Hef's foolproof, no-holds-barred formula for keeping Playboy in the public eye

It's as reliable as the change of seasons.

Or the migration of our feathered friends.

The rising and setting of the sun.

Here's what happens.

Famous (or nonfamous) female does something that merits media attention.

Hugh Hefner then makes her offer to pose naked in his magazine.

It matters not that the chances of the woman posing naked for a photographer are, let's say, about ZERO.

Mr. Hefner will ask anyway.

The media then writes story about it.

"Playboy asks (insert woman's name here) to pose"

The wire services will move a short story, any number of newspapers and now, Web sites, will run a short item in their "Newsmakers" or "Names in the News" or "Bold Faced Names" sections.

Latest example: [Angelina Jolie]

Sure, Mr. Hefner, Mrs. Jolie-Pitt would love to pose naked for you, just as soon as she gets back from Namibia and spends a few weeks with her personal trainer following her Caesarean section.

As Hef's personal talent scout, the job would call for daily perusing of the major daily papers from around the world, and nightly viewing of the celebrity gossip TV roundups. The E! Channel would be on in the Playboy newsroom 24-7.

If it's not a famous acress or a budding startlet, maybe it's some sad sack, confused young lady in Georgia who leaves her fiance, takes a bus to Albuquerque and concocts a story about being abducted by Hispanics.

"Playboy Wants Runaway Bride" say all the papers.

Perhaps a foxy public school teacher who seduced one of her young students might want to clear the air, along with a tasteful pictorial.

Mr. Hefner, thoughtfully sucking on his smoking pipe, could tell the critics it's an "important culture phenomenon" in which he and his readers are interested.

It rarely happens, these newsmaker pictorials, but once in a while Mr. Hefner scores (Jessica Hahn, Anna Nicole Smith.)

It's these groundbreaking triumphs that stand out, not the propositions that fail. It must make all the hard work and planning, all the cock 'n bull ideas that never come to fruition, worth the effort for the old man in the silk pajamas.