• by January 15, 2004

WATCH FOR PLAYBOY'S NEXT LEGAL PLAY, MATE - The Internet has essentially destroyed the economic model for printed erotic publications, but now the best-known magazine in that field may be getting even. A federal court says it's okay for Playboy to move forward with a suit it filed in 1999 against Netscape and Excite that claims the search engines' use of generic key words like "playboy" and "playmate" to drive traffic to competing adult entertainment sites was a violation of Playboy's trademarks. In other words, Playboy is saying it would be okay for search engines to direct users to "hefty girls," but definitely not to other people's sites using the term "Hef's girls." The ruling from a three-judge panel of 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals was bolstered by expert testimony that determined 51 percent of people who typed in the key word "playboy" believed they were linking to Playboy. This was no simple play on words, said Judge Thomas G. Nelson, author of the 28-page decision, who acknowledged that Playboy's brand might have suffered "tarnishment" as a result of the confusion. What happens next could well influence beyond the world of off-line skin book publishing. Although Playboy is seeking damages "well into the seven figures," a final ruling in its favor could impact the types and manner in which search engines exploit keywords.

HE WASN'T READY FOR PRIMETIME, BUT HE'S READY TO POP UP ON YOUR DIAL SOMETIME SOON -- After eons of bashing the "liberal" media, conservatives will finally have some self-described liberals in the media to bash. Spunky left-wing Progress Media has signed conservative media basher Al Franken to host a daily radio talkshow, which Franken jokingly refers to as "The O'Franken Factor." That not-so-oblique reference, of course, is a play off Fox News Channel's "The O'Reilly Factor," hosted by right-winger Bill O'Reilly. Fox unsuccessfully tried to sue Franken last year, because his best-selling book - "Lies And The Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair And Balanced Look At The Right" - poked fun of the network's brand of conservative news and even utilized images of O'Reilly on its cover. But Franken is only the first - and perhaps most hilarious - in a slew of outwardly liberal news media personalities slated for radio and TV. Progress Media also unveiled plans for a weekly radio talkshow co-hosted by Robert Kennedy Jr. and liberal attorney Mike Papantonio. Meanwhile, former Vice President Al Gore is developing his own liberally slanted cable news network, suggesting that despite the proclamations of right-wingers, CNN, MSNBC and the broadcast network news divisions, are not nearly liberal enough. And if all this wasn't galling enough for the conservative establishment, Progress Media has slotted Franken's new show to air between noon and 3 p.m. (ET), positioning it head- to-head with conservative media icon Rush Limbaugh. But somehow the Riff doesn't think the counter-programming strategy will have much of an impact on Limbaugh's audience share.

GANNETT? MAYBE IT SHOULD BE CALLED DRAGNET - First the Riff learns that a top reporter of its venerable USA Today was caught fabricating a story (shocking news indeed, given the current credibility of newspaper journalism these days) and now we find out that a former Gannett employee has pled guilty to bilking the publisher out of $3.6 million over nearly a decade. Wade Beck, a controller for flagship USA Today, copped a plea admitting that he wrote 856 Gannett company checks to fictitious vendors and then deposited the funds in his personal account between 1994 and 2001.