Dumenco points to Rupert Murdoch and Steven Brill as voices calling for an end to free news on the Internet. But Dumenco is concerned that "a lot of news — possibly most news — has little real value to the average consumer." His prime example: Phillip Garrido's kidnapping of Jaycee Lee Dugard. Dumenco writes,

The Garrido story has essentially zero value in my life. In fact, I'm frustrated by how compelling it is, how much time I've already spent reading about the story (mostly on the web), because there's absolutely nothing to be gained from it. (I might actually be willing to pay to never have to hear Garrido's name again.) Garrido is obviously something of a sui generis monster, so there are no object lessons here, it's not a cautionary tale, and there are likely few adjustments to be made to, say, the California parole system (Garrido was on parole for an old crime). We simply flock to this story, almost compulsively, like the proverbial car accident. Not because it's informative or edifying, but because, well, we can't look away. It's tragedy porn.

First of all, the idea that Garrido is one-of-a-kind, "so there are no object lessons here," is a bit of wishful thinking. He's hardly the first person to kidnap a child (as comparisons to the also-highly-publicized Elizabeth Smart case attest). He wasn't even the only sex offender in his neighborhood. His story has implications not just for the "California parole system" and the Contra Costa County Sheriff's Department (a country district supervisor has said, "I feel confident the sheriff will use this as an example of how to do things better"), but also for how we deal with sex offenders and treat people with delusions. And as Gavin de Becker implies in The Gift of Fear, knowing how criminals operate can help protect ourselves and others.

Of course, this doesn't mean we necessarily need to hear from Jaycee Dugard's aunt — and certainly, news networks are sometimes guilty of exploiting tragedy to boost their bottom line. But Dumenco sounds a little bit like the old SNL bit where Al Franken asked "How does this affect me, Al Franken?" That was in part a joke about self-absorption, and it's somewhat self-absorbed to assume that every piece of news has to be personally applicable to you in order to be worthwhile. News is a little bit like science — it's not always possible to tell at the outset what its applications will be. And it's a pretty short journey from "how does this Garrido thing affect me?" to "how do these elections in Afghanistan affect me?" to a damaging disaffection with other people and the world.

There's an interesting conversation to be had about what kind of online news people will actually pay for. Will they shell out for Heidi Montag's latest lameness but not for healthcare reform? Domestic but not international? TV recaps but not book reviews? Will a pay model for online news lead media outlets to be even more sensationalistic than they already are? It's possible. And it's certainly true that Rupert Murdoch of all people isn't above using stories like Garrido's as "porn." But that doesn't mean we shouldn't hear these stories at all, or that the only news that's worth paying for is news with a personal and immediate application.

Image via LA Times.

How Much Would YOU Pay to Read Still More About Sicko Garrido? [Advertising Age]

The Good:
Amy Poehler: Actress, comedienne, Christian Siriano copycat.
I can only hope that Angelica Huston was invited for her amazing turn in The Darjeeling Limited as a mother/Buddhist nun who doesn't know what to talk about when we talk about love.
Ann Moore, left, is the CEO of Time, Inc. Indra Nooyi, right, is the CEO of Pepsi Co. Donatella Versace would be happy, surely, to see women in power wearing dresses.
Arianna Huffington: She writes books, she runs blogs, she wears ballgowns.
Elizabeth Gilbert, author of Eat, Pray, Love, which was apparently a little smug, highly readable and very "influential." (I hate that word.)
Georgina Chapman designs for Marchesa and married Harvey Weinstein. I'm not sure if these things, independently or together, make her a person of merit. But what do I know?
Kristen Wiig of SNL: Further proof that women are funny.
Madeeha Hasan Odhaib is the "Mother Theresa of Baghdad." I wonder if George Bush, or even fellow attendee John McCain, even care.
I love Martha Stewart: She runs an empire and still manages to can her own preserves. Also, she does it in heels.
Mary Lou Jepsen founded Pixel Qi and was also the founding Chief Technology Officer of One Laptop Per Child, which strives to deliver mesh-networked laptops to children in developing countries.
Nancy Brinker, who founded Susan G. Komen for the Cure, is a breast cancer survivor and mother, and was also appointed to the position of Chief of Protocol by President Bush.
Rupert Murdoch and Wendi Deng: The dark overlord and his whipsmart wife.
Suzanne Vega: She sings.
Sure Baby Mama is supposed to be the anti-Knocked Up or whatever, but more importantly, Tina Fey has brought Liz Lemon and Tracey Jordan into our lives.
Did you participate in Teach for America? Or have eighty gajilliion friends who did? Thank Wendy Kopp, who founded the program, for the experience.
Ziyi Zhang: She acts. Also I am in awe of her bone structure.

