Harry McCracken's Guide to Self-Employment

Longtime readers of this blog know I began predicting years ago that low-cost Web technologies and open-source software would lead many B2B journalists to quit their jobs and strike on out on their own.

And regular readers know that the highest-profile editor to make the leap to standalone journalist is Harry McCracken, formerly of PC World.

Now Harry has published a sort of how-to guide for anyone interested in following in his entrepreneurial footsteps. If you've been thinking it might be time to work for yourself, check it out.

tags: journalism, b2b, media, trade press, magazines, newsletters, business media, entrepreneurial journalism, standalone journalism

B2B blogger scoops world on Biden pick

I'm feeling a wee bit proud today. Heck, I think everyone in B2B journalism should be feeling a little proud today. Particularly those of us who live and work in the B2B blogosphere.
As Adam Tinworth has pointed out, perhaps the biggest news story on earth last week was broken by a B2B blogger.
According to Adam, Reed Business Information's Flightblogger was the first with the news that Barak Obama had chosen Joe Biden as his running mate. And he broke the news through Twitter and with the help of his readers. If that's not an example of how to report in 2008 -- fast, first, connected, Web-first and employing tweets and crowdsourcing -- I don't know what is.

Now according to Adam, others in the blogosphere picked up the story and ran with it. And, according to Flightblogger Jon Ostrower, other bloggers, as well as the news networks, failed to credit him for the scoop.

It's worth noting that if, in fact, Jon was the first with the news (on 8/22 at 5:33 pm and 8:03 pm), then he only has himself to blame for not getting more attention. His posts are, well, sort of vague. Even he uses the word "speculation" to describe his findings. More importantly, he buries the lede. The "news" is at the bottom of continually updated post. And you have to read pretty closely to see that he's actually on to something important. Even the headline is lackluster -- "Presidential Picks and Planes." His tweets are no better. At 8:22 pm he writes that he "may" have the story: "NetJets 863 MDW-ILG may point to Biden as Obama VP. Look for a return flight."

But I don't want to get all nitpicky here. It looks like Jon broke the news. And that's worth celebrating if you care about news and B2B.

Jon's scoop is particularly good news if you're me.
Because several years ago I had the pleasure of speaking to a bunch of RBI journalists about "becoming more blog-like" -- by adopting some of the practices of the blogosphere in their work. I think it's safe to say that the reaction I received from some of the staff was a wee bit short of love and adulation. In particular, I remember one guy who promised me "we will never do that s*#t here."
And today I can say for sure that I was right when I responded, "Yes you will."

For a different take on this subject, check out the strange coverage from L.A. Times, which missed Jon's work, fails to credit anyone in the blogosphere, and instead seems gleeful that Obama's text-notification system failed. Or check out this piece from a student journalist who is positively disgusted by CNN's apparent lack of original reporting on the Biden pick.

(Note: B2B blog historians, if there are such people, may be amused to see that the first time I wrote about B2B blogs and the airline industry was three years ago this summer. I guess that means its probably time to drop the modifier "new" from the phrase "new media.")

Hat tip to Kristine Lowe, the newest B2B blogger on my radar screen. Although I subscribe to Adam's feed, and although I look at Flightblogger from time to time, I'm days behind in my reading and was unaware of Jon's scoop until I read about it on Kristine's blog. (Anyone who knows me and my enormous ego will guess correctly that I stumbled upon Kristine's blog because she linked to me and mentioned me by name. That triggered a Google alert in my in-box this morning.)

tags: journalism, b2b, media, trade press, magazines, newsletters, business media

Wall Street finances and B2B publishing explained

Borrow cash. Buy a publishing company. Choke on debt. Borrow more. Buy another publisher. Choke on debt. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat.

tags: journalism, b2b, media, trade press, magazines, newsletters, business media

Talking to ourselves and making little sense

One of my many journalism obsessions is watching the internal communications processes at publishing companies.
I follow this stuff pretty closely. I read the memos (when I can get them.) I check out Intranets and wikis (when they're available to me.) I read executives' blogs, publishers' sales reports and I attend in-house meetings at client sites whenever possible.
So allow me to share this important bit of info:
As a general rule, for reasons that escape me, companies that are in the business of communicating information to readers do a terrible job of communicating information to their employees.

