It was the picture of the woman runner holding a digital camera that first attracted us to today's NYT item article on "marathons meet tech." Yes, those Nike+ shoes are all the rage this year, transmitting data from your shoes to your iPod so you can constantly monitor your pace and progress and not see the car running the red light. But what runner, pro or novice, actually packs a PowerShot on their 26.2 mile quest for knee injuries? Apparently, quite a few; or, if not digital cameras, then a whole roster of gadgets to pass the time, remember the moment, and weigh you down.

“I’ve been at finish lines where people come across looking like a hardware store,” said Andrew Graham, the chief executive of Bones in Motion, which makes the software Mr. Kaye will use in his Motorola Motokrzr K1m phone.

Technology is adding a new sound effect, beyond the roar of the crowd and pounding of feet, to many races. “In marathons these days, it’s really common to hear beep beep beeping,” said David Willey, the editor in chief of Runner’s World, referring to the alarms on the heart-rate monitors worn by many runners to track their pulses. “That’s definitely something you didn’t hear 10 years ago.”

This is the point where, if we had the energy, we'd get in touch with Observer-to-Portfolio staffer-cum-marathon critic Gabriel Sherman who, staring through us as he's wont to do, would launch into a teeth-clenched rage about idiot first-timers poisoning the art of the marathon with their gizmos and widgets before putting his earbuds back in, reading his text messages, and glancing at his wrist to check his pulse on his heartrate watch.

This summer, the New York Observer lost one of their star reporters to Conde Nast when the greatest magazine launch ever, Conde Nast Portfolio, grabbed up Gabriel Sherman for their staff.

Thanks to Nat Ives, we have now have the whole file full of new CN Portfolio staffers. Joining Gabe are a gaggle of other A-List reporters, including the New York Times' Kurt Eichenwald, Time's Matt Cooper, and of course, EIC Joanne Lipman. (Gotta' keep that Google search up.)

But today we, along with everyone else, learn that Gabe is not the only Observer gone the way of the glossy. Sheelah Kolhatkar, NYO's culture writer, is also leaving the weekly paper for a staff writer position at CN Portfolio.

Looks like quite a team, but everyone still better hit the ground running. There's only seven months left until the first issue comes out.

You'd think after writing for dailies and weeklies, seven months would be a solid amount of time to get the first few issues rolling — and to hire Katherine Seelye, Rebecca Dana, and Adam Fisher.

A Portfolio of 'Portfolio' Hires [Nat Ives, Ad Age]

While Keith Kelly today leads with news about the U.S. version of OK! magazine supposedly being right on track (and not having burnt through its $100 million budget), the real news is the salmon-tinged depature of the New York Observer's Gabe Sherman, who's splitting the scene for – and where else is hiring like a Malaysian button factory? – Conde Nast Portfolio. The man who arguably has more folks blowing into his agape ears than any other media reporter joins Joanne Lipman's camp as a staff writer, where his knack for infiltrating the glossies and sometimes awkward deipnosophist behavior can become fully realized. The sad bit of news: He's leaving behind TV industry byline Rebecca Dana — though we've heard the softest of murmorings that a suddenly vacant WWD might be opening its doors.

Condé can do [Keith Kelly, NYP]

The Wall Street Journal is considering selling out like a bunch of B-List celebrities turned reality TV stars. At least according to media guru Gabriel Sherman over at the New York Observer.

Advertisements on the front page are long common for the Daily News and the New York Post, and the journal is now following suit. It's all part of their “Project Renaissance" redesign, which is just about the douchbaggiest name for a redesign we've ever heard. Anyways, it seems readers (not to mention WSJ staffers) are a bit turned off by the concept of a front page advertisement on a newspaper

The prospect of a front-page ad has rankled some Journal staffers.

“We understand this is a for-profit business,” one newsroom staffer said. “But an ad on the front page? That would really piss people off.”

Really? It would? We have no idea … we don't read the WSJ (unless Jim Romenesko or David Hirshman strong arm us into it) let alone actually pick up an actual newspaper. But we believe everything Sherman tells us — especially when it involves a really bitchy media vs. the people fight.

Time’s Successor List: Weisberg Gets Called, Kinsley Quits As Usual [Gabriel Sherman, New York Observer]

Sure, last night might've been the official start to Passover, but in media land, we're not the only ones who miss deadlines. Which is why only today are we getting around to polling various personalities from inside the bubble as to their holiday plans, whether they're more likely to suffer from mother's guilt (and celebrate Passover) or daddy's drinking (and celebrate Easter) — or, like us, both. Let's see who else will be dipping their herbs (in gin) twice.

