Pinch Sulzberger. The Old Gray Lady is clearly at an historical crossroads. (The Corsair lights a Cohiba Corona Especiale) Even Harold Evans has noticed. Sulzberger's anxious hesistation at this critical Either/Or juncture annerves. Perhaps "Pinch" should whip out his goddamned Purple Moose to help him make the next pimp move. (Exaggerated cough suggesting feigned detachment) On the one hand, he can take baby steps on digitizing the New York Times entirely, which was an rather brilliant suggestion by the otherwise buffonish James Cramer. (Averted Gaze) The Corsair would phase out the daily print editions of the Times altogether, except for the Sunday edition, which is an advertising cash cow and the way we work our way through our hangovers. Says Cramer:

"In a week�s time, the New York Times Company will report another dismal quarter, one that will show decreased cash flow and total chaos in the New England region (thank you, Boston Globe) and reflect the admission, however tacit, that the company, despite recent deep job cuts, still has too many mouths to feed.

"... Yet, there�s hope. Hope from an ironic source, but hope nonetheless ... Why not preselect everything we need from the Times via Google and be done with the paper entirely? While we�re at it, why not write the obituary of the whole company? After all, it�s been the worst-performing newspaper stock in America for the past five years. The stock�s down 30 percent in the last year and 50 percent from just three years ago. Portfolio managers despise the thing and know that, unlike the just-sold Knight Ridder, the family owners at the Times have created a dual class of stock that makes a takeover simply impossible (the other class has all the voting power). To Wall Street, despite the unassailable brand name, the company�s got a real Sartre thing going, a total Huis Clos: static circulation, uneven ads, and a cost structure that, despite giant cuts to every division save online, can�t be right-sized without gutting the operation."

Sulzberger is portrayed as channeling his inner Hamlet once again on the TV side. Says Gabriel Sherman in the salmon-colored weekly:

"The New York Times is considering pulling up stakes in its great venture into television.

"Though the award-winning but ratings-deficient Discovery Times channel is a 50-50 partnership with Discovery Communications, Discovery currently controls four of the seven seats on its board. According to sources at The Times and the Discovery Channel familiar with the negotiations, The Times wants to add an eighth member.

"Or perhaps Times executives may decide not to have a television station at all.

"Later this month, The Times will reach a window in its three-year-old deal with Discovery: It will have an option to sell back its stake, for which The Times paid $100 million."

In for a penny, in for a pound, Pinchykins. No one can put on more meaningful documentaries than the Times. And let's see Kristoff in Darfur; Friedman in India and Lebanon and Herbert in Washington. But you have to go in full-throttle, Pinch. You can't just be a bitch. More here.



Michael Roberts and Roberto Cavalli. (image via style)

In:The New Yorker's Michael Roberts. Fashionhero Michael Roberts, who may or may not be the frontrunner to become Vanity Fair's Fashion Director, packed them in Tuesday despite the April chill. According to Fashionweekdaily:

"...A gaggle of 'it' boys and girls turned up the heat inside the Tod�s store on Madison Avenue, where the Italian leather goods house joined The New Yorker in hosting a preview of its Michael Roberts-designed T-Logo accessories.

"Dennis Hopper, Samantha Boardman, Fabian and Martina Basabe, Julia Restoin Roitfeld, Margherita Missoni, Robert Burke, Barbara Wilhelm, Claire Bernard, Genevieve Jones, Zani Gugelmann, Ren�e Rockefeller, Jennifer Creel, Carlos Souza, Amanda Hearst, Lisa Airan, Carlos Mota, Kelly Killoren, Marina Rust Connor, and Celerie Kemble all made their way through the newly-expanded, 6,500-square foot store, where floor-to-ceiling vachetta leather screens housed different rooms displaying Roberts� oversized illustrations of cartoon-like speedboats alongside wares from Derek Lam."

Does this constitute the "Seventh Room," Graydon?

More here.



(image via stephenelliot)

Out: The Legacy of Tom Delay. The perfect Dickensian villain Robert Novak wildly overstates the ultimate legacy of Tom Delay, who was ultimately brought low by his own political overreach namely, Texas Congressional redistricting. The Texas finance probe was merely the proximate cause. Novak valedictory:

"DeLay's 11-term House career now coming to a close was filled with paradoxes. He must be ranked with the great legislative leaders of all time, such as Thomas Brackett Reed, Robert A. Taft and Lyndon B. Johnson. Nobody has been as effective in enacting the conservative agenda into law, which explains the intense opposition to him. The House has been a different place since he stepped down as majority leader six months ago, easier to go along and get along for members of both parties."

It is impossible to argue that Delay was one of the most successful Congressional legislators of our time. But -- leaving aside the financial improprieties -- there was never any grand vision or overarching theme beyond his cultural conservatism that drove him. Delay was simply an ideological enforcer, the soi-dissant "Hammer." Taft, for all his faults, was a committed isolationist (at the time "anti-interventionist"), and LBJ, notwithstanding Vietnam, signed the Civil Rights Act.


Delay utilized his power bluntly, hammerlike, not for a worthy ideal, but only for the betterment of his organization.



(image via sky)

In: Peaches Geldoff. In lieu of Parasite Hilton, whose demise from our radar may or may not have something to do with the The Herpes Simplex (Exaggerated cough suggesting feigned detachment), we need a new "It" Girl. We vote for Peaches Geldoff, even though she is only 17, and won't be ripe yet for another year (but that didn't stop her from pinching Pete Doherty's concave ass). According to the 3AMGirls:

"Trying to get into Madame JoJo's club in Soho, preachy rock star Bob's 17-year-old daughter came out with the immortal 'Don't you know who I am?' line.

"She rocked up with sister Pixie, 15, and a group of pals to see band Naked Girls play on Tuesday night.

"... Our source tells us: 'Peaches strutted up to the front desk and looked shocked when she was asked to pay to get in. She asked, 'Do you know who I am?' but no one recognised her until she said her name.

".. But the undeterred party girl pulled a fast one and crept in with the band itself"