Today, for example, I had the chance to read the internal memo that Source Media's CEO Jim Malkin sent to employees earlier this week to announce a large-scale reorganization.
And it's awful.
If you read my initial post about Source Media's plans on Tuesday, you'd have seen that I was supportive. You'd also have seen that my support was based largely on a quote that Malkin gave to Folio.
But today as I struggled to read the memo, my support simply drained away.
Am I being too harsh?
Check it out yourself.
I'm sure you'll agree that the memo is simply unreadable.
First, it's 1,830 words long. And I have this picture of every poor soul at Source trying to "speed read" through the thing to get to something important.
Second, the memo doesn't answer the one question that probably every single reader had: Is anyone getting laid off?
Third, the memo is full of dense paragraphs of "who reports to whom" nonsense that should have been in a graphic (or even in a separate memo.)
The result of all this, I'm sure, is that the employees of Source Media reacted to the memo in a way that the company would not have wanted. Some employees likely felt manipulated or misled (as they read through line after line of spin only to find that there was no "news" there about the layoffs.) Others, particularly the journalists, likely spent a good bit of time chuckling at the writing and complaining that the boss had "buried the lede." And it's pretty unlikely that the clerical and support staff was filled with team spirit after reading seemingly endless descriptions of which executive would be reporting to which other executive.

There's simply no reason for this sort of thing at any company. There are loads of very talented people working in the internal communications field. Any decent size company can hire someone to manage employee communications. Even the smallest company can get a consultant to help with major messages.
But at a journalism company, failing to master internal communications is just unforgivable. For god's sake, a publishing company is filled with people who communicate for a living!
So please, whether you're the CEO, a publisher or anyone else at a media company -- the next time you have something important to say, walk down the hall and ask someone for help.

To see some other examples of simply awful internal communications in publishing, check out Tony Silber's critique of John French's memo to Penton earlier this year, check out my post on the fury at Cygnus, and don't miss the now-famous video of Sam Zell cursing one of his journalists.

Also, if you're interested in following developments in internal communications (a field that is struggling with many of the same issues as B2B publishing), I'd suggest you start by reading two of the best blogs in the space: Talking Internal Communications and H&K's Change and Internal Communications.

tags: journalism, b2b, media, trade press, magazines, newsletters, business media, internal communications, employee communications

Source Media throws editors into the pool

Source Media, publisher of a number of Wall Street-focused brands such as The Bond Buyer and Securities Industry News, is reorganizing into a team-based system.
Under the plan, every title at Source will have an editor-in-chief, but won't have a dedicated staff. Instead, Source editors will be organized into four different "pools." And the EICs will pull editors from those pools as needed.

It's possible that the reorganization is nothing more than an attempt to reduce costs by lowering head count. And, according to Folio, 20 jobs will be cut.
But I'm willing to entertain the possibility that this is actually a more nuanced -- and more sensible -- move than it might appear.
Because I'm heartened by the words of Source CEO Jim Malkin, who explained the restructuring to Folio by saying: "Essentially, we are shifting from a group of publications into an information company."

(As an aside, some longtime observers of B2B media may chuckle at Source Media's ambition to become an "information company." That's because Source Media is the former Thomson Media unit of Canada's Thomson Corp., which Thomson sold in 2004. Some four years later, Thomson merged with Reuters to form Thomson Reuters, giving it control of roughly one-third of the market in financial information services. Or, to put it another way, it's probably not too much of a stretch to say that when Thomson set its sites on becoming an information company -- and competing against Bloomberg for the big money on Wall Street -- the first thing it did was to start dumping print magazines. We'll have to wait a bit to see if Source follows suit.)

tags: journalism, b2b, media, trade press, magazines, newsletters, business media

What We Know Now

We're in a strange position in B2B journalism in 2008.
As the Web has grown, altering forever the business and art of publishing, B2B has sometimes taken the lead.
We are far ahead of our peers in the newspaper, TV and consumer magazine world in some areas. Other times we languish far behind.

In two areas in particular, B2B has shown the way to the future:
1. No other area of journalism does a better job of producing (and selling) data on the Web.
2. No other area of journalism is doing a better job of moving to Web-only -- eliminating inefficient print pubs to cut costs while preserving brands online.

But it would be misleading to suggest that all of B2B has taken to the Web faster than the rest of journalism. We have publications (and entire companies) that trail the overall journalism industry. And these slower moving publications are filled with publishers, editors and salespeople who cannot or will not see that the fundamentals of the business model have changed. These folks are often hardworking, bright and ambitious, but they nonetheless remain delusional about the level of change that is needed.
You can tell them that adding some online bells and whistles isn't enough. You can tell them that offering a digital edition isn't enough. You can tell them that running a newsroom on a print-publishing schedule, while claiming you "get" the Web isn't enough. You can tell them that selling banner ads and buttons isn't enough when new online-only competitors offer advanced metrics, behavioral tracking and lead-gen campaigns.
But they will look at you blankly and say "our readers aren't there yet" or "we don't have the budget" or "we need more training" or one of a thousand other excuses.

