Dating Experts Admit Their Own Matches Strike Out
New York Daily News
By Gina Salamone
May 31, 2012

When even dating “experts” have no luck with relationships, is there hope for anyone?

The three stars in Bravo’s new docu-series, “Miss Advised,” premiering June 18 at 10 p.m., admit they have just as much trouble as their clients.

“I actually was under this misguided impression that I was exceptionally talented at dating, and this show proved otherwise,” dating columnist Julia Allison said in a conference call Wednesday. “It was a teachable moment for me. And I think I had to see it through other people’s eyes to see that I was making all of the mistakes that I recommend other people don’t make.”

The show follows Allison as she tries to find love in Los Angeles after moving from New York. Also appearing are New York matchmaker Amy Laurent and radio host and sex expert Emily Morse.

Laurent got into the matchmaking business seven years ago. “I haven’t been in the matchmaking business this long because I don’t know what I’m doing,” she boasts. “I certainly do and I’ve had a lot of success, but at the same time just because we’re experts does not mean we’re perfect.

“And I’m really tired of people not really admitting that. That’s kind of like the biggest secret among experts is: Guess what, we also are human beings. This was my chance … to really put that out there and say, ‘This is my passion. This is what I do best.’ But I also have my own fears and vulnerabilities that I need to work on.”

Allison says that while she can stink at maintaining relationships, she’s good at getting dates.

“The way I get them is by being open,” she says. “A lot of women don’t realize how closed down they are. They put on their sunglasses, they have their iPod in. They look at the ground. They don’t smile. And I do the opposite of that.

“I look men in the eyes, I smile at them. I’m warm and open. And I screw it up later. I think that women don’t realize guys are rejected everywhere they go. And in order to have a man approach them to ask them on a date, all they have to do is look at them in the eyes and smile and sparkle a little bit.”

A Social Media Game Plan from the Internet’s Self-Promotion Princess
Forbes Woman
By J. Maureen Henderson
July 13, 2011

I can’t remember how I first came across Julia Allison’s name, but the more I read about her, the more fascinated I became by tales (exaggerated or otherwise) of her personality-fueled hype machine. I decided that I had to interview her and get her take on how to build an online brand from scratch.

The Julia Allison who answers my questions, however, is a far cry from the girl who led a spandex-clad exercise class on the streets of New York or showed up at Gawker czar Nick Denton’s Halloween party in a dress bedecked in condoms or who has been romantically linked to Dave Eggers’s brother and John McCain’s son or appeared on the covers of Wired and TimeOut New York or inspired a coterie of haters who dissect her every online move. You get the drift.

These days, the syndicated social media columnist for Tribune Media Services sounds less  like the self-promotion princess of old and more like a slightly cynical big sister imparting some hard-learned been there, done that wisdom.

On personal branding and the need to manage your image:

“No one with a strong personal brand gets there by just seeing what happens naturally - Kate Middleton comes to mind. A strong personal brand takes discipline, confidence, consistency and a clear sense of what you’d like to achieve.  When I first started writing a column at Georgetown, I did not manage mine whatsoever; I was a college student, I had never heard of a personal brand.  Although I have been a columnist for eight years now, I didn’t truly understand the extent to which one must control one’s personal brand until quite recently.  I still don’t feel that my personal brand is in line with who I am or who I would like to be.  But if I were starting from scratch, I would attempt to manage absolutely every aspect of it, Steve Jobs style.”

On the any publicity is good publicity axiom:

“Anyone who says this is either delusional or a masochist.  No one in their right mind believes that any publicity is good publicity. That’s just what well-meaning people say to their friends who get bad publicity so they don’t feel quite as crappy.  Bad publicity is bad publicity, end of story.

On whether or not she has a male counterpart:

“I’m not sure I have one.  I do think the reaction to me, starting in 2003 or so, would have been completely different had I been male.  I doubt I would have been judged based upon how I looked, what I wore, or who I dated.  I know many men who talk about their personal lives far more extensively than I do, including journalists and entrepreneurs – George Gurley of The Observer comes to mind; he wrote years of columns, including transcripts of his couples therapy sessions with his girlfriend, Jeff Jarvis, who wrote an entire book on his prostate cancer and subsequent sexual issues, Jason Calacanis, who posts just as many photos of his dogs as I do and Tim Ferriss, who has written extensively about sex – who aren’t derided or dismissed for it.  I wouldn’t say any of them is my ‘male counterpart’ but I would say that they share certain commonalities with me.”

