Once upon a time, media bulletin board site Mediabistro had a talented, anonymous ad blogger called Agency Spy, who got good dirt and the occasional undeserved murder rap. The original Agency Spy left to start her own blog a couple months ago, but earlier today she put up a post saying the site was grinding to a temporary halt. Why? Because, Mediabistro multimillionaire founder Laurel Touby said, MB was enforcing a noncompete agreement against her! Seems pretty petty, Laurel, considering you're the second-richest internet media woman in New York now. The $23 million Mediabistro machine can't compete with one little alumnus? Tisk tisk. [Adscam, The Brief]

Daily Candy, the email newsletter for women who like to buy things, was improbably successful. Former journalist Dany Levy founded it in 2000; it quickly became profitable, and she sold a controlling stake in the business to the private investment firm Pilot Group in 2003 for $3.5 million. Pilot Group sold the newsletter to Comcast last week for (an unbelievable) $125 million. But Levy, we hear, retained about a 20% interest in Daily Candy-which would mean that she walked away from the sale with $25 million. That would make her the undisputed internet cash queen of New York media. Take that, Laurel Touby!

Mediabistro maven Laurel Touby is doing a one-hour telechat for the website Spirited Woman. This is notable for two reasons: one, you have to gawk at the site's hippie-rainbow 1996 design. Two, they're hyping up her online appearance with this: "Laurel rarely does interviews." HAH. In 2008 alone, she's been quoted in the New York Times, Mergers & Acquisitions, Law and More, and a CNBC segment about middle-class milionaires.

Boa-wearing internet entrepreneur Laurel Touby shocked and awed the media world when she sold her freelancer-helping website MediaBistro for $23 mil, despite her famous inability to use e-mail. "I thought, 'O.K., a car and driver and a new apartment and a whole new life.' In fact, I can only afford two out of three," she told the Times last year. She must be on some sort of branding campaign, because she's still complaining about her millions. She is seriously and totally not that rich! she tells CNBC. For God's sake, she lives in a sixth-floor walkup! Click for the other indignities of being a middle-class millionaire.

There's no Gawker correspondent at this week's Mediabistro conference-unless a tipster volunteers for the role. (Photograph: Julia Allison and sidekicks greeted attendees with top hats.)

MIDTOWN WEST — "You're a normal person," Wired editor Chris Anderson asked me at Wired's 15th anniversary party last night in New York. "What do you make of all this?" He nodded his head toward the four corners of the roof top, crowded with the Wired set. In response, I said something about the thick-rimmed black frames and all the scarves. But for reading-comprehension points, I should have said I felt like I was in the midst of a cult. Because that's what Conde Nast's Wired is all about, Anderson and Wired cofounder Louis Rossetto told us in their speeches: turning the cult of technology into a culture, but keeping it as fervent as a cult. That and covers of a nude Jenna Fischer and LonelyGirl15 in bed, of course. Below, photos of the faithful.

Freelancer-helping website MediaBistro's upcoming conference, the unfortunately-named MediaBistro Circus, may not be coming along so well: boa-wearing propriestress Laurel Touby recently emailed, like, literally every single person she knows, begging them to register for "two days of inspired programming designed to bring very senior-level media people up to speed on what's happening in digital media." Another bad sign? Hiring circus freaks via Craigslist—on the cheap.

Boa-wearing MediaBistro entrepreneur Laurel Touby has made the mediabaristas of New York City laugh, again and again, with her inability to use e-mail. (Then we remember that she sold MediaBistro for $23 mil—at which point all laughter abruptly stops.) So you can understand the concern we feel about her brand-new Twitter account. So far she's plugged her conference, announced gym plans, and given out her dining coordinates so people can "drop by and say hello":

Boa-sporting Mediabistro.com proprietress Laurel Touby continues unabated in her menacing campaign to misuse email—an invention originally designed to simplify communications. Her latest infraction: in order to promote an upcoming "Mediabistro Circus," she decided to save a little time by sending a mass email to her entire contact list—all 2,000 people. The message starts off with an apology to those who "hate my guts," which is a good sign that perhaps it would be better to pursue a different outreach strategy. The entire ill-conceived email, after the jump.