[Images via Getty.]

The Good:
Christy Turlington glows in a red dress in an unexpected silhouette.
Emily Mortimer went a little gladiator for the superhero theme.
Stella McCartney and Kate Moss shine perfectly.
Camilla Belle looks wrapped in clouds.
If I were Christina Ricci, I would never ever ever take this dress off. Ever. It is one of the greatest things I have ever seen. Love. Speechless. Sigh.
Diane Kruger looks a little bit like the Tin Man, but I love that she went for a short dress. Also, love love the shoes.
Iman. Always perfect. What else is new?
Kate Mara! Yellow! Yes! Yes!
Tom Cruise looks weirder than normal, but Katie Holmes looks fantastic, which of course I hate to say. But there's no denying all that red.
Dear Mischa Barton: Strip and give me that dress right now. Kthanxbai.
Please God let my face age like Natasha Richardson's.
Rachel Bilson looks like a total freak and I love. Clearly, she mistook "superheroes" to mean "Morticia Addams."
ScarJo is simultaneously old school and somewhat infantalized in her D&G but she looks hot, so good for her.
I still am not entirely sure who Taylor Swift is, but I like her chainmail-esque dress.
Sorry, you just can't hate on Victoria Beckham.
Emmy Rossum is a head-turner in this black-and-white floral frock.
Claudia Schiffer's dress is downright ethereal. Valentino is downright orange.
Ellen Barkin manages to always play it classy.
Jessica Stam is sorta a bad ass!
Michelle Trachtenberg? Or Liza at Studio 54?
Molly Sims must know my weakness for the color yellow.
Call me a crazy motherfucker, but Wendi Deng looks incredible.
Almost-goth Amanda Peet is fabulous.
Um, I love that Amber Valetta's dress has wings.
I totally heart you and your kick-ass black dress Ashley Olsen.
Can we discuss how awesome it is that Barbara Walters is there with Charlie Rose?
Claire Danes is sorta channeling Angela here, no?
This is seriously the best I have ever seen Fergie look.
Yeah, same for Hilary Duff.
Lake Bell went for it.
Lauren Bush is one class act in royal purple.
Margherita Missoni: Crazy-awesome.
Michelle Monahagan should only ever wear copper. Wow.
Paula Patton: Pretty.
Sofia's shiny drop-waisted number is delightful.
Tilda Swinton? Or Mr. Roboto?
Vera Wang and Karolina Kurkova play their metallics en suite.
Be my flamenco dancer, Ingrid van der Bosch.
Maggie Gyllenhaal knows you gotta go big or go home.
Venus Williams is a beacon of light.
Be still my heart, Zoe Kravitz-as-a-Clara Bow.
Bee Shaffer's dress is phenomenal. But why is Andre Leon Talley relegated to straightening her train?!

[Images via Getty.]

[Images via AP and Getty.]

"Free from horoscopes, letters and sensationalized sex stories," it promised to instead deliver "frocks, politics, lipstick, handbags, human rights, babies, gardening, stilettos, fridge magnets." Its target age range was 15-40. I bought every issue I could get my hands on at the campus international bookstore/clove cigarette purveyor. But...

No one else did. In one of those cases of tremendous pressure meets limited funding meets entrenched competition, Frank shut down after less than two years.

Pursuits will be a whole nother story. It's not a women's magazine but a magazine that must appeal to women in order to win over the Sunday advertisers the Journal craves. It won't rely on the "blink" psychology of newsstand sales. It doesn't have to appeal to 15-year-olds or run horoscopes. It doesn't have to be at all "cool." Maybe, with all those advantages, Tina Gaudoin will be able to put together a magazine that is, actually somewhat "frank"?