I think about the laggards in B2B journalism whenever I read about the extraordinary problems facing the U.S. newspaper industry. I think it's safe to say that daily newspapers have done a worse job than any other media sector in adjusting to the changes of the past few years.
And while every mistake that daily newspapers made has also been made by B2B publications, I would be hard-pressed to name a B2B company that has made as many mistakes as the average daily newspaper.

There's a wonderful piece online today that I would urge everyone in B2B to read. It's by William Lobdell, who left the Los Angeles Times last week after 18 years with the company. Lobdell has published a piece called "42 Things I Know" in which he outlines the mistakes made by the Times.
The Times is the poster boy for how not to adjust to the Web. It seems less likely every day that the thing can even survive. And there are lessons to be learned in studying what went wrong.
Take a look at Lobdell's piece (tip of the hat to Ryan for pointing me to Lobdell with his tweet of this morning.) Then ask yourself some hard questions about your publication, your company and your career. And if you're with a print-first, or -- God forbid -- a print-only B2B publication, ask yourself, as Lobdell did, if it has "become riskier to stay than to go."

tags: journalism, b2b, media, trade press, magazines, newsletters, business media, web-first publishing, advertising

The voice of reason (on copyright) goes silent

The media blogosphere is a slightly less interesting place today.
William Patry is shutting down his blog on copyright law.
And given that no less an institution than the Associated Press has apparently forgotten the basics of "fair use," I can't think of a worse time for this to happen.

First, a little background on Patry. He is the author of a the definitive work on U.S. copyright law -- the seven-volume textbook series called "Patry on Copyright." And over a 26-year career Paltry has held a series of posts where he wielded tremendous influence over copyright law. He's the former copyright counsel to the U.S. House of Representatives, Committee on the Judiciary, the former Policy Planning Advisor to the Register of Copyrights, and was a professor of law at Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law.
But Patry is probably best known -- and often criticized for -- his most recent job: Senior Copyright Counsel for Google.

If you've ever heard me speak to a room full of journalists, odds are you've heard me say that a) traditional copyright law is dead; and b) journalists who are passionate defenders of traditional copyright law tend not to understand what it is they're defending.
But I'm not a copyright attorney. So I've tended not to push this point further in my presentations. Rather, I just urge the journalists in the audience (and the publishers that employ them) to consult with their attorneys and consider replacing copyright protections with the more open system known as Creative Commons. (Here's some more info if you're interested in the history behind Creative Commons.)
And if you've been at one of my presentations then you've also likely heard me end the section on copyright with a final suggestion that "you should read this guy William Patry." (Note: Don't read my endorsement of Patry's work as a suggestion that we see eye-to-eye on everything. Patry describes himself as a moderate on copyright. I'm probably more extreme in my desire to see copyright protections weakened. But the fact remains that he is thousands of times smarter than I about this subject, and thus worth reading.)

In his farewell post, Patry says he's giving up the blogging game for two reasons -- frustrations with the blogging life (anonymous comments from morons, etc.) and that the current state of copyright law "is too depressing."
I understand both reasons. And I don't begrudge him the decision to move on. Blogging is a time-consuming and often frustrating endeavor. And for people like Patry (and me) who choose not to run ads or otherwise make money from our blogs, blogging can often feel like a waste of time.

But I'm going to miss the guy.
I'd urge you to read Patry's final post. Feel free to ignore the first section. That's where Patry complains that people stopped seeing his blog as a "personal" blog once he accepted a position with Google. But that's just silly. Google is one of the most powerful forces in the media world. And taking a job there will influence how people see you. Complaining about that is as pointless as cursing the sun for rising in the East when your windows face the West.
But do pay attention to the second section. It's there that Patry says part of the reason he's stopping his blog is that "copyright law has abandoned its reason for being: to encourage learning and the creation of new works. Instead, its principal functions now are to preserve existing failed business models, to suppress new business models and technologies, and to obtain, if possible, enormous windfall profits from activity that not only causes no harm, but which is beneficial to copyright owners."

For other reactions to Patry's departure, check out Mathew Ingram, Robert Hyndman and Jack Schofield.

On a sort of related note, Harry McCracken has a piece on his new Technologizer site about Web sites that didn't deserve to die. As a New Yorker, I'll add my voice to that of the other residents of this town that miss Kozmo! Now that was service (Yea, sure, it was a terrible business. But I loved it so.)

tags: journalism, b2b, media, trade press, magazines, newsletters, business media

Getting caught up

I've been on the road for weeks ... and am just now settling back into my routine.
I'm in my apartment. The baby is asleep. And in the past 24 hours I've managed to get caught up on email, feeds, tweets, bills, invoices, voice mail, paper mail and neighborhood gossip.
But I'm still way behind on blogging.

How far behind?
It's been a week since ASBPE announced the winners of its annual Azbee Awards and I haven't even offered my congratulations to the winners. Heck, I was at the conference; I was the keynote speaker, and I still haven't been able to set aside the time to say "Well Done" until now.

