Media-Whore D'Oeuvres



(image via JT/NYSocialDiary)

"HANNAH Bronfman celebrated her coming of legal drinking age over the weekend. Saturday night, the daughter of Warner Music Group chairman Edgar Bronfman Jr. partied at Citrine on West 21st Street with her brother, Ben Brewer, lead guitar/vocalist of the Exit, and his pregnant fiancée, Sri Lankan pop star M.I.A. - who was 'cuddling with Ben all night, rubbing her belly and dancing.' Bronfman's publicist told us '300 BFFs' (best friends forever) attended, and the after-party continued at Bronfman's suite at the Hotel on Rivington." (NYPost)

"Yesterday was a rainy day in New York and when it wasn’t raining, it was getting colder. Down at Michael’s a group of women were celebrating Kathy Lacey Hoge’s 39th birthday at the round table in the bay. At the table right next to them was the beautiful Jane Fonda looking like the glamorous movie star she always will be .. Right next to them Liz Smith was lunching with Ellen Levine, the editorial director of Hearst .. Liz Smith is one of the leading philanthropists in New York today, personally without wealth, she raises millions and millions and millions every year for causes benefiting mainly the children and the citizens in need of New York (and the world)." (NYSocialDiary)

"The global financial crisis will reduce the hedge-fund industry to as little as a third of its current size, billionaire investor George Soros said yesterday. 'The hedge-fund industry is going to move through a shakeout,' Soros, one of the world's first hedge-fund managers and still among the best known, said yesterday in a speech at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. 'In my estimation (the industry) will be reduced in size by anywhere between half and two thirds,' he said. He did not specify if he was talking about the number of funds or the amount of money invested in them. Many of the ultra-wealthy investors who fueled a doubling in hedge-fund industry assets to about $1.9 trillion across roughly 10,000 of the loosely regulated funds worldwide in the last three years have been pulling their money out, fearful of hedge-fund failures." (NYPost)

"Grace Jones is what we call a proper diva. Apart from having nightly caviar facials and manicures on her Hurricane tour starting January 19 in Birmingham, just like at the Mobos she'll get driven right up to the stage." (The3AMGirls)

"On the afternoon of Thursday, Oct. 23, around 1 p.m., Phil Griffin, the president of MSNBC, reached into his back pocket and pulled out his wallet. Mr. Griffin was sitting at a table at the Sea Grill restaurant, overlooking the ice rink at Rockefeller Plaza, the nerve center of NBC. From the wallet, he pulled out a tattered CNN work ID from the early ’80s, a memento, he said, from his first job in TV. He always kept the CNN badge on him. 'Not sure why,' he said." (Observer)

"The opening of a new waterway between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans is akin in historic significance to the opening of the Suez Canal, in 1869, or is Panamanian cousin, in 1914. With this sea change will come the rise and fall of international seaports, newfound access to nearly a quarter of the world's remaining undiscovered oil and gas reserves, and a recalibration of geo-strategic power." (TheAtlantic)

"In the opening panel at ContentNext Media’s EconSports conference, moderator Will Leitch, founder of Gawker-owned sports news blog Deadspin, remembered the reaction among sports executives when they first saw his approach to covering sports. 'They were surprised at how quickly we posted and the interaction with readers.' Now, he added, 'leagues can’t be stupid [about social media] anymore.'" (Paidcontent)



(image via foreignpolicy)

"Prince Charles seems to like visiting Tokyo in times of crisis. The heir to the British throne last visited in November 1990 as Japan's economic bubble was exploding. He's here again this week as the bursting of another bubble -- this one in global credit markets -- drags down the Asian nation's economy. A coincidence, perhaps, yet the trip hasn't been without an economic dust-up of its own. Public scrutiny prompted Prince Charles and his wife, Camilla, to bring a smaller-than-usual entourage amid dimming growth prospects. In the spirit of thrift, he is paying for Camilla's return flight himself, as the Duchess of Cornwall is heading back early." (Bloomberg)