Ten years ago, Arianna Huffington was best known for appearances on the now-defunct Politically Incorrect, and Tina Brown was throwing lavish parties for the now-defunct Talk magazine. Meanwhile, Time was chugging along, covering news and politics just as it had been for decades. It’s this that the publication is trying to seize upon with its new TimeFrames initiative, which begins with a new issue that looks back on the magazine’s coverage of the last decade.

hough the Daily Beast’s upcoming merger with Newsweek drew much fanfare and back-patting on all sides when it was announced last week, not everyone is happy about the imminent marriage. In fact, some people are completely opposed to it—people like the staff of Newsweek.com, an entity that seems unlikely exist once the merger takes place.

On CNN’s Reliable Sources today, host Howard Kurtz landed a double interview with Sidney Harman and Kurtz’s Daily Beast boss Tina Brown to talk about the just-announced merger of Brown’s Daily Beast website and Harman’s struggling Newsweek magazine. The three discussed how the merger will work, Brown’s plans to hire more women at Newsweek, and how the print and online sides of the new company will mesh together.

Throughout the past few month there have been many whispers that embattled print weekly Newsweek and the red-hot (and well funded) website The Daily Beast were in talks about merging their two businesses. A lot of people thought it made sense, the marraige of a print behemoth (with solid ad revenue) and a hip and cool online entity with a proven editorial hall of famer in Tina Brown. Alas, as Ms. Brown said recently, the two entities could not agree to terms on a prenup and the talks died without a deal. But no so fast – according to The Observer, it turns out that the merger may, in fact, be back on.

Who will be Newsweek‘s next editor-in-chief? Now that Tina Brown has officially taken herself out of the running, the job could go to anyone—even a regular schlub like you.

A month ago, New York Post columnist Keith J. Kelly reported that Tina Brown, magazine editor extraordinaire and Daily Beast founder, was in talks to become Newsweek‘s new editor-in-chief. According to Kelly, she’d be able to make the move without abandoning her beloved website; supposedly, The Daily Beast would be combined with Newsweek‘s online operations, forming one giant super-site.

Alas, the merger wasn’t meant to be.

I think it’s fair to say this news caught most people by surprise. Longtime Washington Post media reporter Howie Kurtz is leaving the paper to join Tina Brown‘s Daily Beast as the site’s Washington Bureau Chief.

Though Jon Meacham stepped down as Editor-in-Chief of Newsweek this summer, his successor has not yet been named. Before leaving, however, he reportedly told Tom Ascheim, Newsweek‘s CEO, that veteran magazine editor Tina Brown might be the best woman for the job. Brown, of course, is currently running The Daily Beast—and she’s said that she has no intention of leaving that post.

But what if she didn’t have to?

Gawker’s Ryan Tate provides a tough-but-fair portrayal of Tina Brown. According to Tate, she is very much living in an anachronistic version of New York: ridiculous amounts of money unwisely spent, Sex in the City as pastiche, and people using fax machines to exchange content. No, that is not hyperbole – according to Tate, Tina Brown can read her website via fax while traveling overseas! Update: Gawker Media owner Nick Denton defends Brown in the comments section of the original post.

What does Tina Brown think of Sarah Palin? While besides knocking a “total ignorance,” she describes the “present, raw, visceral quality,” that helps Palin connect to her supporters.

And also helps her separate from Pres. Obama, who is starting to feel “rarefied” and “unpassionate,” according to Brown.

Tina Brown has just posted her latest version of Hillary Clinton. Considering the Secretary of State is still answering the invisible question put forth by Brown in a column three months ago, she perhaps may want to consider checking in with Tina and company to find out what they have determined her latest iteration to be.

Wow, Tina Brown is very smart. It was reported today that Brown is set to launch a Daily Beast book imprint, Beast Books. The imprint will publish both paperbacks and ebooks on a much faster schedule than traditional publishing keeps. Also? The imprint “will select authors from within The Daily Beast’s cadre of writers, most of whom are paid freelancers, to write books with quick turnarounds.” That’s not all.

Where do you’ve go after you just interviewed Glenn Beck? How about to the founder and funder of The Daily Beast.

Mediaite has confirmed the next interview on Katie Couric‘s lengthy weekly web show “@katiecouric” will be with Barry Diller and Tina Brown. Besides the new web show, Couric (and an exec at CBS News) are adding even more responsibilities.

Today in The Daily Beast, Tina Brown remarks on the somewhat remarkable image recovery Anna Wintour has undergone since the release of the documentary The September Issue. As a former, high profile, controversial, Conde Nast editrix, Brown probably knows a little from whereof she speaks.

Today is the kickoff for Fashion Week — and for the Daily Beast’s brand-new style section, Sexy Beast. Earlier this week Politico announced new lifestyle website Click. Is everyone getting sexier? And how do you make Chicken Goop?

Talk is in the air, or at least its 1999 Liberty Island launch party appears to be the current Titanic-esque metaphor for what has happened in the media word in the last ten years. Tina Brown mentioned it a few weeks ago in a column eulogizing its party planner, referring to it as “the last social celebration of the pre-9/11 celebrity decade.” And in today’s column David Carr uses yesterday’s 10th anniversary of the party to expand on the theme.

Just two weeks ago Tina Brown made some significant waves with her Daily Beast column about Hillary Clinton’s apparent invisibility as Secretary of State. Today, another Brown column landed in our inbox – this one arguing that Bill Clinton be brought back to the fore. Two Clinton columns in as many weeks also jogged our memory: Isn’t Brown penning a book on the Clintons? Why yes, yes she is.

Barry Diller appears to be making a habit of taking well known media types and giving them a lot of money to reinvent themselves on the web. A LOT. Diller is currently funding Tina Brown‘s Daily Beast venture — to the tune of $18 million, and is apparently kicking in $100 million for his just announced venture with departing NBCU chairman Ben Silverman. Just how deep do Diller’s pockets go?

Fleet Street — the seat of the British press for more than 500 years — is no more. This month Agence France-Presse, the last news outfit on Fleet Street, packed up and moved to a cheaper office elsewhere in the city, ending more than 500 years of occupation by news outlets.

Peggy Noonan is weighing in on Hillary Clinton’s apparent disappearance from Obama’s political landscape. Not only does she echo Tina Brown’s earlier thoughts on the matter, it appears that she’s suddenly on Team Hillary:

He may be backing Tina Brown’s (mostly) ad-free Daily Beast, but IAC chairman Barry Diller foresees a not-to-distant future where readers will be required to shoulder that burden. That’s right – readers will pay for content. How has that worked out in the past?

We lived as kings, and it convinced us, I think, that there was a significant underlying value to what we did. And I think we’re finding out now that the real, actual value of journalism in the current economy is not that high.