Arianna Huffington

We can imagine what will be the first question for media mogul Arianna Huffington at this lecture: How will AOL, the new parent company of the Huffington Post, change her sprawling creation launched in 2005? The content-spawning website was bought for $315 million; as part of the deal, Huffington will oversee a new AOL division responsible for bringing together all editorial content from both companies. The social media maven will also discuss a broad vision of uniting traditional and new media forms across the news spectrum ?

In our town, the incensed driver shaking a fist when you run a red light could be George Clooney or Zooey Deschanel. That person in line with you at Intelligentsia in Silver Lake doesn't just look like the bassist in the Red Hot Chili Peppers, he is the bassist in the Red Hot Chili Peppers. But we're cool: We don't stare; we hardly ever cross the line that divides Them and Us. Until it's unavoidable. What follow are true adventures in Tinseltown. Bringing up baby By Mary Heffron Arno I don't mean to be a name-dropper, but I honestly think of Arianna Huffington as a friend even though I haven't spoken to her in person for almost a decade.

JAZZ Billy Cobham Born in Panama, raised in New York and a resident of Switzerland for more than a quarter-century, the drummer and his inspirations are nothing if not worldly. Cobham, a founding member of the Mahavishnu Orchestra in the early 1970s, takes his jazzy ? and jazz fusion-y ? stylings to the stage of the Catalina Bar & Grill for a four-night engagement at the historic Hollywood jazz club. Catalina Bar & Grill. 6725 W. Sunset Blvd., Hollywood. 10 p.m. $20. www.catalinajazzclub.

Should stage owners who profit from the talent appearing on those stages be obliged to pay the talent in something other than exposure? Two labor disputes over talent and compensation, three decades apart yet eerily similar, suggest the issue remains as vexing as ever. The more recent concerns whether the Huffington Post should pay its non-staff writers and bloggers, who supply most of the popular website's content for free. Arianna Huffington, who sold the site she cofounded to AOL in February for $315 million, has increasingly come under fire for not paying for most of the content she runs.

Nearly six years after she launched a "group blog" to let her big-name friends air their views, Arianna Huffington returned to Los Angeles Tuesday on a triumphal tour, after selling her website to AOL for $315 million. Hardly anyone viewed Huffington Post in 2005 as something that could become a major media player. It seemed to be more like an online salon, where Arianna's many rich and famous friends ? from Walter Cronkite to Norman Mailer, Nora Ephron and former U.S. Sen. Gary Hart ?

Thank you for Fred Dickey's nuanced portrait of Arianna Huffington ("Provocative. Irritating. Charming. Arianna Huffington." July 30). Huffington suffers the same criticism leveled at many women in the public realm who are intelligent, articulate and challenge the status quo. Without editorializing, Dickey's article showed Huffington's many sides. So far no other journalist has given her the benefit of the doubt. Saint? Sinner? Humanitarian? Opportunist? Let's give her a chance. Ellen Johnson Phoenix, Ariz.

Arianna Huffington, a conservative cable TV talk show host and wife of former Rep. Michael Huffington (R-Santa Barbara), claims that Sen. Bob Dole's presidential campaign is trying to "muzzle" and "discredit" her for criticizing his candidacy. Dole's campaign says that Arianna Huffington has been saying mean things about the majority leader and his wife and is "a little hysterical" over a tough telephone call from campaign manager Scott Reed.

Re "A White House Fluent in Language of Fanatics," Commentary, May 21: Arianna Huffington's insightful comparison of the Bush administration to the movie "The Matrix Reloaded" is well founded. Remember the movie craze when audiences wore special glasses to view 3-D films? The picture was fuzzy if the glasses were taken off. If our nation removed President Bush's rose-colored glasses we would not only see a different color alert for our economy, health care, Social Security and civil rights, we would see a frightening "reality film" instead of "Top Gun."

A U.S. ambassador's widow filed a $25-million libel suit Thursday in Los Angeles Superior Court against conservative columnist Arianna Huffington, saying an allegation that the widow had an affair with President Clinton was a "pernicious lie." Shelia Davis Lawrence also separately sued the National Enquirer for publishing what she said were false statements concerning the alleged affair.

Imagine if the San Francisco Chronicle beefed up coverage of the state capital and asked Gov. Jerry Brown which agencies deserved the most coverage. Or what if Fox News planned to take a closer look at the United Nations with the blessing of Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon? The snickering that ensued would be prolonged, followed by a righteous blast of indignation from other news outlets. Journalism born out of such cooperation would rightly stink of conflict. That will be at least the initial aroma around the latest journalistic initiative by America's fastest-growing news outlet, Patch.

Write it down Re "HuffPo's mojo," Feb. 16 I don't know where FOA ("friend of Arianna") Mickey Kaus got the idea that journalists are "coddled and well paid," but it sure won't be with the Huffington Post in the near future. I was a reporter for AOL's Patch (among others) until it decided to cut local editors' budgets to the point that it couldn't even pay me the tiny stipend that works out to, after interviewing, researching, fact checking, formatting, photographing and, oh yes, writing, something like $10 an hour.

EVENTS Arianna Huffington We can imagine what will be the first question for media mogul Arianna Huffington at this lecture: How will AOL, the new parent company of the Huffington Post, change her sprawling creation launched in 2005? The content-spawning website was bought for $315 million; as part of the deal, Huffington will oversee a new AOL division responsible for bringing together all editorial content from both companies. The social media maven will also discuss a broad vision of uniting traditional and new media forms across the news spectrum ?

We can imagine what will be the first question for media mogul Arianna Huffington at this lecture: How will AOL, the new parent company of the Huffington Post, change her sprawling creation launched in 2005? The content-spawning website was bought for $315 million; as part of the deal, Huffington will oversee a new AOL division responsible for bringing together all editorial content from both companies. The social media maven will also discuss a broad vision of uniting traditional and new media forms across the news spectrum ?

Elegantly clad in black lace, her famously copper hair now blond, Arianna Huffington was surrounded by friends and well-wishers as she arrived Saturday at a fundraising dinner for Columbia University's student newspaper. Everyone wanted to congratulate her on AOL's $315-million purchase of the Huffington Post. "You're in the big show now," said David Stone, Columbia's executive vice president for communications. Huffington gently shook her head, widened her eyes and replied, "It's all a little too much, isn't it?"

Nearly six years after she launched a "group blog" to let her big-name friends air their views, Arianna Huffington returned to Los Angeles Tuesday on a triumphal tour, after selling her website to AOL for $315 million. Hardly anyone viewed Huffington Post in 2005 as something that could become a major media player. It seemed to be more like an online salon, where Arianna's many rich and famous friends ? from Walter Cronkite to Norman Mailer, Nora Ephron and former U.S. Sen. Gary Hart ?

In a bid to make itself relevant again, struggling Internet pioneer AOL Inc. announced late Sunday that it would buy the Huffington Post, the well-known news and opinion site, for $315 million in cash and stock. As part of the deal, Huffington Post co-founder Arianna Huffington will oversee a new group responsible for bringing together all editorial content from both companies including news, technology, music and local media websites. The deal, which was signed Sunday with approval from the boards of both companies, is something of a gamble for AOL, which is looking to reignite growth in advertising revenue.