So, here's a belated congratulations to all of this year's winners -- particularly RBI's Restaurants & Institutions and IDG's ComputerWorld, Network World, PC World CIO and CSO. (Disclosure: I've had the good luck to consult with both RBI and IDG.)

tags: journalism, b2b, media, trade press, magazines, newsletters, business media

Something in the air

I'm on the road this week and next. And as I sit in hotel rooms and read my feeds at the beginning and end of each day, I get the feeling that by the time I get back home, I won't even recognize the media industry -- particularly B2B.
Consider some of what is happening:
1. John French, Penton's CEO, has stepped down. And although the search for his replacement has barely begun, I'm already hearing some interesting theories about what the Wall Street whizzes that control the company are looking for in the new boss. It now seems likely that
Penton will soon be run by someone from a large, B2C online-only venture, i.e., AOL, Yahoo, etc.
2. McGraw-Hill is likely to be one of the bidders for Reed Business Information, according to U.K. newspaper The Telegraph. Given that RBI is the largest B2B publisher in the United States, such a purchase would catapult McGraw-Hill to the top of the B2B media universe. Of course it's always a distinct possibility that McGraw-Hill only wants RBI's construction division, but is willing to buy the entire company in order to get the financing that RBI is offering. In that case, much of RBI could be back on the market shortly after a McGraw-Hill purchase. (For more on this, check out coverage in Paidcontent and Business Media Blog.)
3. Cygnus has taken to suing ex-workers who abandoned the troubled company to start a competing publication. I don't have any inside information on the case. And I'm not a lawyer. But regardless of the legal implications, the case is likely to contribute to the toxic atmosphere that is Cygnus. And I couldn't help but laughing to see that news of the lawsuit broke exactly one month after Standard & Poor's lowered its outlook on Cygnus' bonds.

All this comes in the wake of the Guardian's purchase of PaidContent, Bloomberg's decision to restructure its news operations, the near collapse of America's publicly traded B2C newspaper companies and the loss of thousands of jobs among the ink-stained masses.

Something is happening. And I suspect that years from now we'll look back on the summer of 2008 as the time when the entire media profession entered a new era.
Are you ready?

tags: journalism, b2b, media, trade press, magazines, newsletters, business media, web-first publishing

PaidContent is sold to the Guardian!

Wow!
U.K.-based Guardian News & Media, publisher of the Guardian and the Observer newspapers, has purchased PaidContent.
In a nutshell that means that arguably the most Web-savvy newspaper company on earth has purchased what is arguably the most important Web-only B2B property on earth.

First, let me offer my congratulations to Rafat and his team.
They have built a truly remarkable series of products in less than six years -- largely by avoiding the cost and workflow problems of legacy print companies. As important, Rafat understood what so few people did understand six years ago -- the world of content was moving away from print. And there was need for news product that could cover use online and mobile media to cover developments in online and mobile media.

Second, let me suggest that this news has implications for all of us in the B2B space here in the United States. Here's why: although PaidContent is a global company, with sites dedicated to media news in India and the U.K., it's probably best-known for its U.S.-based parent site. And the purchase seems to represent the first major incursion into the U.S. market by Guardian News & Media's B2B unit, called Guardian Professional.
I happen to know that executives from Guardian spent a lot of time in the U.S. a few months ago, meeting with some of the smartest folks in the online world. They asked a lot of questions. And they impressed a lot of people. And my guess is that they spotted a number of opportunities (such as PaidContent) and a number of vulnerabilities in the B2B space.

The news about PaidContent comes just a day after Bloomberg announced a major reorganization that will separate its Web and multimedia news operations from the "text" news unit that writes for the Bloomberg terminals.
Clearly something is happening here.
And years from now we may look back and realize that this was the week that the B2B industry in the U.S. entered an all-new era.

For more on the deal, check out coverage from ReadWriteWeb, which offers some good background on the Guardian's recent progress online.
For some background on PaidContent, as well as a link to a video in which Rafat explains the journalism theories behind the company, check out this earlier post of mine.
If you're not already familiar with the Guardian, here's a good a place as any to start -- an article from earlier this week about U.S.-based B2B publisher IDG. (Disclosure: IDG is a client of mine.)

tags: journalism, b2b, media, trade press, magazines, newsletters, business media, web-first publishing

Bloomberg restructures. And I ask "why?"

Today is a day when all of us in B2B journalism should pause, look at the news in our industry, and ponder what it means for each of us.
Because it doesn't get any bigger than this: Bloomberg LP is restructuring.

