Laurel Touby founded mediabistro.com in 1996, sold it in 2007 (for $23 million) and began her first real vacation in October of last year – a six-month sabbatical around the world.

We caught up with Touby today by phone in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, to find out what she’s been up to, her thoughts on Foursquare and Chatroulette, what her plans are next and more.

After Harry Potter’s worldwide record-breaking weekend, we got to talking about certain parallels between the magical land of Hogwarts and the equally magical land of headlines, bylines, cutlines, chyrons, blog pickup and declining ad pages. Turns out, the two have a lot in common!

On that note, for your edification and enjoyment, we present our own version – let’s call it “Harry Potter and the Media Muggles.”

Bloomberg, which acquired Business Week last month, announced this week that they were looking to layoff 100 positions or 25% of its staff. Judging from Twitter it looks like the layoffs took place today (h/t FishbowlNY).

As we reported last week, Bloomberg LLC had expressed interest in BusinessWeek late in the process, but was given extra time to perform due diligence. Well it appears that the bid has come in, according to Jon Fine, making them the presumptive favorite in purchasing the troubled title.

The deadline for final bids for BusinessWeek came and went yesterday, and its unclear whether or not Bloomberg LP would bid. The financial media giant is reportedly very interested in acquiring the troubled financial magazine, but since they got involved so late into the process, they will get an extra couple of days to perform due diligence and decide upon its bid.

Who: Maegan Carberry, Jon Fine, Matt Romanoski, Jay Rosen, Rachel Sklar What: MediaBistro’s “Finding a Business Model for News & Online Media,” at Comix When: July 16, 2009 Thumbs: Up