Tiscali UK culls celebrities

Tiscali UK is to ditch a number of celebrity columnists from its LineOne portal just six months after they started work.

It's not known exactly who will be for the chop but sassy actress Joan Collins could well be a victim of Tiscali UK's latest axe-wielding exercise.

It seems the Italian-owned ISP is tightening the purse strings as part of its bid to trample on the British market place.

In December (before LineOne was bought by Tiscali), LineOne announced it had created a "portal with personality" by recruiting a number of celebs to boost the editorial direction of the site. Insiders tell us this little project cost LineOne a cool £1 million although this has yet to be confirmed.

Joan Collins, Honor Blackman, Ruby Wax, Craig Charles, Jeremy Hardy, Dame Thora Hird and George Best were among a stable of high-profile names to boost the site. Six months on and sources tell us they're for the chop.

A spokeswoman for Tiscali UK was unable to say exactly which celebs would get their marching orders.

However, she said: "I finally confirm to you that Tiscali is terminating some of the celebrity content contracts, but not all of them.

"This is part of the rationalisation process that is happening across the three portals," she said.

On a separate issue, did you know Tiscali's PR company in Italy is called - get this - "Image Building". By 'eck, Tiscali UK could sure do with some of that. ®