Nielsen, the fumbling audience measurement company notorious for snapping up the competition instead of building a better product for market, is doing the print industry a favor and promising not to get involved in measuring its audience. Even though its new "anywhere/anytime" initiative promised to be able to measure all media consumption, David Calhoun's band of incompetents won't be treading on FAS-FAX territory.

Not only that: Nielsen is looking to get out of print entirely.

CONTINUED »

Adweek editor Alison Fahey was named yesterday to the top spot of publisher/editorial director at the Nielsen Business Media brand, which doesn't so much publish "weekly" as "whenever's convenient." She's been editor there for 10 years and now, if Nielsen's move to slash 4,000 jobs is any indication, her chief role in the coming weeks will be to finger who's getting the ax. Happy hunting!

Nielsen Business Media, publisher of Adweek, Brandweek, Mediaweek, and The Hollywood Reporter, is laying off an indeterminate number of editorial staffers; it's not clear how much bloodshed there will be. (Not that it stopped Nielsen from

But expect more. While Nielsen may be a publisher facing the same ad dollar restraints as anybody else in the print realm, it's long been rumored they've been looking to sell NBM, even though they deny it. And what's the one thing a seller will do to make its properties look more attractive to a potential buyer? Cut costs across the line to boost margins.

Adweek's semi-arbitrary ranking of "hot" magazines places The Economist at the top in this, the trade mag's 28th annual listicle. Given that they also named Men's Vogue the "hottest startup" of the year, you're now free to completely ignore any weight you actually gave to these rankings. (Family Circle making the No. 7 spot overall should've been reason enough.) Below, watch The Economist's "executive team of the year" do its best to remain humble.

CONTINUED »

Men's Health editor Dave Zinczenko will be honored with Adweek's "Editor of the Year" superlative, which even special reports editor Tony Case admits is basically an award for talking about his sex life and waking up early enough to appear on the Today show.

Double, double, toil, and (more) trouble for Nielsen. Rounding out a week of very public embarrassments for the audience metrics company comes news its publishing unit – which includes Billboard and The Hollywood Reporter – is essentially in bed with the company's business arm. A recent spec sheet detailing what's needed for a new editor of Nielsen's Adweek reads: "The new Adweek provides the most comprehensive source of news, ideas, information, trends, forecasts and analysis in the advertising industry coupled with Nielsen exclusive data." It's a veritable admission Adweek's editorial is shaped by Nielsen research, argues rival MediaPost: "Aside from raising issues with other trade publications Nielsen must deal with, the disclosure raises questions about Adweek's editorial autonomy." Not that a media conglomerate, from News Corp. to NBC Universal, doesn't use each of its units to support the others, but the reportage in Nielsen's ad trade now comes with a scooper to collect all those grains of salt.