Jeff Bercovici, Women's Wear Daily
I attended a seder in the west village last night. We had Maxwell House-sponsored haggadahs that seemed to have been translated from Hebrew into Yiddish, then into Russian, German, and finally English, by someone who spoke none of those languages. This morning I had pancakes and pork sausage for breakfast. Take that, Yahweh!

Joe Scarborough, MSNBC
Going to be hosting an Easter egg hunt for my little girl's friends at our home in Pensacola, FL. If it's anything like last year, all the adults will be enjoying adult conversation and beer while I am dressed up like a 6'4" Peter Cottontail, sweating my rabbits' feet off.

Sunday to church and lunch with the family.

Tray Butler, HX
Normally Easter is the weekend of my annual pajama party, which has become a notorious tradition among friends over the years. I’m actually putting the ‘jamas and jelly-bean shots on hold this year for the sake of a more wholesome holiday, heading South to hide Easter eggs for my four-year-old brother. (Yes, there’s a bit of an age gap. Long story.) I’ll also hopefully catch up with a few friends in the ATL, and those kids are crrrazy. I’ll be packing some PJs, just in case.

Jack Shafer, Slate
I worship no deity, including the newly improved Jesus Christ. That means I'm available to break bread wirth anybody who asks me to attend their celebration. I have no invitations in hand, so I'll probably grill something and drink beer on Sunday.

Choire Sicha, New York Observer
Well, I don't know the month of Nisan from a Nissan. I prefer to use any of these less-high Holy Days to sit idly at my desk, IMing with the goyim. After sundown, I'll be playing poker, chain-smoking, and eating pepperoni pizza. Please send someone around on Sunday to roll away the emotional stone that keeps me trapped in my house on weekends.

Jesse Oxfeld, Gawker
I will, as always, be heading to the American Jew's promised land: The New Jersey suburbs. I believe today's Pesach Express leaves Penn Station at 5:20. I should be back in the city by 11 (as I was last night, too), ready to commence Gawking again in the morning. In observance of the holiday, though, I do write while reclining.

After the jump: Post-It Keith Kelly, Times ad man Stuart Elliott, Gawker gal Jessica Coen, Huffington Post's Rachel Skarl, and the NYO's Gabe Sherman.

CONTINUED »

• Finally, we find out that we’re not the only ones who understand Jon Friedman's irrelevance. [CJR]

• Lewis Lapham is retiring from Harper's magazine. That job is just really cutting into his smoking break time. [WaPo]

• Georgie Anne Geyer thinks it takes a newspaper to raise a nation. Blogs, blogs, blogs. [AP]

• Could Stephen Colbert's book be even better than Bonnie Fuller's? We think it could, we think it could. [Fishbowl NY]

• What ever happened to the Budget Living editors? Some started a blog, others are planning parties … and everyone else is at Real Simple. [WWD]

• All it takes to be a good reporter is compassion and friendliness? Ha, try telling that to Gabe Sherman. [BJ]

If anyone is promoting James Risen's book, it is not the New York Times, but Gabriel Sherman and the New York Observer.

In his second piece on the connection between Risen's book State of War and the editors at the Times, Sherman fuels the media attention on the (already overplayed) story, to report that Risen asked NYT editors to sign a nondisclosure agreement before viewing his book's contents. Some editors didn't even see the book until after the paper ran the story:

Through several months in late 2005, Mr. Risen and bureau chief Phil Taubman had clashed over whether Times editors would get a preview of the book’s closely guarded contents, sources said. It was not until Dec. 27—11 days after the wiretapping story had run—that Mr. Risen relented and allowed Mr. Taubman to see the manuscript.

This week, it seems as though the reporter is going back on his previous reports of promotional connections (which, understandably, he blames on Matt Drudge) to say that, actually, the Times published the story because they didn't know whether or not N.S.A info would be in Risen's book. (It's ok, we're yawning, too.)

… sources with knowledge of the internal debate at The Times said that editors, unsure what Mr. Risen’s book might say, pressed to publish the story before the end of the year.

Still scandalous? Of course. The Times held onto that damn story for a year. Still, we expected something juicier than a non-disclosure agreement from a story on the NYT. After all, what other paper spends $1.7 million and counting on reporters they don't even like that much?

Risen Gave Times A Non-Disclosure On Wiretap Book [Gabriel Sherman, NYO]
Earlier: People are still talking about James Risen's book?