Love

Clearly, if you were a new Editor of a news organisation, you wouldn't want your first day hi-jacked by tricky questions about the journalistic ethics of the previous regime. So I now don't expect the announcement of a new Editor of BBC News until well after tonight's Panorama.

If I'm right, you might like to know a little more about James Harding, former Editor of The Times. He got a first in History at Trinity College, Cambridge, but might not have been entirely bookish. Contemporaries at Trinity included Alexander Armstrong; elsewhere in the city Ben Miller was going out with Rachel Weisz, not far away in Trinity Hall. It's possible James knew Rachel from London - he was at St Paul's School in Barnes; she did her A-levels at St Paul's Girls School in Brook Green.

Jez Butterworth was at St John's, and became a friend. Jez eventually became flatmates with Miller in London - and, in 1992, an evening of four playlets, under the title "I Believe in Love", co-written by Butterworth and James Harding, directed by Butterworth, was performed at the Etcetera Theatre, above the Oxford Tavern in Camden High Street. Among the cast was Sasha Behar, who played 'Mad' Maya Sharma in Coronation Street, and has just joined Holby City.

In 1995 James was on the post-grad newspaper journalism course at City University, as a Financial Times trainee. Contemporaries included Matt Wells, now US editor of blogs and networks for the Guardian, and Guardian interview specialist Decca Aitkenhead.

Somewhere along the line at the FT he may have crossed paths with Nick Denton, now US based new media mogul - and owner of website Gawker. Gawker described James as "insanely hot" when he was first appointed Editor of The Times.