Mirroring greater flexibility in broadcast media, magazines are starting to take ads closer to the on-sale date and are narrowing the gap between ad close and sale date. Print media is feeling scheduling pressure because local TV and radio are now placing campaigns closer to air date and digital out-of-home media have been able to respond to last-minute ad calls. Hearst's Cosmopolitan has shaved two weeks off its seven-week window and intends to shrink the lead time to three weeks by January 2010. Plans call for eventually adopting the same schedule for all of Hearst's 15 titles, says …

Real estate company Re/Max putting its national media account into play. Carat, which has held the account since the company began buying national TV advertising in 1999, is defending, the client said. The company's annual budget is almost $50 million. Abby Lee, director of regional marketing, says the evaluation includes national TV, radio, print and online initiatives. Local media chores, handled in-house, are not part of the review. "Times are changing both in media and real estate, and we want to position ourselves so that when the market turns around we are out in front," says Lee. …

SAG and AFTRA's leaders unanimously endorsed a new three-year commercials pact. The move by the two actors unions over the weekend triggers a ratification vote among the 150,000 members. The commercials deal marked a return to joint negotiations by SAG and AFTRA, which split angrily a year ago. The unions and the ad industry reached a tentative agreement on April 1. The tentative pact represented a $36 million pay hike over three years, including $21 million more in pension and health contributions. Ballots will be mailed next week with a return date in mid-May. Little opposition has emerged …

CC Media Holdings Inc., the company that owns Clear Channel, has announced in a filing that its preliminary first-quarter revenue totaled $1.2 billion, down 23% from $1.56 billion the year earlier. The company is the nation's largest player in radio broadcasting and outdoor advertising. The decreasing revenue is likely to drive down the company's bond prices as investors fret that Clear Channel might have trouble honoring its agreements with lenders.

John Madden, whose plainspoken, straightforward style set the standard for football analysts, is retiring after 30 years in the broadcast booth. Most recently, he appeared on NBC Sports' "Sunday Night Football." Madden surprised NBC Sports chairman Dick Ebersol with the decision this week, and he declined Ebersol's efforts to persuade him to continue working part time. Cris Collingsworth will move from the pre-game "Football Night in America" show to the "Sunday Night Football" booth to replace Madden. Madden is the only sports broadcaster to serve as the lead football analyst for each of the Big Four broadcast …

Satellite-television provider DirecTV Group has agreed to pay $2.3 million and cable TV company Comcast will pay $900,000 for violating the federal "do not call" law. The companies were accused of having employees or telemarketers call consumers who specifically told the companies not to call them again. A DirecTV telemarketer also agreed to pay a $115,000 penalty for making prerecorded sales calls to consumers who asked not to be called, violating a 2005 court order barring it from making such prerecorded calls. DirecTV paid $5.3 million under that 2005 order. Last month, the FTC also filed a …

Jack Haire will take over as Parade CEO in July, after spending some 28 years at TimeWarner, including stints as publisher of Time magazine and as a top executive for several other magazines. Haire admits he has a lot to learn about newspapers, but believes the weekend supplement is poised to come out of the current recession better than other publications. He seeks to position it as an attractive option to marketers who want a broad-based ad vehicle. Haire is replacing Walter Anderson and notes that he brings a business-side view to Parade that is different from …

ABC Entertainment Group President Stephen McPherson could be the programming executive under the most pressure to produce a breakout hit heading into next month's upfronts. McPherson's ABC trailed only CBS in total viewers back in 2006. But since then it has lost more viewers than any other network. As a result, Disney insiders, talent agents, producers, media buyers and rival programmers say McPherson is "feeling the heat" to find a new hit. "ABC has struggled with scripted series and [with its lineup] on Friday and Saturday nights," says John Rash, Campbell Mithun director of media analysis. …

Sports and other live events are experimenting with 3-D programming, as several networks look forward to putting 3-D in homes. Kerner Software Technologies, for example, is part of a new 3-D TV network venture with AMG TV and hopes to be broadcasting 3-D part time by the end of 2009. BSkyB had its first3-D telecast earlier this month, sending a Keane concert out from Abbey Road Studio to a few 3-D viewing venues and over the Web. Concerts and opera in 3-D are likely to become a regular attraction in theaters, but experts think that sports will be …

Ikea is conducting a review of its global media account, currently serviced by two WPP shops: Mediaedge:cia, which handles the business in the U.S., and MediaCom. The company's estimated annual global ad budget is $300 million. Ikea spent $95 million in measured media in the U.S. alone last year, per Nielsen. Both incumbent shops have said they will pitch the consolidated global account and it is unclear how many other agencies will be competing.