Paris Hilton: Corporate America profits handsomely from her antics

Professional blond Paris Hilton has got some deep-pocketed fans in corporate America, including Comcast Corp. (NASDAQ: CMCSA), Warner Music Group Corp. (NYSE: WMG) and Time Warner Inc. (NYSE: TWX), who are hoping that she can pay her debt to society pretty quickly.

Hilton, who was released from jail this morning because of a medical condition, has shrewdly cashed in on her notoriety. She deserves a gold medal for parlaying her 15 minutes of fame into a show-business career. She's responsible for many awful trends including the growth in popularity of small toy-sized dogs and celebrity sex tapes. Her economic impact is undeniable.

Though she's confined to her home for the next 40 days, expect to see quite a bit more of the ditzy heiress America loves to hate.

Comcast's E! cable network is the newest home to The Simple Life. In the latest season of the show that refuses to die, Hilton and her sometimes BFF (best friend forever), Nicole Richie, are camp counselors who, among other things, motivate a group of overweight children to live healthier. No word if binging and purging will be covered.

For reasons best known to CEO Edgar Bronfman, Warner Music is putting out Hilton's album Paris, which is on sale for $19.98. Time Warner's TMZ.com site and other entertainment sites can count on millions of people hitting their pages for the latest gossip on Hliton. By the way, TMZ is reporting that Hilton's problem is emotional, not physical.

I neglected to mention her contribution to literature. Speculation was rampant that Hilton was planning a book about her prison experience, which I guess now is out the window since she didn't actually spend much time in the slammer. Hilton, though, is pretty resourceful and will no doubt pen a sequel to Confessions of an Heiress once she recovers from her ordeal.

Remember that corporate America profits handsomely from pop culture fads, even bad ones.