Funnily enough, a lot of people thought they'd hand the reins to another Frank, as in Robert Frank, the newspaper's chronicler of the uberwealthy and how they live and author of the book Richistan — wisely, they found someone who might be a little less openly contemptuous of the wealth of its most valuable readers. Personally, I could use a weekly magazine edited by Thomas Frank, but no one asked me.

Editor is picked at WSJ Mag [NY Post]

• Miramax mogul Harvey Weinstein and Marchesa co-designer Georgina Chapman got hitched on Saturday night at Weinstein's home in Westport, CT. The bride wore Marchesa, the groom Tom Ford, the Gypsy Kings gave a private concert and even Vogue's Anna Wintour attended. Also there: Model Natalia Vodianova, celebrity stylist Rachel Zoe, Renée Zellweger, Jennifer Lopez, Marc Anthony, Anne Hathaway and Cameron Diaz (all of whom, sadly, need no further introduction). [WWD, 1st item]
  
• Chapman designed not one but two gowns for her wedding: One for the ceremony and one for the reception. Modest! [GlamChic]
  
• This year's CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fun big winner Rogan Gregory is rumored to be the next designer to do a collection for Target, thus confirming Moe's theory that designers go straight from Vogue to the red bullseye, lovingly guided by Anna Wintour herself. [WWD, 2nd item]

• God bless Valentino. The man denied his retirement for an eternity, then announced he was retiring, then threw himself a giant party for the anniversary of his label, and now — just for good measure — he is being honored by the mayor of Paris with an honorary citizenship to the city. [Fashion Week Daily]
• Victoria Beckham's "V-Sculpt' make-up line scares us even more than Victoria Beckham's sculpted boobs. [BellaSugar]
• Oh Lord: Who would want Tara Reid to be the face of anything? Yet alone "sleepwear." [Sassybella]
• High Grant ex/English socialite Jemima Khan has designed a charm bracelet to benefit some charitable cause. The charms on the bracelet represent the five major world religions. Says Khan of her design, "I have been personally connected to the three Abrahamic religions: Judaism through my paternal grandfather, Christianity through my mother, and Islam through my marriage and my children." Well doesn't that make her special! [Fashion Week Daily]
• All that talk about Vivienne Westwood moving her show back to London from Paris? Sorta bullshit. Westwood will only be showing her secondary line, Red Label, in Mother England. The eponymous shit will still show en Paris. [Vogue UK]
• YSL designer Stefano Pilati has decided that runway shows and scary and impersonal so he will be showing the YSL menswear collection in a presentation and a private dinner this season instead. Touching is permitted. [Fashion Week Daily]
• Oh no! Another cryptic e-mail from ELLE's Gilles Bensimon! Really, someone please stage an intervention and soon. [Fashion Week Daily]
• Another reason to love/loathe Topshop: Launching collections ''collaborated" on by English designers Jonathan Saunders, Louise Goldin, Christopher Kane, Marios Schwab, Todd Lynn and Richard Nicoll starting in mid-January. [WWD, 5th item]
• Herve Leger is back! And now designed under the Max Azria label. Um, ok? [WWD, 4th item]

Regan also says that HarperCollins encouraged "a culture of gossip, back-stabbing, negative leaks and hostility." This from a woman who used to call her assistants cunts who only had a job because of her hard work. Regan insists that she was made to take the fall for the bad publicity sullying the O.J. imaginary confession, If I Did It and her lawsuit also alleges "that Rupert Murdoch personally approved the Simpson project and suggested that she pay $1 million for the deal." Say what you will about Regan, but everything she publishes, even her lawsuits, are juicy!

