From the weekend papers

Life at Playa Vista: Despite its turbulent legal history, the planned community gets very positive reviews among residents interviewed by the Daily Breeze in a Sunday piece. "We're here. We're never going to go away," said one homeowner. Does everyone living there really feel that way? Meanwhile, there continue to be concerns among activitists about methane and a public hearing is scheduled for Tuesday.

Oil money: It's not quite Prudhoe Bay, but Long Beach oil fields have been one of the city's biggest moneymakers and are helping speed along capital improvement projects. For the fiscal year ending Sept. 30, the port and city stand to collect $80 million, $30 million more than anticipated from agreements with private businesses.

The MySpace Effect: In a curious twist, Silicon Valley start-ups are trying to ride the coattails of something in L.A. (actually Santa Monica). They're looking to serve MySpace users with voicemail services, photo slide shows and browsing technology of one sort of another. Venture capitalist Tom Cole told the San Jose Mercury News: "MySpace is clearly the 800-pound gorilla."

Gender pay: The secret to shatterering the glass-ceiling appears to be women reaching the ranks of senior management. But according to a new study, just increasing the number of women in lower-level positions won't do much good. Oh, and men working for women managers seem to do slightly worse in the pay department than men working for men.

Ruca ride: The happening and off the wall surf and sportswear company in Costa Mesa gets profiled in the New York Times Sunday Styles section. Annual sales are still just $20 million, but its quirky line of shirts and trunks are being touted as the next big thing, a sort of cross between surfer and rocker chic.

"Desperate" programming: The ABC hit "Desperate Housewives" is being franchised in Spanish- and Portugese-language versions, an interesting effort to combine the success of the American series with the immense popularity of telenovelas in Latin America. Local casts are being used to re-enact the original scripts. “ ‘Desperate Housewives’ shares certain characteristics with the telenovela, but it is based more on real life and is not as dramatized," Fernando Barbosa told the New York Times. He's senior vice president for Latin America at Buena Vista International Television, a branch of Walt Disney Co.

So long, TV Times: Well, not quite, but as of Sept. 30, the Los Angeles Times weekly TV listings will only be available on request and will be delivered on Saturdays. Daily listings will still appear in the Calendar section. Some weeks back, the Times reduced the size of TV Times and cut back on movie listings. Daily stock market coverage has been another victim of the Times and other newspapers trying to cut costs and use the Web as a cheaper alternative.

New LANG CEO: John C. McKeon, former vice president/marketing for Knight Ridder, was named president and chief executive of the Los Angeles Newspaper Group, the cluster of MediaNews properties that includes the Daily News, Long Beach Press-Telegram and San Gabriel Valley Tribune. Before Knight Ridder, McKeon was executive vice president and general manager of Newsday.