Kara Visits TMZ.com

How much did I love it yesterday when Harvey Levin, managing editor of TMZ.com, had the news that Paris Hilton had dropped her appeals efforts in regard to her upcoming incarceration for violating her probation and he slapped it up on the celebrity news and gossip site during my visit.

A longer post is coming about my visit to TMZ.com, which is owned by Time Warner (and launched jointly by its Telepictures and AOL units) and is doing some of the most interesting blends of text, video and pictures on the Web right now and pointing the way to what kind of content offerings really work in the medium.

And, an added plus and a rarity: Hollywood execs who really get the Internet and are not scared of it. Why should they be, with 8 million unique visitors a month, despite being launched less than two years ago? And then there is that important buzz (thanks to the never-ending hijinks of Alec Baldwin, Michael Richards, Mel Gibson, Anna Nicole Smith and, of course, the gift that keeps on giving, Paris Hilton) that the site has garnered both online and, especially, offline.

Here’s a trio of video interviews I shot at TMZ.com, with more to come, with Levin, Alan Citron, its general manager (note the rogue’s gallery of celebs behind him) and former Telepictures exec Jim Paratore (who is still working with the site and on an upcoming TMZ television show as executive producer):