Bloomberg is arguably the smartest and most profitable news operation in history. It is certainly the biggest money-making operation in the history of B2B. (Now that Reuters and Thomson have merged, Bloomberg may or may not be the biggest player in business journalism -- it depends on how you measure things.)
So what does it mean when the best of the best in our industry decides to restructure? Why would it do so? Can other companies extract a lesson?

First, let's look at what is happening.
In essence, Bloomberg News is separating its multimedia operation (which includes the Web, television and radio units) from its text operation (the news and data service that is delivered to Wall Street via dedicated terminals. This same unit will continue to rewrite terminal news for publication in client newspapers. The company's print magazine will also reside in the new text division.)
In addition, the parent company, Bloomberg LP, is splitting into three units -- news, data and financial products. (This part of the revamp is even more complicated than it would first appear. The financial products unit will include "data" products such as the trading systems and analytics tools. Whereas the data unit will house the company's databases and its law unit.)
It's also worth noting that the restructuring is not related to any financial difficulties at the company. No layoffs are planned. The company continues to be a cash-producing machine.

Second, let's look at the why.
My friend Rafat at PaidContent says the restructuring sounds like Bloomberg is planning a spinoff or sale of the multimedia unit.
I agree. Particularly since the restructuring comes amid rumors on Wall Street that Merrill Lynch, reeling from the credit crisis, is looking to sell its 20% stake in Bloomberg. (The most likely buyer is the trust of New York mayor and company founder Mike Bloomberg. Value of the stake is somewhere in the neighborhood of $5 billion.)
It's also worth noting that although Bloomberg continues to print money, the company's core audience of Wall Street bigwigs and traders is hurting. Sales are likely to have declined in recent months. And it would take a very optimistic person indeed to suggest sales will rise in the near term.

Third, let's look at other details.
Under the new structure, Matt Winkler, who has run Bloomberg's news operations since the beginning, will lose control of the multimedia operation. Winkler will maintain control of the text unit.
Bloomberg is also launching an incubator unit, dubbed Bloomberg Ventures, which will presumably look for new opportunities and acquisitions. It will be run by Lex Fenwick, the company's former CEO.
Portfolio suggests that the reorg may mean that Bloomberg's "famously bizarre corporate culture (is) being slowly dismantled." Certainly I hope that is true. Bloomberg is, by far, the least pleasant place I have ever worked. More importantly, it was a place where truly bizarre personalities tended to thrive. The Portfolio piece says that Bloomberg's new president, Dan Doctoroff, had come to realize that, in the words of a company insider, "Matt Winkler's reign of terror and crazy little rules" were hurting the organization.

But here's the part that intrigues me:
The restructuring will create two, distinct groups of journalists in the company.
One team will be dedicated to print and the terminals. It will report to Winkler.
The second team will be dedicated to multimedia and the Web. The company is searching for someone to run that team.
But I have to ask: why the split? and why now?

Bloomberg's move comes as the rest of the industry -- both B2B and B2C -- struggles to merge print, Web and television operations. Everyone from the Washington Post to Hanley-Wood is looking to create some form of Web-first publishing in which journalists are able to produce news for any medium.
But Bloomberg seems to be moving in a different direction.
Perhaps this is nothing more than a convoluted way to dilute Winkler's power without hurting the core product -- terminal sales.
Or perhaps it is nothing more than a way to create two, state-of-the-art news organizations in anticipation of selling one of them.
Or, perhaps, Bloomberg has a very different idea of what it will take to run a news company and make money in the future.

tags: journalism, b2b, media, trade press, magazines, newsletters, business media, web-first publishing

Congratulations to the TABPI winners!

TABPI, the international association for B2B journalists, has announced its pick for the best magazines and Websites in the industry.
Congratulations to all the winners!

As of this morning, the list of winners is available only on TABPI's Facebook page. But later today the list will appear on TABPI's Web site.

Longtime readers of this blog will know that I'm most interested in the Web site awards. And longtime readers won't be surprised to see that the list of winners contains a number of my longtime favorites. UK-based Accountancy Age took the gold this year (the Incisive-owned product won the bronze last year.) Computerworld picked up the silver and Modern Healthcare won the bronze awards. In the new category for Best Online Feature Computerworld took first place, PC World took second, and Therapy Times took the third-place prize. (Disclosure: I've consulted on online-journalism issues with IDG, the owner of both Computerworld and PC World.)

