The Morning Fix: Oscar noms out! Diddy goes cable. New Weather man

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After the coffee. Before figuring out who the Academy snubbed.

The Skinny: It was five years ago today I quit cigarettes. Just thought I’d share that. Tuesday’s headlines include early analysis of the Oscar nominations, a new cable channel from Diddy and a look at one of the most popular channels on YouTube.

The Daily Dose: ‘I haven’t seen any of these movies,’ sports radio personality Dan Patrick quipped Tuesday morning after looking at a list of the nominations for Best Picture. He’s not the only one, and that may be a problem for ABC, which airs the awards show. While lots of people tune in for the glitz and gowns, having some popular movies in the running for the top trophies doesn’t hurt either. Last year’s show, which saw ‘The King’s Speech’ take the big prize, averaged 37 million viewers. A far cry from the 55 million that watched in 1998, the year ‘Titanic’ cleaned up. Billy Crystal, you have your work cut out for you.

Crowded field. There will be nine movies including ‘Hugo,’ ‘The Artist’ and ‘The Descendants’ vying for Best Picture at next month’s Oscars, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences announced Tuesday morning. Other nominations include Melissa McCarthy for Best Supporting Actress for ‘Bridesmaids’ and, of course, George Clooney and Meryl Streep in the best acting categories. Early thoughts on the nominations from the Los Angeles Times, New York Times, Variety and Hollywood Reporter.

Big machine. The future of television may be on YouTube. Machinima, a channel on the Google-owned online video site, has a monthly average of 125 million viewers looking at a billion videos. The channel is for video game geeks and draws lots of teenage boys. A look at the channel and the influence it’s exerting in the entertainment industry from the Los Angeles TImes.

Diddy TV. Music and fashion mogul Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs is launching a cable music channel and has Comcast on board to carry it, according to Broadcasting & Cable. The channel, dubbed Revolt, is set to launch in December of this year. Former MTV programming exec Andy Schuon is on board to help get it off the ground.

New BFFs. Billionaire investor Ron Burkle, who made his fortune in the supermarket business, has moved from the fringes of Hollywood to the thick of it with an investment in Ryan Kavanaugh’s production company, Relativity Media. Maybe he’ll get to ride around in Kavanaugh’s helicopter! Details from the Wall Street Journal.

Change in forecast. The Weather Channel made some news Tuesday morning, announcing that David Kenny, former president of Web application firm Akama and a Yahoo board member, will become chairman and chief executive of the company. The hire is a further sign of the growing emphasis the Weather Channel is putting on its digital and online operations. He replaces Mike Kelly, a publishing industry veteran who will remain as a consultant. This news is so fresh, we don’t even have a link for you.

Guard your wallet. With Time Warner Cable and the Pac-12 Conference launching regional sports channels in Los Angeles later this year, consumers should brace themselves for a hit. Sports Business Daily looks at what these two new channels could do to your cable bill. It won’t be pretty.

Home-field advantage. WNBC, the local New York NBC affiliate that will carry the Super Bowl, is poised to make millions more in local advertising now that the Giants are in the game than they would have if the San Francisco 49ers had won. Of course, the same is true for the Boston NBC affiliate because of the Patriots’ involvement in the game. Having a local team in the Super Bowl is kind of like winning the lottery for a TV station. More from the New York Post.

Inside the Los Angeles Times: John Horn and Steven Zeitchik look at the contradictions the Sundance Film Festival. Lots of tough films about the bad economy amidst a festival full of booze, caviar and free gifts! Sign me up.

-- Joe Flint

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