Remember last December, when Laurel Touby's inability to use the internet created mayhem? Now (or yesterday), months later, Animal gadfly Bucky Turco annoys everyone on that list again with the attached plug for a funny Pope-related thing on their website. No responses this time from Spiegelman, Bercovici, or Jared Paul Stern.

Boa-wearing weird-lady Laurel Touby, CEO of MediaBistro (and windfall wealth recipient) stars in a completely ridiculous promotional video for the upcoming MediaBistro conference. It's called, inexplicably, MediaBistro Circus. Just as inexplicably, the video stars Laurel in a ringmaster's uniform and top hat, holding a fake "press conference" with a gaggle of reporters. Stunts like this make our job too easy, but then we realize she's a millionaire, so guess who has the last laugh? Click for the video.

Touby is the founder of Mediabistro.com, which she sold off for a pretty penny in July 2007. She still refers to herself a "cyberhostess" despite the fact that no one else has used the prefix "cyber" in half a decade.

Former Gawker editor Choire Sicha interviewed BusinessWeek's Jon Fine—husband of confused gazillionaire Mediabistro lady Laurel Touby—for this internet video thing called Bloggingheads. And he sorta made Jon uncomfortable! No one likes to talk about money, especially when they have lots and lots of it. "This short clip is my final, incoherent (and actually feverish) attempt at rehashing his wife Laurel Touby's complaints about her riches in the New York Times," Choire says. Enjoy Jon's hip Ramones shirt and admire his vast record collection, after the jump!

So Laurel Touby says she came home from the sale of her allegedly freelance-journalist-helping website Mediabistro.com with $9 to $11 million after taxes. (Really? What about those investors? Hmm.) She tells the Times: "'I had all kinds of illusions about how far the money would go and what I would enjoy, but they're not true,' Ms. Touby said. 'I thought, 'O.K., a car and driver and a new apartment and a whole new life.' In fact, I can only afford two out of three.'" Um, which two would that be? Anyway, here is an example of not to do with that kind of windfall: "She remains determined to buy a Manhattan loft apartment, which will consume half her money, and must still earn $100,000 a year to maintain it, she said." Wow, bad call, sister.

Mediabistro founder Laurel Touby and all her Laurel Touby-loving friends have put together a very special Christmas video to wish you happy holidays! From Touby's "media family" (which includes husband Jon Fine, Bonnie Fuller, and Arianna Huffington) to yours (which probably doesn't), please have a "warm and fuzzy New Year!" It's just like that I Am African campaign but without any social good and slightly less funny!

Last night, Mediabistro founder Laurel Touby wonderfully displayed her utter inability to use email. (Once again, we question how this woman founded an internet company and sold it for $23 million.) Rebecca Fox, Mediabistro's managing editor, had sent out an email alert that News Corp. had bought Beliefnet.com. Rebecca did not bcc the email list—and so her boss Laurel replied to all. Which started a most unholy email chain!

Every year Gawker commenter and ad sales guy (and the best argument for abolishing the divide between editorial and advertising) LolCait has a super special Thanksgiving in his mind. There all of his and your favorite characters meet and dreams come true. This year Laurel Touby hosts.

Accepting her Min award this afternoon for being one of the most intriguing people of 2007, Mediabistro.com's Laurel Touby asked the audience: How many people found their jobs on Mediabistro? Two people raised hands. One of them looked at her boss and mouthed the word "Sorry." "Oh!" said Touby from the stage. "Three people!" Then she said something about boas.

Digital media types here in New York are always looking for a reason to celebrate their own achievements. A couple of months ago, a few of them began calling themselves the Founders Club and decided to start holding mixers around town. Last night, NBC hosted the latest in the series on the set of Saturday Night Live. Who showed? Mostly wantrepreneurs looking for a VC teat to suckle, of course. But I also ran into Digg CEO Jay Adelson, pictured above; a definitely not-pictured angel Ron Conway, who dodged my camera; a Facebook "founder"; and MC Hammer.

So just how awesome was Laurel Touby's Mediabistro "Golden Boa" party that her husband Jon Fine is still nursing his hangover via Facebook? This awesome: