> from www.lukeisback.com: I Retract The Playboy Buying AVN Story And I Apologize To AVN, Paul Fishbein, And To AVN’s Employees. A few weeks ago, without giving Paul Fishbein adequate time to respond, I published a story that Playboy was buying AVN.

I had four separate sources telling me this, including two sources who have been giving me accurate information for a long time. When AVN stoutly denied the story, my sources stood by it. So did I until now. Now, based on everything I know, I conclude I was wrong about Playboy buying AVN. In my writing on Playboy buying AVN, I included the shot: “AVN’s employees will be the last to know.”

I apologize to AVN’s employees for making them fear for their jobs.

> Dan G writes on www.xxxporntalk.com: Ford is smarter than this…I see this as a move to nullify the ammunition he has given AVNers over this story so they can no longer use it to bash him (‘Yes, I was wrong, and I publicly apologised for it’).

This, of course, effectively clears the slate and puts the ball back into AVN’s court for when Luke drops the bomb that is ‘The Ramone Tape’. He’s now apologised for the Playboy story, so they can’t use that to bash him or will appear churlish. Their only other recourse will be to have Ramone publicly apologise, or to pass no comment on the story.

Boy, I hope Luke secures a copy of that answerphone message….

> Mastrick writes on ADT: Not that I noticed mind you, I just read it on Gene Ross’ website, www.adultfyi.com. It amazes me that KSEX hasn’t really grown in over four years, they still have these occasional Mickey Mouse outages. Perhaps a real station manager and somebody with a real background from a cable or satellite headend could do something with the station – I’ve always liked the concept of KSEX, it’s just the execution that’s wanting.