On not letting haters get you down:

“I have had every reaction you can imagine: anger, tears, incredulity, laughter, bargaining, even legal action. You know what works for my sanity?  Pretending they do not exist.  Realizing that they rarely  if ever have the proper information. I do believe we have an enormous problem with hatred on the internet in general, and as a whole, it should not be ignored – it should be battled.  But for me, it’s important to keep perspective.  They’re going to say what they’re going to say, and at the end of the day, anyone who is that obsessed with someone else  and espouses that sort of consistent hatred and negativity  needs their head examined.  Or needs to get a more productive hobby.”

On shortcuts to fame and whether she’d advise a Junior Julia Allison to pull out all the stunt stops to get her name known:

“It’s important to be respected and known for the right things, because it will take you years to repair the damage wrecked by impulsive ‘profile-raising’ stunts. Your reputation is the most valuable currency you have. Unless you have a very clear idea of where that stunt will get you, I would not encourage anyone to think in terms of ‘how to make the biggest splash.’ Just do what you do well, and do it better and in a more unique way than anyone else.  If you keep working hard, you’ll get to where you want to go eventually – and maybe faster than someone who tried to ‘splash’ her way there.”

Tribune’s New Tech Columnist: Julia Allison (Yes, That Julia Allison)
Forbes
By Jeff Bercovici
January 31, 2011

If you know the name Julia Allison, chances are good it’s because you’re a reader of the gossip blogs where she was a regular fixture two or three years ago. Editors of those blogs knew that even the briefest mention of whom Allison was dating (usually someone famous) or what she was wearing (usually something pink) could set off a page-view-boosting feeding frenzy among commenters.

If that is where you know her from, you might be surprised by the 29-year-old’s latest gig: Starting March 1, she’ll be writing a weekly column on social media and digital communications for Tribune Media Services, the newspaper-and-TV chain’s syndication arm. Called “Social Studies,” it will cover topics from Twitter etiquette to cyberbullying to Facebook envy syndrome.

It turns out that Allison has for some time now been making good on her hard-won microfame (and her 22,000 Twitter followers) by establishing herself as a credible commentator on technology and internet culture, the kind who gets invited to speak about “personal branding,” her area of unchallenged expertise, at conferences, corporate events and the occasional university. “The ironic thing is that, as you’ll see from my first column, this is the most logical job in the world for me,” she says. “I’ve written columns for years, and I’ve been obsessed with technology and social media the entire time.  So to combine them — it’s pretty much my dream job.” (Microsoft and Sony would buy that: They’ve put her in ad campaigns for Bing and the Vaio, respectively.)

It’s a far cry from swanning down red carpets every night, but those days are over, swears Allison. “I haven’t left sweatpants in three weeks getting this column launched,” she says.

Well, at least she hadn’t until this past weekend, when she headed down to Pensacola to see her boyfriend, Jack McCain, get his pilot’s wings. That’s McCain as in the 2008 presidential candidate, Jack’s father. Some things don’t change.

Talking Shop with Julia Allison
AOL City’s Best
By Rachel Raczka
Oct 10, 2010

Mediaite Julia Allison might be hard to slow down - we caught her somewhere between a train from Boston and a Chicago production of “Candide” - but thanks to Twitter and her tell-all blog, she’s not too hard to track. After getting her advice on the best veggie burger in town and shopping tips for tutu lovers, she left us weirdly pining for the glamorous, slightly know-it-all older sister we never had.

We hear you’ve moved to the West Coast?
Well, I’m technically and happily a nomad. After living in New York for six years, I packed up all my stuff about two months ago, put it into storage, and have been shuttling between five cities: New York, Chicago, San Francisco, LA and Boston. I stay with friends and in Chicago, my parents generously lent me their condo in the city. Despite upwards of eight flights a month, I’m spending less than half of my former monthly rent on travel costs than when I lived full time in New York.

What restaurant do you think you’ll miss most?
No question, no hesitation: Momofuku anything. David Chang is a genius. Ma Peche is my latest favorite, but the best meal I’ve had had to be at Ko. My guilty pleasure, however, is Houston’s yeah, yeah, it’s Hillstone now on 27th and Park, where I went at least once a month for six years to order what I consider to be the best veggie burger in town. It’s not trendy, but damn, it’s delicious.