(Update [11:26 am, ET]) : The complete list of winners is now available on TABPI's site.)

tags: journalism, b2b, media, trade press, magazines, newsletters, business media, web-first publishing

Tampa and an intern look to the future

Much of the journalism world is abuzz today over the reorganization of the newsrooms at the Tampa Tribune and WFLA.
In brief, the plan calls for merging the news-gathering functions of the newspaper and its Web site with those of the local television station. The plan also downplays the traditional beat structure and instead creates five reporting teams (breaking news, data, investigative, personal and citizen journalism.)
It's obviously too early to tell how this will work out. And although the details on the plan are few and far between, it is clear that some people will lose their jobs.
Given that, I would have anticipated the usual doom and gloom from the staff.
So it was with great pleasure that I read an optimistic piece from an intern at the Tampa paper. I don't want to paraphrase what Jessica DaSilva had to say. Rather, I'd urge you to read her entire blog post. But suffice it to say that there are young people entering the workforce today who are every bit as excited about journalism and their careers as I was when I was in my early 20s. They can see past the problems of any single medium and imagine a time when the audience comes first.
And that thrills me.

It's worth noting that the news about Tampa's convergence plan comes almost a month to the day since the Associated Press' Kathleen Carroll unveiled the details of the AP's new convergence-focused "'1-2-3" system for filing stories. Close observers of the journalism world will note that the AP's new method (flash a headline/update with a brief/create a longer piece in a variety of media) is reminiscent of the Bloomberg method (headline/two-graf/update and "tour".)
Longtime readers of this blog will no doubt guess correctly that I'm thrilled with the AP's new system. I've been urging journalists for a long time to study the Bloomberg method and create a version of their own as part of the move to Web-first publishing. You can see some of my thoughts on the Bloomberg system here and here.)

(Addendum: A considerable number of people have found their way to this post by following backlinks from Jessica's post. I welcome all such readers. I'm glad to have you on board. However, as longtime readers of this blog know, I do not allow anonymous personal attacks in comments. If you want to use this blog to criticize Jessica -- or anyone else -- provide me with your real name and a working email or phone number. Otherwise, I have no interest in your opinion. Thanks.)

tags: journalism, b2b, media, trade press, magazines, newsletters, business media, web-first publishing

A threat from an unlikely place

I've been writing for a long time about the new competitors that traditional B2B publishers are finding on the Web.
Whether we're talking about Web-only publishers, editors who strike out on their own, sources who become publishers, or marketers who become journalists, the days in which the only competition that a typical, monthly B2B magazine faced was another monthly magazine are long gone.
And now we can add one more to the list of Web-based competitors -- newspaper beat reporters.

Take a look at Pharmalot, a Newark Star-Ledger reporter's blog about the U.S. pharmaceutical industry. Or even better, take a look at this article about Pharmalot on the Beat Blogging site, where you'll find that Pharmalot is successful "when measured by any metric -- Web traffic, content and financially," according to the blogger's boss.

The reporter behind Pharmalot is Ed Silverman, who has covered pharmaceuticals for 12 years for the local newspaper (northern New Jersey is filled with pharmaceutical firms.) The basic concept behind Pharmalot is that in the course of working his beat, Ed was already accumulating enough news to compete with any national publication in the space. So by moving to a blog platform, he was able to expand both his coverage and reach nationally.

Now Pharmalot isn't a business threat to existing B2B publishers. At least not yet. A quick look through the site indicates that the ad staff at the newspaper hasn't learned to sell high-cost ads targeting readers from the pharmaceutical industry. Rather the ads are the same low-cost run-of-site nonsense that you'll find anywhere else on a newspaper site. But it probably won't be long before someone there finds out that targeted B2B ads are worth more than branding buttons from Ford and WaMu.

More importantly, it won't be long before other newspapers realize there's potential (and some easy money) in duplicating the Pharmalot model. There are thousands of business reporters covering hundreds of beats at newspapers across the country. And odds are there's at least one who would pose a competitive threat to any B2B publication you could name.

So if you're an editor or executive at a traditional, print-based publishing company, it's time to ask yourself three questions.
1. Who are the best newspaper reporters covering the beat that my magazine/Web site covers? (If you have the budget, it may be time to hire away anyone who poses a serious threat.)
2. Are any of those newspaper reporters capable of launching a Web-based, national version of what they already do locally? (Ignore the print-based legacy reporters. But keep your eye on anyone who appears Web-savvy.)
3. How is it possible for a daily newspaper reporter to create an all-new product based on what he learns from working his beat when the staff at my monthly magazine says they're too busy to write daily stories for the Web? (It's probably well past the time to dump some staffers and move to a Web-first workflow.)

tags: journalism, b2b, media, trade press, magazines, newsletters, business media, web-first publishing, advertising

The best of the best

There's some breaking news in the B2B world...and in a change from the all-too-common news about layoffs and debt problems, today's news is good news.

The American Society of Business Publication Editors has announced the finalists for Magazine of the Year, Web Site of the Year, and Multi-Platform awards.
My congratulations to everyone who made the finals.

