Over at The Motley Fool, Rick Aristotle Munarriz writes about the expectations of XM Satellite Radio to kick off its presence at the Consumer Electronics Show with not only a big number as far as subscribers go, but some significant plans as far as video services go.

CNNMoney's Paul La Monica writes Thursday about a potential purchase of EchoStar, the company behind DISH Network, by AT&T, further solidifying the bond between television and telecom providers. For some time now, you've been able to purchase DISH Network programming through SBC (which purchased AT&T and recently changed its name to the old-school brand's) at a discount, and this would make the "one stop shopping" even more of an easy sell, in both directions.

Roxanne Cooper informs about the news that the Gambit Weekly, the alt-pub from New Orleans, will be selling the "Best Of" issue that was set to hit the streets right about the time that Hurricane Karina devastated the city for $10 each, with the proceeds going to The Foundation for Entertainment Development and Education. While it was surely unfortunate that the publication wasn't able to make the difference it usually does when it hits the streets (as Rox mentions, alt-weekly "Best Of" issues are usually good for business), this is probably an even better way that the Gambit can help the community.

Information on how you can purchase a copy is available here.

For some time now, the Seattle Times has allowed freelancer Bill Richards to cover its ongoing battle with the Seattle Post-Intelligencer regarding the joint operating agreement (JOA) that the papers are stuck in. This week, the Times has named its own Eric Pryne as the staffer who would continue the coverage of this story, the P-I's Todd Bishop reports.

It should be noted that the P-I has been covering the story on its own, while the Times was given a lot of kudos for bringing in an outsider to do the job. Will that change, especially in this time of super-critical media followers, or is the fact that the P-I has been able to do it all along proof positive that while we all hope and think that newspaper reporters can be perfectly objective, that a reporter covering the economics of his or her publication can do so legitimately? I don't have an issue with the paper's decision to make this move, but think they might be criticized for doing so, purely because of the "objective" move it took for the last three years.

Wow, I must have missed this story last month, and it's interesting that it didn't get more play. Randy Dotinga writes at Wired about a court ruling in Florida saying that a woman involved in a case should be considered a "public figure" - much like an elected official or celebrity - because she had been vehemently discussed on the Internet, perhaps changing how various discussions on the Internet would be considered "media" for the masses.

[update] Check out Doug Fisher's comments as well.

Wow, now here's an interesting idea. Rebecca Blood points out that Ithaca College is running a film contest for students who shoot a 30-second film. Sounds easy, right? Well, it's got to be shot completely from a cellphone.

The Boston Globe's Keith Read writes about the success (?) that SIRIUS Satellite Radio might end up having this holiday season with the move (finally) of Howard Stern to its service. According to some retailers, SIRIUS hardware is moving quite well off the shelves, with one store manager at a Best Buy going as far as to say "This is driving our revenue right now..."

We'll see what kind of sub numbers that SIRIUS throws out there early in '06, but there are probably many a Stern fan who didn't buy in until the last minute, perhaps feeding the dark forecasts that this move made analysts have. At the end of the day, this might not make or break satellite radio, because converts to it have been singing its praises for some time now, but it will probably show how much a draw it has on the general population.

In what has to be the funniest thing I've seen in a long, long time, "Saturday Night Live" had a hysterical short film this weekend having to do with the Chronicles of Narnia film release, Magnolia cupcakes, Mr. Pibb, Red Vines, and a number of other things that might make you fall out of your chair if you watch. In any case, I highly recommend it. Check it out here.

So, you're looking for transparency in journalism or a reason why journalists might like having a blog? Check out this post by Jackie Corley, a writer at The Courier, a local publication in Central New Jersey.

Jackie had written up an article about a town's mayor who was picked up on a DWI charge last week, a story that was bumped for something else. After that happened, she posted it to her blog. And yes, her superiors are okay with it having been published there.

