Latest posts
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The Hollywood Reporter’s Women in Entertainment list, 2008 — Oprah on top
By Maya Trent · Republished 2026-05-21 · Originally reported by Dan Cox on FishbowlLA, 2008 Every December, The Hollywood Reporter ranks the most powerful women in entertainment. In 2008 the ritual landed in the middle of the trade’s own painful retrenchment. Then In December 2008, The Hollywood Reporter published its annual Power 100 list of…
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THReviews — the 2008 Hollywood Reporter digital play that the Nielsen era never finished
By Owen Reyes · Originally reported by Dan Cox (2008) · Wayback archive → In late 2008, with Variety publicly making fun of itself in a Daily-Show-adjacent self-parody mode, The Hollywood Reporter announced it was getting serious about digital. The launch product was called THReviews — a portal aggregating reviews, news, and entertainment content from…
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FishbowlLA at the party — Jacob Weisberg’s ‘Bush Tragedy’ book launch at Arianna Huffington’s house, 2008
By Cassidy Lee · Republished 2026-05-16 · Originally reported by Kate Coe on FishbowlLA, February 2008 In late February 2008, FishbowlLA ran one of its “FBLA Goes to the Party” dispatches — covering Slate editor Jacob Weisberg’s launch event for his book The Bush Tragedy. The Domino-sponsored party drew 300 guests to Arianna Huffington’s Brentwood…
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The November 2008 Feline Butcher trial — holistic-health practice and the celebrity-clientele angle
By Jordan Vega · Republished 2026-05-16 · Originally reported by Dan Cox on FishbowlLA, November 2008 In mid-November 2008, the jury in the trial of holistic-health practitioner Feline Butcher — whose celebrity clientele included Tom Cruise, Lisa Marie Presley, and Queen Latifah — was still deliberating after she faced 17 counts of practicing medicine without…
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Anita Busch confronts Anthony Pellicano at his December 2008 sentencing — the wiretapping case in court
By Jordan Vega · Republished 2026-05-16 · Originally reported by Dan Cox on FishbowlLA, December 2008 In mid-December 2008, former LA Times journalist Anita Busch addressed Anthony Pellicano at his federal sentencing for wiretapping, wire fraud, and racketeering. Busch had been a primary target of Pellicano’s surveillance operation, including the notorious 2002 fish-and-bullet-hole-in-windshield episode at…
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John Montorio’s 2008 LA Times exit — and what Russ Stanton’s first weeks signaled
By Jordan Vega · Originally reported by Kate Coe (2008) · Wayback archive → In mid-February 2008, with Russ Stanton newly installed as LA Times editor after James O’Shea’s firing, John Montorio — the last of what FishbowlLA had been calling the Baquet boys — got pushed out. Montorio told the paper it was “my…
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July 2007: Jacob Bernstein’s WWD profile of Nikki Finke, and the synchronized blog pickup
By Owen Reyes · Republished 2026-05-16 · Originally reported by Kate Coe on FishbowlLA, July 2007 In mid-July 2007, FishbowlLA noticed something curious: a Jacob Bernstein profile of Nikki Finke in Women’s Wear Daily was suddenly being discussed across multiple LA-media blogs the same weekend. FBLA had received an email from a “high-powered PR type”…
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I’d like to thank the Academy, and NPR’ — a 2007 Oscar-week thought experiment
By Sasha Park · Republished 2026-05-16 · Originally reported by Greg on FishbowlLA, January 2007 In late January 2007, ahead of that year’s Academy Awards, FishbowlLA ran a light Oscar-week thought experiment imagining what an ordinary person might say given the acceptance-speech limelight. The piece was a piece of FBLA-NPR-collaboration whimsy. Then The piece was…
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Eric Mika’s 2007 plan to take The Hollywood Reporter global — print ‘defying gravity
By Owen Reyes · Republished 2026-05-16 · Originally reported by Greg on FishbowlLA, November 2007 In early November 2007, FishbowlLA interviewed Eric Mika — The Hollywood Reporter’s senior vice president and publishing director — about the trade’s ambitious global-expansion push. Mika told FBLA that “the Hollywood Reporter for the last several months is defying gravity,”…
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Andrew Horan rises from cub reporter to A1 editor at the Orange County Register
By Maya Trent · Republished 2026-05-21 · Originally reported by Greg on FishbowlLA, 2007 In 2007, the Orange County Register was reshuffling its newsroom — and one promotion captured both a career and a paper in flux. Then FishbowlLA reported that Andrew Horan had been named A1 editor of the Orange County Register — the…