No one who pays attention to the B2B press will be surprised by the list of finalists. Many of the magazines (Builder, CFO, PCWorld) have become perennial favorites. Many of the Web site finalists are also from the list of usual suspects (Computerworld, MacWorld, CFO.com, EDN, etc.)
There are, however, a few lower profile Web properties that made the finals.
Among the notables -- ere.net, the blog, news and community network devoted to the human resources industry, nominated for Web site of the Year, and BioPharm International, the online operation of Advanstar monthly magazine BioPharm International, nominated for the Multi-Platform Award.
I'm a fan of ere.net, and I'd urge you to take a look at it.
On the other hand, as much as I like BioPharm's Web property (and there are a few things to like), I'm not going to suggest that you look at the site. And I'm certainly not going to link to it.
That's because BioPharm's site contains a ridiculous page of legal nonsense about who is, and who is not, allowed to link to it. That page includes the nonsensical claim that the company "may at any time, in its sole discretion, without cause, revoke your right to link to any pages on this Site."
Now if there's one thing we've learned in the past few weeks from AP's silliness, it's that there's an ongoing debate about what constitutes "fair use" when quoting someone else's copy. But there is no such debate about the legality of linking. Thus, although it seems clear that the editorial staff of BioPharm "gets" the Web, I think it's a safe bet that the legal department does not.
So, in protest, I'm not going to link to the site. Why would I do anything that would boost the site's incoming links, lift BioPharm's standing with Google and make it easier to increase advertising rates?
I'm also going to suggest that the judges at ASBPE pass on giving the prize to BioPharm. Why would an organization that is seeking to illustrate best practices on the Web give an award to a site that stands in opposition to the very idea of linking?
Besides, if ASBPE wanted to link to the winners of its awards, it might incur the wrath of a misinformed lawyer.

You can see the complete list of finalists on the ASBPE home page.
The winners will be announced next month in Kansas City at ASBPE's annual convention. I have the honor of being the keynote speaker this year.
If you're going to be there, stop by and say hello. Remember, however, that I may at any time, at my sole discretion, without cause, revoke your right to say "hello."

tags: journalism, b2b, media, trade press, magazines, newsletters, business media

Wall Street worries about Cygnus

The bad news just keeps coming for traditional B2B publishers.

Credit rating agency S&P has lowered its outlook for Cygnus Business Media, a move that suggests a ratings downgrade is possible in the near future.
S&P, citing concerns about the publisher's debt load, changed its outlook on Cygnus and its parent company to negative from stable. At the same time S&P affirmed its its CCC+ credit rating on Cygnus.
So, to put this into simple English, S&P is suggesting that Cygnus' corporate credit rating -- which is already in the junk bond category -- may be too high.

The problem, according to a statement from S&P, is born of "concern over the company's significant maturities in 2009." That's a reference to some $157 million in debt that's due next year, according to Folio.

So just how worried is S&P?
Consider this: Cygnus is already in the lowest tier in S&P's ratings system -- the area called "highest risk." And there are only two rating steps lower than CCC in that tier: CC and C.
After that, the only rating left is D -- for companies in default.

Click here for an earlier story on junk-bond ratings and B2B publishing.

tags: journalism, b2b, media, trade press, magazines, newsletters, business media

The magazine industry gets connected

There has been an interesting development in B2B journalism this week.

Folio magazine launched a social-networking site for people in the magazine industry ... and much to my surprise ... it took off at a rate that I can only call extraordinary. Within a few hours of its debut, the MediaPRO network had attracted 400 members.
Even more interesting is that MediaPRO seems to be attracting people for whom it is their first online social network. And that is quite an accomplishment. For if there's any single trait that distinguishes the magazine industry it is its seeming inability to try new things.
In fact, I'm always amazed to find that so few people in the industry have actually experimented with the stuff they talk about all the time. Everyone sits in the same conference rooms at the Folio show, ABM conferences, etc., hearing about the same things over and over again for years and years, but no one actually tries any of it.
For example, based on my very unscientific surveys I'd say that fewer than 3% of B2B editors have learned to shoot/edit/upload video.
And is there a senior executive anywhere in the magazine world who hasn't been pushing his staff to add blogs and user-generated content? But what percentage of those executives has ever even posted a comment to a blog or forum anywhere in the world?
All of social media and social networking has been much the same. The magazine industry and its investors talk about it a lot. And Lord knows people are throwing money at the stuff. (PaidContent recently reported that investment in the space in the 15 months ending with the close of the first quarter topped $3 billion.)
But until the arrival of MediaPRO, it seemed that only the early adopters had actually even logged on to a social media site.

