Fear not! We’ll learn more about Slim in the near future–you can count on deep dives from both the Times and The Wall Street Journal into all things Slim.

Though I imagine some of these answers may be less interesting than people imagine. For instance, I’m pretty sure he views his Times investment as a way to earn 14 percent on his money and enjoy a nice equity kicker if the stock ever rebounds.

In any case, it turns out that Slim probably has some questions about the Times himself. Like who runs it and what they do. Financial Times:

Carlos Slim Helu, who has ridden to the rescue of the New York Times with a $250m loan this week, professed to know little about the closest thing America has to a newspaper of record just six months ago.

‘Do you know the New York Times?’ the world’s second-richest man asked one visitor in July. ‘Do you know this guy [Arthur] Sulzberger and some woman called Janet [Robinson, chief executive]? What do you think?’”

It’s too late for any more due diligence at this point, but that doesn’t mean you can’t continue to learn about your latest investment. Let me suggest two excellent books about the paper of record:

“The Trust: The Private and Powerful Family Behind The New York Times,” by Susan E. Tifft and Alex S. Jones: a doorstop of a book that’s also pretty readable. It will explain who Pinch Sulzberger is and how his forefathers built the family business.

“Hard News: Twenty-one Brutal Months at The New York Times and How They Changed the American Media,” by Seth Mnookin: a comparatively breezy read that focuses on a couple people who no longer work at the paper–reporter/fabulist Jayson Blair and his former executive editor, Howell Raines. I don’t think the Blair incident “changed the American Media,” but you can allow Mnookin some hyperbole. His book does do a very nice job of explaining the Times’s hidebound–and excellent–news tradition.

What else should Slim be reading as he studies up on his newest acquisition? Let me know in comments below.

That’s what Portfolio magazine’s Kevin Maney tried to do last Friday, when he announced that as part of the cutbacks at Condé Nast, he’d no longer be writing his Tech Observer blog.

It had a great lede: “If Tech Observer looks a little sparse from here on, that’s because it is dead.”

But by Monday, Maney’s post had disappeared. Is Maney going to be writing the blog, after all? No, I’m told, he’s not. But Condé’s just not that excited about telling people that, especially since it may try to keep a small crew of bloggers working on the magazine’s site even after it fires the majority of the staff.

Luckily, I still happened to have a browser window open with Kevin’s now-vanished goodbye post. Here’s the full text:

Oct 31 2008   7:50PM  EDT
The End of This Blog

Kevin Maney writes: If Tech Observer looks a little sparse from here on, that’s because it is dead.

Some of you may have already seen the news that almost all of Portfolio.com’s staff is getting cut, and the site will be reformulated as something less costly and ambitious. As part of that, my contract to do this blog has been terminated.

I’ve enjoyed being here. To quote Douglas Adams: So long, and thanks for all the fish.

If you’re in the Bay Area, come see our band play on Dec. 2 at the charity event Silicon Valley Rocks. Or buy our CD, Privacy. Perhaps you can help me leave journalism to become a rock star. (You know, I’m looking for a profession with more job security…)

Next fall, keep an eye out for my book, to be published by Doubleday. At the moment it’s titled, The Fidelity Swap: Why Some Things Catch On, and Others Don’t.

And I’ll still be writing for Portfolio magazine … and hoping the economy gets fixed. Soon. Really soon.

Take care.

Kevin”

Unfortunately, it’s almost certain that we’re going to be seeing a lot more goodbye posts over the next few months. The silver lining is that sometimes people write really good stories as they’re being fired. Not sure I’d be up for writing one myself, but I sure do appreciate reading good stories.

Here’s the best one I can recall: Seth Mnookin’s report on the end of his job at Brill’s Content/Inside.com, from way, way back in October 2001. I scoured the Web looking for this one but couldn’t find it, and ultimately asked Seth for help.

Turns out I wasn’t the only one; I think this story is now a bit legendary. And Seth turned out just fine–fancy jobs, big deal books–so this tale has a happy ending. Here’s hoping this era’s layoff stories turn out the same way.

[Image Credit: Shht!]