Just in case anyone thought the pub was trying to "hold back" on the story getting out there at all, it appears that this isn't the case.

Just heard that Yahoo! will be the exclusive home for video and audio broadcasting of Howard Stern's "welcome" to satellite radio this Friday, December 16, after 9a.m. Eastern.

The Boston Globe's Robert Gavin writes about the newspaper's announcement that Mary Jacobus would be taking on the role of president and general manager at the daily, taking on the role being vacated by Richard Daniels, who is moving elsewhere within the Boston Globe Media organization.

Like him or not, James Wolcott does ring the bell very well sometimes, which is why he's in my RSS reader. This week, he's calling out journalists for their continued cracking on bloggers for their "work habits" when, as it turns out, there are plenty of journalists who aren't exactly on the up and up across the board. Again, this isn't a full-on condemnation, so hold your mouse before commenting, it's just a statement of fact - there are a lot of stones being thrown out of glass houses, IMHO, and Wolcott definitely shares that opinion.

Again, this is by no means a comeuppance for bloggers as a whole, just a state of the union that those who would like to shame the great unwashed might want to scrub a little under the arms in some cases.

The Baltimore Sun's Nick Madigan writes about the countersuit filed against Sinclair Broadcasting by a former employee, Jonathan Leiberman, who took offense to the much-ballyhooed documentary about Senator John Kerry that the television station ownership company was running across its network before the 2004 Presidential Election. Leiberman was tossed after he refused to take part in the program - which many outsiders saw as a direct attack at Kerry and not a "news" story - and then told the Sun about what was happening inside Sinclair.

Wanna bet that broadband is so ubiquitous that the big businesses are starting to see how it can work for them? Well, it looks like CBS has decided to offer up its March Madness action for the NCAA basketball tournament, online, for nada. Well, not every game, but the out-of-market action. As the Hollywood Reporter article mentions, the games have been online for years through CSTV, but that's certainly changed now that CSTV has been purchased by CBS. The games will be ad-supported, and will definitely grab viewership. Additionally, it might even change what the numbers of people who go to local bars and restaurants at lunchtime to see the games look like, if people know that now they can at least listen to the games through their office Internet connections (sorry, productivity - not like you were going to win out that month anyway).

I'm a full believer that there should be a "My Rating" column within iTunes for when you're viewing other people's music on a subnet, that compiles the latest ratings that anyone else who has listened to the music gives for a song. Kind of like an internal rating system, offering the ratings of multiple people, perhaps helping you decide whether or not you actually want to listen to something.

A couple days ago, Jeff Jarvis was buggin' about advertisements that Infinity-owned WFAN was putting up all over the tri-state area for the "Imus in the Morning" program. I've seen these billboards as far away as Independence Township, out near Buttzville, NJ, and in the same city that I live in outside of NYC. Jeff's qualm here (other than the fact that he thinks Imus is a "half-dead cowpoke") is that Viacom did nothing to defend Howard Stern on First Amendment issues, and is putting up Imus as "the posterboy for the First Amendment."

I couldn't disagree more. It's an advertising campaign, for one thing. In no way is Viacom "defending" Imus against those who might disagree with what he's saying. They're taking advantage of the fact that even though David Lee Roth & Co. are going to take Stern's slot(s) in the morning show timeframe, they might as well attempt to appeal to people who aren't going to buy Sirius Satellite Radio service, and cover the bases completely. It's not like everyone who listens to Stern will convert to Imus, nor will they to Adam Carolla or Roth.

Additionally, this is a WFAN advertisement, not a 20-page Infinity buy. WFAN doesn't have to run every single ad, I'm sure, through some sort of Infinity wheelhouse for approval - it's still in the top two or three billing stations in the damn country, after all. So, I say it again, it's an advertising/marketing ploy, not a corporate stand. Whether or not you want to call it Infinity's (or terrestrial radio's) white flag, that's up to you. I call it smart marketing - or at least a kickstand.