I'm not sure what it is about MediaPRO that is allowing it to make inroads with such a change-resistant culture.
Don't get me wrong. I like the site quite a bit ... but I almost always like social networking sites.
There's nothing revolutionary about MediaPRO. The site uses the same connect-with-me protocols, the same notify-me-by-email methods and the same look-at-who-I-know voyeurism to create the same sort of experience that you find anywhere in social media.
Also, Folio made the wise decision not to spend a lot of money on this. Thus MediaPRO is built on Ning, the same platform that powers social-networking sites such as Wired Journalists (which now has more than 2100 members.) So even the look and feel is familiar to anyone with even a passing familiarity with social networks.

Perhaps it's just timing.
Perhaps now that things are truly getting tough in the magazine world, people have actually begun looking at the technologies that they've spent so much time talking about for the past few years.
Let's hope.
In the meantime, check out MediaPRO and connect with me.

(Before you get too optimistic about what MediaPRO signals for the industry, take a look at Scott Karp's piece on what magazines don't understand about the Web.)

tags: journalism, b2b, media, trade press, magazines, newsletters, business media

Now it's Penton's turn -- more layoffs in B2B

I don't have much in the way of details ... but it appears that there have been layoffs at Penton.

According to a comment on a post from yesterday about layoffs, 42 people at Penton have been let go. If true, the firings come two months after CEO John French announced a hiring freeze and asked company managers to reforecast all revenue and expenses for 2008.

I'll be checking Folio for news on the situation. And I'll see what, if any, details I can pick up myself in the next hour or so before I have to head to a meeting.

Update: Folio confirms that 42 people have been laid off.

tags: journalism, b2b, media, trade press, magazines, newsletters, business media

The model no longer works

The media world is abuzz today with word that Sam Zell is planning a massive revamp of Tribune Co. -- cutting staff (which the company thinks it can do without hurting content after it began measuring the productivity of journalists and learning, presumably, who could be dropped), reducing the size of the news hole and printing fewer copies.
Other coverage of the announcement is here and here.
But you can skip almost everything that's been written about the announcement and go straight to the coverage by the New York Observer. Because that's the only paper I've seen that didn't bury the lede, and instead opened its story with this quote from Zell: ""What has become clear as we have gotten intimately familiar with the business is that the model for newspapers no longer works."

I agree with Zell. And I've often expressed gratitude in the past few years that I no longer make my living in newspapers. Because I don't know of another part of the media that has done a worse job of adjusting to the new era of Web journalism.

But this blog isn't about the newspaper industry. This blog is about B2B journalism.
And although it's true that B2B has done a better job on the Web than the newspaper business has, I think it's also true that "the model for B2B publishing no longer works."

With some exceptions, the B2B world is saddled with the same problems that are plaguing the newspaper business: the wrong staff with the wrong attitude producing the wrong product in the wrong way for the wrong audience.
I see the same issues nearly everywhere I go in B2B:
-- journalists with a skill set from the 1970s and an emotional resistance to change;
-- workflow rules that focus on producing weekly or monthly products rather than real-time news;
-- advertising sales people who are paralyzed by the idea of learning Web metrics;
-- circulation departments that are still worried that Google is delivering them the "wrong" readers while somehow "stealing" content;
-- entire publications that seem dedicated to producing content only for some target market of 72-year olds that have "always read us" while refusing to lead their readers into a new era;
-- and, most importantly, enormous and growing costs related to print.

B2B journalism itself is not broken. The core of what we do -- produce and distribute industry-focused news and information -- remains valuable.
And as bad as things may be, there are, as I've said before, answers to what ails us.
But the first step has to be for more of us to do what Zell has done and speak aloud the difficult truth: the model for B2B publishing no longer works.

tags: journalism, b2b, media, trade press, magazines, newsletters, business media, web-first publishing, advertising

More layoffs in B2B

I'm back from a road trip and trying to catch up on all the stuff in my RSS feeds. But after glancing at the depressing headlines from Folio magazine in the past few days, I wish I hadn't bothered.

First, there's been another series of layoffs at United Business Media's TechInsights unit. Close observers of the B2B world will note that these layoffs come nearly a year to the day after the company announced it would lay off 200 people and and just four months after the company announced a major restructuring.

Second, Reed Business Information has laid off 41 of its staffers. RBI said more layoffs were possible. That news comes several weeks after RBI's parent company said it planned to sell off the entire B2B unit. (In a related note, RBI's parent, Reed Elsevier, is said to be making plans to arrange a $1.5 billion loan for anyone who would buy the B2B giant, publisher of Variety, Professional Builder, Broadcasting & Cable and dozens of other magazines and Web sites.)

But if you really want to read a depressing story, check out Folio's coverage of the death of VON magazine. It's a tale of disappearing executives, a write off of more than $10 million in debt, and a secretive move to seize assets by the folks who months before had invested $11 million in the operation.

tags: journalism, b2b, media, trade press, magazines, newsletters, business media