These days it's clearer than ever: loyalty and Hollywood go together like boxing gloves and telephones.

Now that we in the Western World are eating fish skeletons out of the garbage like the Heathcliff of world powers, too poor to lavish celebrities with sufficient amounts of money and gifts, our disappointed stars are turning their rhinoplastied noses eastward, to the mysterious, exciting, oil-rich Orient. In Dubai, where oil barons mingle with Russian gangsters in $1,500 shoes, the money flows as plentifully as the region's largest export. And just like that, our celebrities are taking their balls and going to the UAE!

CONTINUED »

When you are a high-profile writer working on a new book, one part of the publicity machine — besides a book tour and leaking juicy quotes to Page Six — is placing an excerpt of your manuscript in a magazine as high-profile as your name. Much of Vanity Fair's feature well is reserved for crap like this. Even Entertainment Weekly participates, this week running an excerpt from Eminem's new book (complete with childhood photos, awww!). Sad, then, for Sharon Waxman. She's the former NYT Hollywood reporter and current ignoramus who's been reduced to Nikki Finke also-ran on Waxword, her attempt to be a Hollywood industry insider reporter in a niche that just wants her out. Waxman is also gearing up to launch The Wrap News, a HuffPo-y sort of vehicle for, yep, Hollywood insider news. But Waxman is also an accomplished author. Her latest book is Loot: The Battle Over the Stolen Treasures of the Ancient World. It even has an accompanying website! Except now that the book is about to hit stores (Oct. 28), Waxman should be out there promoting the hell out of the thing. Instead, she's only managed to copy/paste her work into this month's fleeting media obsession.

CONTINUED »

Sharon Waxman, who is about to start her own Hollywood gossip enterprise, on why the John Edwards scandal still has any secrets left to be told: "My guess is that there is a simple reason why the mainstream media is unable to confirm the Edwards-Hunter affair during these past weeks. Because very few people knew what had been going on. Edwards’ staff didn’t know. Elizabeth Edwards didn’t know. The group may have been as small as three: Edwards, Hunter and her pal Bob McGovern." There's that, and also: "These past weeks,' nobody but the National Enquirer has been asking these questions. And you know what happens when some other folks do start asking questions? This little thing called answers. Strike two, Waxman.

Bonnie Fuller and Tina Brown aren't the only ladies of the media industry rolling out new web projects. So, too, is NYT and WaPo scribe Sharon Waxman, currently blogging Hollywood at Waxword, a Deadline Hollywood-esque site punched up with Waxman's analysis.

Now flush with $500k in funding, Waxman in January will launch The Wrap News, a gossip-something-or-other website that will join the 947,000 other URLs doing the same thing.

In sharing the news of Waxman's new venture, sex obsessed media columnist Jon Friedman points to Waxman's recent story about The Hollywood Reporter being up for sale. Of course, Waxman, seen here getting strangled by Quentin Tarantino, was six months late to the story — Jossip was the first to connect the dots. In February. Here's hoping her Hollywood headlines will have a shorter timeline.

Back in February, we noticed something taking place inside Hollywood media: Both The Hollywood Reporter and Variety were putting themselves on the block. While Variety, from LexisNexis owner Reed Elsevier, was making its intent to sell a public matter, THR owner Nielsen publicly denied it was shopping itself around. Finally, this week and many months later, Sharon Waxman heard the same news — and added one tidbit to the gossip: the New York Times is supposedly a potential buyer.

Except, according to everything we understand, the Times is as much a player in this deal as, say, Rodale. That is: They're a big name publisher that always looks at these type of deals, but almost certainly won't be interested in taking on another (troubled) print liability. There's also some wild rumor about that Valcon, the name given to the six private equity firms that own Nielsen, might be interested in picking up Variety, too, and having total control over film studio advertising budgets.

• If you see more pantless people on the subway than usual on Sunday, the joke is on you. Improv Everywhere takes over public transit this weekend.

• Justice by example: Marion Jones was given a six-month sentence for using steroids. Your parents weren't kidding when they said life isn't fair.

CONTINUED »