Jeff Zucker

In recent months, bad news in the financial world has translated into big news for CNBC, and big news is good news for a 24-hour cable news network. With national interest in financial news at a fever pitch, the business news network has been posting its highest ratings in its 19-year history.

And now, owner GE is rewarding them with … budget cuts!

Bosses at CNBC, The Observer has learned, are now preparing to scale back budgets. Sources inside CNBC have heard that the figure could approach a 10 percent overall budget cut.

“We’re committed to having the best team in business news worldwide,” said CNBC spokesman Kevin Goldman.  read more »

On Friday afternoon, Jeff Zucker, president and C.E.O. of NBC Universal, stood on stage in the ballroom on the third floor of the New York Hilton Hotel on 53rd Street and gestured at the afternoon's guest of honor Matt Lauer, who was seated nearby.

"I'm sure this isn't the first Hilton that Matt has been inside," said Mr. Zucker.

Zing!

Later, he asked the longtime host of The Today Show what it was like waking up every morning knowing "that Lester Holt is waiting for you to die."

The crowd chuckled. They had paid $400-a-seat to eat chicken à la something and watch a conga line of NBC employees and celebrities (Tom Cruise! Mario Lopez! Donald Trump! Clay Aiken!) make fun of Mr.  read more »

"I'm just a normal girl. I don't live in a log cabin, I wear leather shoes," said eco-socialite Sloan Barnett. "I'm just like you, but I try every day to do better!" Ms. Barnett, who is 40, was the guest of honor at a book party Wednesday evening hosted by President and CEO of NBC Universal Jeff Zucker and his wife Caryn at the Central Park Boathouse. Ms. Barnett's new book, Green Goes with Everything: Simple Steps to a Healthier Life and a Cleaner Planet, came out a couple weeks ago.

But is Ms. Barnett just a normal girl? In April 2007, the New York Times's Ruth la Ferla visited one of Ms. Barnett's "eco parties"—kind of like a Tupperware party, but with eco-friendly products—and discovered that the daughter of a cable television and cellular phone billionaire George Lindemann was pushing green housecleaning onto fancy friends like Renée Rockefeller, Valesca Guerrand-Hermès, Melania Trump, Julia Koch and Jessica Seinfeld. (Incidentally, the products were made by a brand called Shaklee, which Ms. Barnett's husband, Roger Barnett, purchased in 2004.)  read more »

Can you guess which ragingly hot chest belongs to which swimmer? It sounds like a game you might play on Queerty or something, but you can just do it on, you know, NBC's Olympics Web site.

Stare at the chest, think of the swimmer, click a button, and there's the face. It's like online shopping.

Apparently NBC isn't above link-baiting.

More Landmania for you Friday afternoon!

As we wrote this week, NBC and The New York Times are going into the Olympics with different goals: NBC is covering the sports, The Times is waiting for a big news story.

Well, Jonathan Landman, The Times' deputy managing editor, laid out his own distinctions between NBC and the paper of record in his weekly memo. Even though Jeff Zucker believes NBC's coverage over the next two weeks is "the most ambitious broadcasting event ever attempted," with a planned 3,600 hours of coverage, including 2,200 hours live on the Internet, Mr. Landman isn't so impressed:

The formula for a great news and information Web site: Be interesting and useful.

 read more »

NBC visited 7 World Trade Center on June 2, the most recent of more than one visit to Larry Silverstein’s gleaming downtown tower, whose top 10 floors are still available for lease. Sources say NBC was considering housing its new business operations center there.

“NBC has been back to 7 World Trade Center a number of times, with executives and different division heads poring over the building,” said a real estate insider, who, on a recent visit to the building, saw NBC representatives looking like “cats who swallowed the canary.”

Those “executives” included Jeff Zucker, the president and CEO of NBC Universal, according to another source.

A Silverstein spokesman said he would “not comment on nor confirm discussions with potential tenants.” But another broker familiar with NBC’s plans said the media giant has since moved on from 7 World Trade, and is now looking at SJP Properties’ under-construction 11 Times Square and properties along Eighth Avenue.  read more »

According to several news reports today, though it is currently in fourth place among the broadcast networks, NBC has wrapped up its advance advertising sales this year with successful results.

And they didn't even throw an upfront!

Earlier this year, NBC executives announced that they would eschew the traditional TV time frame, not show pilots to advertisers at an upfront presentation, and would roll out new programming all year long.

"NBC's intention to announce a new sked in April—and then follow with a mix of small meetings and one big Gotham pitch—promises to disrupt the usual upfront selling season by giving the net a full month's head start on dealmaking," Variety reported back in February.

Four months later, that approach appears to be working.  read more »

Page Six meant to report that Katie Couric might be returning to NBC when Jeff Zucker was spotted visiting her Upper East Side apartment, but instead totally outed Mr. Zucker to his wife! The NBC Universal CEO was simply picking up a gift that he asked Katie to buy for his wife for mother's day. [P6]  read more »

At Monday's Costume Institute gala, Christina Ricci reportedly left when she learned that she wasn't seated with her boyfriend and Speed Racer co-star, Kick Gurry; Jeff Zucker avoided Project Runway stealer, Harvey Weinstein, on the red carpet. [P6]

Rudy Giuliani shops for pants at TJ Maxx and his wife helps him! [P6]  read more »

President of NBC Universal, Jeff Zucker, will file a defamation suit against Harvey Weinstein if he calls him his friend again in public. [P6]

Not-yet-fired Elle fashion director, Nina Garcia, has been asked to take a lesser title at the magazine, but was also told that if she leaves all together, she will no longer be a judge on Project Runway. [P6]  read more »

NBC is planning to get rid of an entire level of MSNBC's management team, as well as making major cuts at NBC News, according to The New York Post. Two senior MSNBC staffers -- head of primetime programming Bill Wolf, and editorial director Davidson Goldin -- are set to see their jobs eliminated. But the cable network's top shows -- those hosted by Chris Matthews, Keith Olbermann, and Dan Abrams -- are said to be sacrosanct, and will escape the cuts unscathed.

As for CNBC, it too will be unaffected, says The Post, because NBC chief Jeff Zucker wants it at full strength to compete with Fox Business.  read more »

NBC Universal's president/CEO Jeff Zucker, television's shiny-headed boy genius, has a new home for the holidays.

A deed filed in city records today shows that he and his wife Caryn closed earlier this month on the late Kitty Carlisle Hart's 11-room apartment at East 64th Street, which they'd been rumored to buy.

They paid $12.3 million, which means the Zucker clan got just a $200,000 discount from the asking price.

The 99-year-old apartment has five bedrooms, five fireplaces, four bathrooms, wood paneling, a maid's room, a salon, and an eat-in kitchen. But the Zuckers are used to nice spreads: In November 2005, they sold their Central Park West duplex for $15 million.  read more »

“The buzz was loud and clear, we struck a chord,” said president of NBC Entertainment Kevin Reilly at the network’s Upfront presentation yesterday afternoon. But: “Frankly, we need to be more better.”

Mr. Reilly was saying what the hundreds of ad executives milling around Radio City for the first day of the Upfronts already knew.  read more »