Where have you had the luck finding more cute A-line party dresses than we’ve ever seen?
[Laughs] Well, I have to do something to cover up my Kim Kardashian backside, and A-line party dresses do the trick! I tend to alternate between a few shopping staples, primarily Bergdorf’s and Bloomingdale’s, supplemented with some boutiques like Roni and for special occasions and red carpet events, Rent the Runway. Lately, I’ve veered into slightly sexier, edgier territory with Herve Leger, but I’ll never give up my Betsey Johnson. Her brightly colored, be-tutu’d confections just make me happy.

Your main hair man, Ryan Darius, has been getting a lot of attention with his upcoming show on LOGO.
No one knows how to make a woman feel beautiful and confident in her hair the way Ryan does. He likes it long, full, silky. If you do one thing for yourself this year, get a color and cut by Ryan. If you’re really in the mood for a treat, try the extension line he works with, Platinum Seamless. He gave me the Platinum Seamless extensions in February to grow out a terrible cut and I never want to go back to “normal” hair again. It takes 45 minutes and uses medical grade adhesive so it stays for two months, but never damages your natural hair.

Best of Julia’s NYC Faves

Best Veggie Burger:
Houston’s (now Hillstone)
378 Park Ave. South

Best Meal:
Momofuku Ko
163 1st Ave.

Best for Red Carpet:
Rent the Runway
www.renttherunway.com/

Best Hair Cut:
Ryan Darius
Ryan Darius Salon
82 West 12th Street

BING’s Taxi Ad is the Next Little Thing
The Wall Street Journal
By Marshall Heyman
July 8, 2010 

There’s a new way to gauge whether you’ve, as they say, “made it” in New York: You’re featured in an advertisement for Bing in a taxi cab.

A couple of months ago, Taxi TV started airing short promos for the Internet search engine. In the commercials, sort-of-recognizable Manhattanites talk about their favorite place in the city, show how to call up that place on a PDA, go to the place, and then humorously are turned away.

Some of the people featured in the advertisements include André Leon Talley, of Vogue; Jason Binn, the chief executive of Niche Media; “Sex and the City” star Mario Cantone; Kelly Cutrone, the publicist star of “Kell on Earth;” Sherri Shepherd, co-host of “The View” and Beth Ostrosky Stern, wife of Howard.

“The stuff in the taxis is not that entertaining. It’s mostly old news clips, and you have a captive audience,” Mr. Hadley explained of why the company chose the vessel. “There wasn’t a lot of clutter, and we knew we’d reach New Yorkers and traveling professionals.

“They’re not quite celebrities, said Eric Hadley, the General Manager of Bing, but more like “New York personalities that are well known to a group of people.”

Mr. Hadley said that he cast several of the individuals featured. Ricky Van Veen, co-founder of College Humor, and his assistant, Bee Shaffer, picked the rest. College Humor also produced the spots.

“The conventional wisdom is everyone presses the off button but they don’t,” said Internet personality Julia Allison, who goes to Buttercup Bake Shop in the spot.

“A few people were not available or wanted more money,” said Mr. Hadley, who added that this was “relatively inexpensive for a local campaign but we’ve reached 42 percent of taxi riders over two months.” (Note: Despite regular viewings of the ads and writing about the topic, this reporter hasn’t yet visited Bing.)

“I was in Sony television commercials with Justin Timberlake. The company must have made a $10 million ad buy,” meaning those ads are everywhere. “I got a lot of comments, but not exponentially more than the cab.” In comparison a story featuring her photo in the New York Post about how she’d never have sex again got no response. “Isn’t that crazy?” Ms. Allison asked.

“It’s not like myself as a person or my company or my publications are under the radar,” said Mr. Binn. “We produce a couple hundred events a year with some of the biggest stars in the world. But this Bing thing, I’ve never had a stronger response to anything I’ve ever done.” Mr. Binn said he almost didn’t do the spot but his wife made him work his schedule around it. “It was one of the most brilliant suggestions she’s ever made.” For those who are wondering, Mr. Binn added that the fingers in the close-up of him searching Bing on his PDA are his own. “They don’t get model hands.”

In Mr. Binn’s spot, he visits Lure Fishbar on Mercer Street. “It’s still a good media scene. Now they bust my chops. They’ll say ‘Can you wait for a table?’”

Ms. Cutrone said that since the ads have come out she’s “entitled to free yogurt” at her friend Seth Levine’s Pop Yogurt in SoHo, where she went in the ad after being turned away by Angelo in Little Italy, her real favorite place.

