tina brown

Newsweek and The Daily Beast have finally agreed to merge. But with each business struggling, the new entity may be more like a marriage of two wounded media operations.

Combining Newsweek and the Daily Beast wouldn't have been as big of a debacle as New Coke, but it would have been awfully close. Beyond the clashing egos, it was never made clear how combining the organizations would allow them to become profitable.

Howard Kurtz, arguably the most influential media reporter in the country, is leaving The Washington Post for Tina Brown's Daily Beast website in the latest high-profile defection from old media titan to new media upstart. Kurtz will cover the intersection of politics and media for the site.

As the talent drain at Newsweek continues, the nagging question remains: Who can turn this around? It won't be former New Yorker editor Tina Brown.

I've been in New York a month now -- being ambitious, networking, developing new projects, trying to sell existing ones -- so I decided it was time for a break. I deliberately didn't schedule anything for the whole weekend, thinking I could use it to catch up on some of the things I've neglected,...