The Difference between BusinessWeek and Bloomberg BusinessWeek

I read through the first Bloomberg BusinessWeek issue -- the one after most of the columnists and longtime reporters had either left on their own or had been pushed.

I'm sure I'll get used to the new bylines, but if the magazine were a real estate property, Bloomberg basically bought the magazine for the prestigious address. The new magazine has similar columns to the McGraw Hill BusinessWeek, but this new version is clearly different.

I'm sure most former BizWeek reporters will do ok. Steve Hamm has already started working at IBM. But there are a lot of reporters who still haven't figured out what they'll be doing. I wish them all the best of luck, and look forward to reading the articles in some other format and some other outlet.

BusinessWeek Warns about Social Media Snake Oil

It was his final article for BusinessWeek, Stephen Baker wrote an important article, "Beware Social Media Snake Oil: Hordes of marketing "experts" are promoting the value of wikis, social networks, and blogs. All the hype may obscure the real potential of these online tools."

After five or more years writing about why businesses must embrace social media, BusinessWeek has finally written an article showing that it can be a difficult environment. It's worth checking out the article.

There's more from Baker's blog, "My experiment with FastFollowers on Twitter," which provides an interesting look into the editing process.

So let's be clear: social media can be a great tool, but it has to be approached for each client on that client's terms, understanding their culture, their customers, etc. Organizations should evaluate social media, but shouldn't jump in just because everyone else has.

One final point: the article also points out that people will make mistakes using social media, and that it is possible to turn mistakes. As a case study, Baker cites James Andrews, the former Ketchum social media executive who tweeted negatively about Nashville, and incurred the wrath of a FedEx executive. According to Andrews, the embarrassing situation raised his visibility enough be able to launch his own practice.

When in Disgrace with Fortune and Men's Eyes -- Or, less poetically, some serious changes to Fortune Magazine

Ok, perhaps Shakespeare is not relevant, as in the quote from Sonnet 29, but there's still something rotten in the state of the publishing world.

Fortune Magazine will cut its publishing frequency from 25 issues -- basically every two weeks -- to 18 issues, which means some months Fortune will publish only once a month.

Although it recently remodeled the look and feel of the prestigious business magazine, Fortune is expected to remodel the magazine again, this time focusing on longer articles on fewer topics. If Forbes is about investing, and BusinessWeek about news, Fortune will continue its emphasis on managing (which had gotten less emphasis over the past decade) by adding new columns "to help business professionals do their jobs more effectively. It will have a cleaner, less cluttered look and an upgraded Web site," according to the Wall St. Journal.

In other words, the new Fortune will be more like Entrepreneur or Inc. or even its kid sister publication, Fortune Small Business (FSB) -- all good magazines, but all really focused on service journalism. That's not exactly what Fortune, which has columns on investing and executive lifestyles, was known for.

What's interesting, I think, is that service journalism -- basically articles offering advice and how-to's -- has become more important because the media world is evolving so rapidly that few people truly have a secure grasp of things. I think that's why how-to articles in the blogosphere are often so much more widely read than analysis articles (such as this one). People are looking for advice to help them make sense and respond to the changes.

Well, it looks like Fortune is giving people what they want.

Oh, and unfortunately, there will be layoffs, too.

Here are some of the proposed changes, according to the Journal:

• The magazine itself will become more of a lush-looking premium product. Fortune plans to increase the minimum number of editorial pages in each issue.
• They will stop (or reduce the number) of "CEO-as-god magazine covers that have been a staple of the magazine, whether with Jack Welch or Warren Buffett." Replacing the "CEO-as-god" stories will be more conceptual stories, such as one about the White House's relationship with Google.
• The emphasis on large companies will continue, including on its website. Fortune.com will be "recast to focus on key companies. Executives point to Fortune.com's blog about Apple Inc. and said there are more high-profile companies that will be treated similarly."
• I would expect certain special issues to continue, including the Fortune 500 issue, among others. In fact, we can expect more online-only content about the Fortune 500, "which the magazine hopes to turn into more of a brand that lives online all year."
• Fortune is beefing up service journalism (as noted above), "adding features about career advice and business how-tos. One might feature a person who gives hundreds of public speeches a year, and her advice on how to give more effective presentations. Another column might explain how to manage your online profile. Reflecting the growing influence of the federal government in corporate affairs, Fortune is adding a one-page column called 'Washington Watch.'"