Mr. Hadley said he’s currently thinking about the next round of ads. “I get about two requests a day from people who want to be in them,” he explained. “Do you want to be in one?”  Ms. Allison doesn’t get the same treatment. “I feel like they should give me free cupcakes for life. I’m working on it,” she said. “I did have my intern try to contact them.”

Mr. Hadley said he’s currently thinking about the next round of ads. “I get about two requests a day from people who want to be in them,” he explained. “Do you want to be in one?”

No More Sex in the City
The New York Post
By Mandy Stadtmiller
May 11, 2010

Two weeks ago, Katie Jean Arnold had her celibacy wake-up call. After hooking up with a stranger on the L train platform and going back to his place, she woke up at his apartment and decided to leave. On her way out the door, he came up to her, naked, and said the words she’ll never forget: “What’s your name?”

It was then that she made her Big Decision.

No. More. Sex.

She’s led a sex-free life ever since. It’s not a long time to remain chaste, you might argue, but the 29-year-old musician did a “celibacy cleanse” back in 2003 for eight months and says it made her feel fantastic. This time, she says she’s going to wait until she gets a record deal and puts out her first album before succumbing to temptation.

“Not having sex is like giving up junk food,” says Arnold. “Sex in New York for me had become like the 99-cent package of Ding Dongs on the corner.”

Arnold is more of a trendsetter than she realizes. In this month’s Playboy, Ashley Dupre says of sex: “I’m very good at it, but I’m saving that.” In April, Lady Gaga said, “I’m celibate, celibacy’s fine,” adding that it was something she wanted to “celebrate” with fans. Courtney Love is also on the no-sex bandwagon, declaring she’s been celibate for four years — adding that without it she never could have finished her new record, “Nobody’s Daughter.”

Less — when it comes to sex — is definitely more, argues Hephzibah Anderson, the author of “Chastened,” a new tome touting the lessons she learned during a sex-free year, from August 2006 to August 2007, a quarter of which she spent in New York.

“By tuning out some of that hyper-sexualized, porn-y clamor, you find yourself tuning into a sort of a subtler romance and being attracted to a different kind of guy,” says the 34-year-old London resident who frequents Manhattan. She was inspired to give up sex right before turning 30 when she saw her college boyfriend walking out of De Beers on Fifth Avenue with a smiling blonde.

“It broadens the erotic spectrum having a contrast,” says Anderson. “Otherwise it’s all full-on the whole time.”

Nowhere is it more full-on all the time than in New York, where men declare frustration over having to wait more than one date for sex and — as Arnold proved — hooking up is as simple as waiting for a train.

Or showing up for a job interview.

When Miss Teen Alabama 2007 Canden Bliss Jackson moved to Manhattan in August at the age of 19, she was excited about making it in the big city.

She quickly landed an interview for a job as a personal assistant to an international businessman. Soon after, he asked what would happen if they “started to like each other,” offering to put her up in a flat in SoHo, pay for travel expenses and talking about a salary of $120,000. The now 20-year-old asked him, “What — if I sleep with you?” His response: “Well, let’s not say it like that.”

Jackson explained that she was celibate and planned to be so until marriage. He took this as a negotiating technique, responding, “I like that even better. I’ll make it $150,000.”

Jackson quickly asked for a taxi.

“I feel like society has become more sex-focused,” says the Long Islander and Stony Brook University student. “Whatever happened to appreciating somebody holding your hand or giving you a sweet kiss? I love cuddling. The little things can be so much more intimate.”

Even former dating columnists are saying no to the carnal deed. When 29-year-old media personality Julia Allison went through a very public online breakup in March, she found herself canceling date after date until something finally clicked.

Celibacy was the answer to her problems — and may be the answer for quite a while.

“I had man whiplash,” she says. “I needed to put my neck in a brace.”

She issued a proclamation, writing on her Web site last week, “I decided to codify my unofficial gut reaction of ‘I really don’t feel like dating’ into an official ‘No Dating, No Sex’ stance, at least for the next month, and perhaps beyond that.”

She’s at the point, she says, where she doesn’t want to seek intimacy without the potential for a serious relationship. “I’ve always been against the New York version of fast-food sex. Believe me, come on, please, I’ve slept with guys I don’t love before, but I’ve frankly reached the age where I don’t want to do that anymore. I’ve dipped my toes in those waters, and it’s cold.”

Currently redirecting her passions into her writing, Allison is not the only one who’s refocused all that unused sexual tension into a creative pursuit.