Judith Regan Sues Murdoch Empire [The Smoking Gun]
Ousted publisher Regan sues former employer for $100M [USA Today]
In Complaint, a Portrait of a Company Marked by Rivalry [New York Times]
The Judith Regan Story[New York Magazine]

There's also something to be said for the ingeniousness of its editorial-advertising department synergy: in one six-page (ooh, see what we did there?) feature, "Fall Fashion Picks from the Pros," the magazine actually enlists executives at five major department stores to assemble seasonal "looks" from clothes, accessories and cosmetics all entirely available at their respective employers. (Also intriguingly, the stylist on the feature appears to have been paid by the department stores themselves?) But where the magazine exercises editorial independence it falls flat: its warmed-over list of the 25 best-dressed ladies at New York Fashion Week included Teen Vogue editor Amy Astley, whom we've pictured here so you can ogle all that personal style she is exuding. Its columnists, too, are still clearly finding their voices: an item by "Socializer" columnist Kelly Killoren Bensimon contains the puzzling rumination: "You can't afford cigarettes or taxis anymore. Might as well walk outside. Might as well walk outside and inhale the toxic fumes. I look at it as the new nicotine." Huh. However, as with any middling celebrity tabloid, P6TM serves up a few little nuggets of gold blissfully un-couched by editorial commentary. Like for instance here's author Jonathan Safran Foer complaining about the movie Liev Schrieber made from his book:

"There's an old saying. Don't f—- a pig in the a— and then bitch and moan when your d—- smells like s—- the next day."

*And also, to be sure, if we hadn't been writing a miniscule item for the magazine earlier, because we have a lot of friends who work there, at least we did before we wrote this review.

By all means, dress comfortably, but get out of those sloppy sweats, pajamas and terry-cloth slippers...ladies, keep your hair coiffed and put on some lipstick.

At 5'9½ in bare feet, a pair of heels leaves Kristin Bentz, who runs a fashion-investment blog, towering over many men in a room. "I totally use the shoes for the intimidation factor — for women and for men," she says.

For the record, we used to sit next to Christina Binkley, whom we never remember wearing stilettos because, you know, her work sort of spoke for itself or whatever. AND LOOK AT THE TWO OF US NOW. She learned how to dress, and we're in sweatpants on the sofa repurposing her content for hits.

Heelpolitik: The Power Of The Stiletto [WSJ]
What To Wear When Working From Home [WSJ]

Today's healthy dose of misogyny comes to you courtesy of the NY Post.

Now, we are definitely not fans of marrying people who shoot cops, and then lying about it (if only because the police are the most likely people to find out about that kind of behavior, duh!), but nor are we fans of the kind of ranting women-hating distortions that often pass for truth over at Rupert Murdoch's laughably 'fair and balanced' media outlets. Gather around and warm your hands on the flames of gyno-hate:

"The disgraced Brooklyn cop accused of trying to shield her husband after he allegedly shot an officer whined a 'sorry' apology yesterday - but the irate dad of the wounded policeman insisted that his "disgusted" son will never forgive her.

'I'm very sorry for the injuries to Officer [Andrew] Suarez, and I hope he recovers as he was before,' whimpered Officer Jacqueline Melendez-Rivera, 37, clutching the hand of her lawyer outside her in-laws' Park Slope home.

'I feel horrible,' the cop later added. 'A fellow officer - he's a father, a brother. I feel devastated. I'm very, very sorry. I pray constantly that he recovers.' The pretty, pregnant cop appeared grim-faced - while dolled up in makeup, a black sweater and form-fitting jeans."

Hmmm. Make-up and form-fitting jeans. Not just a liar, but a slut into the bargain.

[Rupert Murdoch doesn't like female people]

And speaking of The Sun really caring about catwalk pants poopers, we were delighted to welcome the paper's campaign to ban size zero models for London's upcoming Fashion Week.

"The models are not just a danger to themselves, they also act as role models for impressionable young girls and women across the country, who have an average dress size of 16.", thunders Rupert Murdoch's bastard print-splattered child.

All well and good, but we can't help thinking that the campaign is just a teensy weensy bit undermined by the article just above it, entitled 'How the A List fit their frocks. EVER wondered how Hollywood's hottest starlets slim down for Awards season? From Jessica's taut tum to Pammy's pert bum, we round up the secrets behind the hottest A-list bodies.'

Size zero, anyone?

[Thin is bad]
[Except in Hollywood]