Nicole Dweck

On Monday, Dec. 17, hundreds gathered at the Metropolitan Pavilion on 18th Street to support Charity: Water, an organization founded by former club promoter Scott Harrison that sells 16 ounces of bottled water for 20 bucks, using the profits to provide clean well H20 to Africans in need.  read more »

Although he swore otherwise, Richard Temtchine was trying to seduce me. “Seduction, it’s definitely an art form,” he explained, as a small plume of steam rose from his espresso. “You’ve heard of Cyrano de Bergerac?”

I nod my head unconvincingly and try to Google it in my head. How do you spell de Bergerac?  read more »

A snarky report in on Page Six of Wednesday's New York Post claimed that CNN publicists were scrambling this week to convince B-list guests to attend the network's first ever "Hero's Tribute," which took place last night at the Museum of Natural History, after first choices like Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt did not confirm attendance.

Still: The show—hosted by Anderson Cooper and Christiane Amanpour, and designed to honor some 18 "ordinary people" who, the network says, have helped change our world for the better—must go on! Tyra Banks was on the red carpet, in a Pamela Roland gown and vintage jewelry. "I didn't want to be too trendy," she said. "Anderson's here! I thought I had to look White House-ey!"  read more »

Yesterday evening at the Four Seasons, scores of well-dressed Manhattan women gathered to chat and mingle at the fifth annual Dinner & Dis(course) cocktail and dinner party. The event, organized by MediaBistro.com, drew together an array of female leaders in the magazine industry, along with one visibly uncomfortable male, Media Bistro associate editor Noah Davis. "At least I have good odds," he quipped.

Laurel Touby, the evening's hostess and the founder of MediaBistro.com, donned a chic Pucci dress, a white feather boa (apparently its been her signature party piece for years) and those quirky-cute glasses. "I just thought we needed to get the girls together to bitch and brag and brawl in the face of ever-increasing stupidity in the marketplace!" she explained. "But really, I know how lonely it can be for people in the industry, how isolating it can be, and I just thought it would be a great chance for us all to get together and mingle with one another,"  read more »

If you live in the east 60's and you like sleeping in on Saturday mornings -- too bad.

For the third Saturday in a row, locals were awoken by the shouts of protesters outside the E.65th street mansion of Viacom CEO Philippe Dauman. The group, which calls itself the Campaign for Corporate Responsibility in Entertainment, wants to change the way media companies portray black and Latino men and women in music videos , T.V, and movies. It's calling for media companies like Viacom to adopt universal standards prohibiting lyrical or visual content that is degrading, promotes violence, and stereotypes black and Latino men as hoodlums and thugs, and women as promiscuous. Sample slogan: "BET does not reflect me!"  read more »

This Thursday evening, a mix of Manhattan's literati, business professionals, and foreign-policy wonks gathered at the Jweish-chic Soho Synogogue loft in downtown Manhattan to celebrate the release of Jared Cohen's new book, Children of Jihad: A Young American's Travels Among the Youth of the Middle East.

At 25, Mr. Cohen is the Bush administration's youngest ever policy planner, and was recently touted by The New Yorker as "Condi's party starter."  read more »

Yesterday evening, journalists and newsy iconoclasts alike gathered at Graydon Carter's uber-trendy, West Village bistro, the Waverly Inn, to celebrate the launch of Newser.com, Michael Wolff's latest project, an innovative online news service that claims to "do the reading for you."

The site, which has been available in beta form since August but launched yesterday with all the bells and whistles, uses high-tech machines to scour the web for news. Human beings, in the form of editors and writers, then comb through these stories to find the ones to highlight. Once top-tier stories are selected, they are fused and re-formatted to be presented in a "smart and entertaining" way. Drudge-like, the site runs the gamut from Turkey's political crisis to Oprah's school girl scandals. One cutesy, and possibly brilliant, feature: an adjustable filter tool, which can be set anywhere between opposite spectrums of "Soft" and "Hard" news, so that readers control whether they get entertainment or more serious journalism.

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Some people go to Africa to try to save the world. Others, like Josh Swiller, go to Africa to save themselves.  read more »

Christiane Amanpour, CNN's chief international correspondent, who has become a fixture reporting from war zones around the world, was awarded a CBE, or Commander in the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire for services to journalism, the news channel announced. Wearing a large brown hat, a chic cream colored skirt suit, and a three tier diamond necklace, she beamed as the Queen pinned Amanpour’s lapel with a blue and gold cross metal inscribed with the motto "For God and the Empire."

The award, which is seen as just one step shy of knighthood, is considered a major honor for Britons. The half-Iranian half-British Ms. Amanpour joked that the honor was "very nice for my British half."  read more »

David Lauren and girlfriend Lauren Bush were just a few among the green movement's good-looking rear-guard to sip martinis and muse passionately if not altogether scientifically about the dangers of environmental degradation and the magnificence of the planet beyond Central Park.

“They really showed how beautiful our world is,” said the young Mr. Lauren. “It just overshadowed whatever beauty is in this room.”  read more »

On Friday night, Salman Rushdie was talking about Dorothy—that is, the Dorothy portrayed by Judy Garland in the 1939 film version of The Wizard of Oz.

Her mantra—“There’s noplace like home!”—is apparently not shared by the literary superstar whose 1988 novel, The Satanic Verses, was banned in his native India and resulted in a fatwa against him.  read more »