“I totally sublimate all of my sexual energy into making wedding dresses because I feel like I need something constructive to channel my energy into,” says Colette Komm, a 28-year-old couture designer who lives on the Upper West Side.

“I’ve seen how people treat sex: like a crutch, like a weapon, like a temporary fix to their problems,” she says. “I’ve seen how some girls think they’re protecting their sexuality by giving it away. Like, ‘This means nothing to me if I take away all the emotional significance of sex.’”

Interestingly, Komm actually says she identifies more with porn star Jenna Jameson as being someone who lives an extreme sexual lifestyle — by having no sex at all.

And what better way to find out what a true porn star thinks of celibacy than to ask one?

Newly celibate musician Katie Jean Arnold actually lives with an X-rated model: her little sister, Crystal. Living in the same Bushwick railroad apartment, Crystal pulls in about $10,000 a month as an adult Web video star, traveling frequently to LA for Internet-only shoots. Going by the stage name “Erin Chase,” she’s also collaborated with her sister on a song called “Can I Get My Underwear Back?”

The 20-year-old blonde says when Katie Jean gave up sex, she also thought about doing it — momentarily.

“I considered celibacy,” Crystal says in a light, breathy voice.

“But I think it’s harder to not have sex than to have sex.”

Who is Julia Allison?
Mainstreet.com
By David Seaman
February 2, 2010

You’ve probably seen Julia Allison before. The 28-year-old TV commentator and media personality has been featured on MSNBC dissecting the latest viral video… or you may have caught her hawking the Sony VAIO in TV commercials alongside Peyton Manning and Justin Timberlake. And if you’re into media gossip, you’ll definitely know her as the girl Gawker.com loves to hate. She has achieved a certain kind of micro-fame in the world of Web 2.0 that may be crossing over into the mainstream, but when we sat down to speak with her we wanted to know how it happened… and more importantly, why. The short answer: because she wanted it. Plus, no one else was looking out for her, least of all media companies.

“They weren’t going to ensure that I had a job… or even that I had an audience. I looked to the Internet as a distribution channel, and also looked to the Internet to allow me to cut out the middle men — the people who were running the magazines and who also took in the ad dollars,” she explained. Recognition was a commodity as far as she was concerned, and she wanted to be paid more than $50 per column for it. Why not become your own publication, talent and publicity machine — all rolled into one?

I’ve met Allison before but it’s worth noting that she is smaller in person, and less intimidating, than you would expect for someone who spends so much time in the public eye. But she undeniably has what could be called “presence.” I overheard another guest talking about her when she was in the studio. He wondered who she was and speculated to his colleague, “She must be a TV person.”

After she graduated from Georgetown in 2004, Allison started working on Capitol Hill because she was interested in politics and wanted to make a difference. She soon became disillusioned by the political process and decided the best way she could have an impact on people’s lives was to become a journalist. So she moved to New York and managed to land herself a gig writing a dating column for free subway newspaper AM New York. Again, she became disillusioned, this time because AM New York paid horribly and she came to the shocking realization that a) journalists make lousy money, and b) it’s a profession with very little security. She decided, rightly we might add, that if she could become somewhat well-known, she would be better able to support herself… and then some.

So she decided to start living her life online, and doing what she could to get noticed. Allison has many attention-getting stunts to her name, including a now-infamous appearance at media mogul Nick Denton’s 2006 Halloween party wearing a “condom dress” and jointly blogging about her relationship with new media millionaire Jakob Lodwick on the Web site JakobandJulia.com. As their relationship went downhill, and eventually ended, Allison realized that airing personal drama in the public sphere has a real drawback. The final post from her on the shuttered JakobandJulia site reads: “It’s always humbling to realize you’ve made an enormous mistake, but I know that, at the very least, my public relationship struggles in the last seven months made others feel less alone. They certainly taught me quite a lesson … just not the lesson I thought I would learn. Good luck to you all.”

But Allison couldn’t give up sharing altogether. She co-founded the lifecasting portal NonSociety.com, where she regularly posts ideas, photos and other content arguably designed to keep her in the public eye. In a sense, all of this was designed to eventually get some big corporation to take notice, and pay her to do something.

When she landed the Sony gig, she felt like it was finally all coming together—and it paid real money… more than a $50 gift card to the Sony store, she confirmed.

(Click here to watch a bit of our interview with Julia.)

