I awoke this morning, feeling sore and cranky. And I realized that today is Aug. 7, which means it was 18 years ago today I was discharged from the Army.
The idea that so much time has passed since I was a young, highly motivated knucklehead with an M-16, always depresses me. It makes me feel old. And this morning I sat on the couch drinking coffee and feeling sorry for myself, when my wife, who is 15 years younger than I, asked me a question that changed my mood:
"You ever hear of a thing called Facebook?"
She has no interest in my work. And she doesn't read this blog. So of course she had never seen any of the things I've written about Facebook. But that's fine. Because today when she asked that question, I felt, for just a minute, younger and more hip than she.
And lord knows I needed that today.
Speaking of young and hip, if you're reading this post on my blog (rather than through an RSS feed), you'll see a new link on the right that says "Follow me on Twitter."
Twitter is a "micro-blogging" platform. And in my never-ending quest to remain digitally connected, I started using it last week.
I have quickly become addicted. I'm sure I'll write more about Twitter (as well as rival Pownce, which I just started using) soon.
And next August, when I'm yet another year further away from the young soldier I once was, I'm hoping that my wife will turn to me and ask "You ever hear of a thing called Twitter?"
To read the news story that brought Facebook to my wife's attention today, click here.
To read more about micro-blogging, click here.
tags: journalism, b2b, media, trade press, magazines, newsletters, business media
Congratulations (on the anniversary). I was wondering what you thought of the multichannel-B&C news.
ReplyDelete-- MU
Hi MU,
ReplyDeleteThanks!
As for the changes at Reed (http://tinyurl.com/24c2zx), I'm afraid I don't have any particular insight. I've consulted with Reed in the past, but I wasn't involved in this process.
Based solely on what I've seen in the press coverage, the move makes sense. Multichannel and B&C compete for ad dollars and attention. And the world of television is going through tremendous change. The need for a slew of different mags to cover different sectors is probably not as strong as it once was.
Multichannel and B&C have have found new success online in recent months. As the sites pushed content in front of the firewall, it seemed to me that the number of advertisers jumped. And certainly page views, etc. rose.
The bottom line I suppose is twofold: 1) the future for much of B2B journalism is certainly online, and the changes at these two publications reflect that, and 2) as cable, broadcast and Web all merge into a single industry, it makes sense to merge the publications that cover it.