In your wicked Wednesday media column: the post-Roger Hodge day at Harper's, real journalists sure don't work in a "coffee shop," layoffs at ABC, and Nancy Grace is bad.

Harper's Magazine editor Roger Hodge left the magazine yesterday for reasons that were initially unexplained; the updated word is that he was fired for weak mag sales and circulation. And today, a tipster tells us that today, the Harper's staff "received an hour long harangue/lecture from [publisher] Rick MacArthur on flagging sales." Also, the "new editor sez they need more women & minorities in the mix." We wish them well on both counts! Great little magazine.


Listen to this bullshit: reporters at a new investigative journalism startup called California Watch are actually working on laptop computers in coffee shops on wi-fi, rather than in a smoky newsroom. Working out of coffee shops: an outrage of journalism, as well as a travesty of people crowding me while I'm working in the coffee shop.


ABC's broadcast division laid off "dozens" of employees yesterday, mostly in New York.


Oh hm, professional televised passer-of-judgment Nancy Grace is asking that her own deposition in a wrongful death case be conducted off camera. We talk so much about Limbaugh and Palin and Beck, but do we give enough attention to Nancy Grace in the 'worst person ever' discussion? Something to think about.