But what exactly is she trying to be? Julia insists she is a journalist despite the fact that most journalists don’t go around directly soliciting money from would-be advertisers. That kind of dirty work is left to the ad sales department. When we pointed out that Bob Woodward probably never asked companies for money in exchange for endorsing them, Allison wasn’t having it. “If Bob Woodward were making fifty bucks a column,” she said, “You know what, he would do what it took.”

Actually, probably not. When Woodward graduated from college in 1965 he went right into the Navy for five years. Then, like Allison, he moved to D.C. where he tried to talk his way into a job at The Washington Post. He failed and instead took a job at the Montgomery Sentinel, a weekly paper. And after a year toiling in the suburbs he managed to land a job at The Post. I doubt he was making much at either gig, that is until he managed to help break the story that led to the resignation of the President of the United States. But really, that’s neither here nor there. If Allison wants to call herself a journalist, fine. But there are plenty of journalists who are making horrible money who would disagree.

The truth is that regardless of how she labels herself, Julia employed a particularly aggressive brand of self-promotion to get to where she is today, and she deserves a ton of credit for that. I understand her branding strategy on a too-close-to-home level. Before I came to MainStreet I tried something similar, though I was far less motivated. I wrote a book about generating buzz, tried a couple dim publicity stunts of my own… and even got on TV a few times as a result. But when it became readily apparent that producers did not care about furthering my career, I eventually quit the schtick, and went back to the mundane business of being a normal person. The truth is that it takes a certain kind of iron constitution to put yourself out there in the way that Julia Allison does… or it takes a kind of willingness to suffer. It seems that she possesses the former more than the latter.

Type “Julia Allison” into Gawker’s search bar and you will be presented with a long list of articles that mock her in one way or another. Click on one of the articles and you’ll probably find a ton of comments that just rip her mercilessly. I asked her if she thought that even the bad press, the worst haters, were actually good for her because they keep people talking about her. Allison says she doesn’t deal well with the criticism: “I’m maybe too sensitive to ever be a real public figure or a real celebrity; I want everyone to like me.” She said she doesn’t want people to think she’s a “dick.”

We got in touch with Gawker writer Richard Lawson and asked him why people seem to react the way they do to Julia and why she’s been such a fixture on the site.

“I think she was just one of the first people to harness web 2.0 and leverage her own personality to make something of a name, and a paycheck, for herself. That was (is?) inherently interesting to Gawker — the whole idea of getting something from nothing but ‘oversharing.’ Is it indulgent? Sure. Does it take a special kind of person to do it? Absolutely. I think you have to decide whether you hate the game, the player or both. I think Gawker hated it all,” he told us via e-mail.

He added in a subsequent e-mail that while Gawker hated it all, it also loved it all. He said it is as interesting to them as it is repellent.

Thankfully for Julia, Gawker’s not the only game in town. She has appeared as a frequent guest on shows including FOX News Channel’s comedic commentary program Red Eye and the now-defunct Morning Show With Mike and Juliet. She was an editor-at-large for Star Magazine for a year and she was reportedly paid a six-figure salary to go on television to talk about celebrity stuff she, by her own admission, often did not know all that much about. A potentially rewarding position as a FOX Business Channel contributor fell through, because producers saw how negatively her appearance was received by certain online commenters.

(Watch her talk about this incident and other TV gigs here.)

These days she broadcasts her inevitable rise in the media game on an almost 24/7 basis — tweeting, blogging, lip-synching (or “lip-dubbing” as she corrected me), vacations, boyfriends, business negotiations. She broadcasts them all, like a real-life version of The Truman Show, only she’s in on the production (though she has said that she’s trying not to “overshare” as much). Her dream job, however, is to one day be a host on The View, though she’s unsure whether people her age (28 according to her Wikipedia, so it must be true) actually watch the show. People our age would watch The View with Julia Allison as a host — I really believe that.

Not everyone thinks her 24/7 lifecasting business model has a future, however. Mary Rambin, a former business partner and NonSociety ex-contributor, left Allison’s venture to form her own publication MoreThanMary.com, which launched Monday. We asked why she left NonSociety. She explained, “We built a great platform on NonSociety, one I believe in. Julia has chosen to maintain the lifecasting course, which I hope people eventually see the value in and realize how challenging it is. I left because Julia and I were not in agreement on how to build the NonSociety brand. That’s the bottom line.”

Alrighty then! Reading between the lines here, but sounds like there’s some drama there. Now let’s all gossip about it, and write anonymous comments about Julia Allison on Gawker and everywhere else she appears. Keep it friendly, though — a booking producer at The View may be reading.