Nello Balan is the owner of Nello, the exceedingly mediocre Italian restaurant on the Upper East Side. He's also one of the city's most shameless—and most notorious—publicity hounds. Balan's latest attempt at drumming up attention, however, now appears to be exploding in his face. Last week, a receipt "surfaced" indicating that Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich had spent $52,000 on lunch. (The bill was for $47,000, but TMZ, which first reported the story, said the billionaire had tacked on a $5,000 tip.) But a spokesman for Abramovich tells us the bill wasn't his and the mogul may pursue legal action against Balan for suggesting otherwise.More
Hunting down celebrities and taking their pictures—work carried out by thousands of paparazzi photographers every day—hasn't changed much over the past few years. The cameras are better and the lenses are longer. But the job still necessitates someone patiently waiting for hours outside the Bowery Hotel so that when Lindsay Lohan finally emerges, a thousand photos can be snapped of her in the six seconds it takes the actress to get from the door of the hotel to her waiting car. But technology could change the celebrity-industrial complex forever if Russian billionaire 
• George Michael is back in the news and, as usual, it has nothing to do with his music. The singer was arrested on Friday for driving drunk when he crashed his car into a truck. Michael, however, is insisting he was sober at the time. So maybe he's just a bad driver? [
• Kate Moss is teaming up with Topshop boss Philip Green and Simon Cowell to launch an entertainment conglomerate that will "rival Disney." At least that's what one British newspaper is reporting. [
With all the depressing talk about the stock market (the Dow 
You may be worrying about losing your job or defaulting on your mortgage, but you can take heart in the fact you're not alone: 
You'll be relieved to hear that 
The cruel blows of the recession have made a certain elite group even more elite: There are now only 49 Russian billionaires, half as many as there were a year ago, according to 
The financial crisis isn't just spoiling Dasha Zhukova's 
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Art Review has issued its "Power 100" list of the industry's most influential figures, and manages to make it semi-relevant in these troubled economic times: Erstwhile major art sponsors UBS and Deutsche Bank are conspicuous in their absence, and the list's compilers say that the murky economic climate has made established artists more desirable to big-name collectors. As a result, Damien Hirst is number one—the only other artist in the top ten, 
You'd think that a Russian billionaire could do pretty much whatever he wants regardless of the current state of economy, right? Not so much, says Roman Abramovich, who 