But is it enough for Fortune to succeed? I don't think so. I think Fortune looses some prestige by dropping its publishing frequency, and perhaps some of its relevance. I also think they're making at least one mistake: "Executives decided it was more important for Fortune to be more visible on the Web, where the magazine may add staffers."

Yet the web-based version of Fortune is free -- the magazine generates no subscription revenue there, just some ad buys. But online advertising buys typically generate less money than print ads.

Meanwhile, on the personnel front, there are going to be layoffs, probably in the next week or so. It also means that whatever stories reporters were working on may be shelved. It means turmoil for the editorial staff and those of us pitching them.

How Business Magazines Are Responding to the Continued Ad Slump

We've seen a big change at BusinessWeek, now owned by Bloomberg. Big changes at Fortune. I guess we're waiting for the shoe to drop for Forbes.

Meanwhile, here are some interesting points from the Journal article, "Fortune Magazine Cuts Back Number of Issues; Changes Are Said to Foreshadow Further Restructuring at Time Inc. Publications as Ad Slump Drags On"

• "Industry executives believe news, business and general-interest magazines—unlike fashion and entertainment titles—are unlikely to rebound fully even after the economy is on a firmer footing." Which is to say, despite a recent Journal article that the business spending slump looks like it's ending, we're still not out of the woods yet.
  
• "They see a permanent change in how readers interact with news titles in the Internet age." Again, the advice component is something that news outlets and news websites are not offering.
• Business magazines have been hit hard during the ad slump: "The number of advertising pages in Fortune dropped 35% from a year ago, on par with the declines at BusinessWeek, Forbes and Newsweek." In contrast, "Ad pages for entertainment and celebrity magazines declined 15% this year from 2008, and fell 18% for fitness and men's lifestyle magazines such as GQ, according to Mediaweek," a far shallower dropoff.

What Does Bloomberg Get in Buying BusinessWeek

The news that Bloomberg LLC has bought BusinessWeek provides the magazine with a good home, but raises some interesting points and questions.

• According to the Wall St. Journal, "Bloomberg's staff of more than 2,200 journalists is bigger than the combined newsrooms of The Wall Street Journal and the New York Times."
  
• BusinessWeek lost $43 million, and is expected to lose more than $60 million this year.
  
• Bloomberg will have to cut costs by combining bureaus -- like DC, Chicago, San Francisco. Even its NYC headquarters will have to leave its overpriced McGraw-Hill office building to move several blocks east to Bloomberg's midtown offices. But will Bloomberg also seek to reduce staff levels?
  
• Subscribers of the Bloomberg terminal, typically Wall Streeters, will now have access to BusinessWeek information, according to Daniel L. Doctoroff, president of Bloomberg. That means the traders won't need to subscribe to the magazine -- so a loss of some revenue.
• BusinessWeek has lost more than half its advertising pages since its peak of more than 6,000 pages in 2000, according to BtoBOnline.
• “Although Bloomberg has built one of the world's largest news organizations, with more than 2,200 journalists, our primary audience has been our 300,000 Bloomberg Professional service subscribers. … BusinessWeek helps better serve our customers by reaching into the corporate suite and corridors of power in government, where news that affects markets and business is made by CEOs, CFOs, deal lawyers, bankers and government officials who typically are not terminal customers,” Daniel L. Doctoroff, president of Bloomberg, said in a statement.
• Norman Pearlstine, Bloomberg's chief content officer and a former editor in chief at Time where he was responsible for all of Time's publications, will become chairman of BusinessWeek and will oversee the integration of the property into Bloomberg.
• According to MarketWatch, it seems that the "privately owned Bloomberg is doing this deal because of a desire to satisfy an executive's ego. Still, it seems likely that whoever is driving this proposed acquisition will get a great deal of criticism." For one, Bloomberg was not successful with its print personal finance monthly magazine.
• According to MarketWatch, citing "a report on BusinessWeek's Web site, the terms weren't disclosed but Bloomberg's cash offer 'is in the $2-$5 million range and that it has agreed to assume liabilities, including potential severance payments.'"
  
• Jon Friedman at MarketWatch feels the deal doesn't make sense.

I think it provides greater visibility to the Bloomberg name. And I would bet that a lot of BusinessWeek writers would like to believe what Stephen Baker tweeted, "Bloomberg bought us. Seems like good news. They dont want to fire everyone. Others get McGraw Hill severance for next 12 mths. Good combo?"

I also think that the deal gives Bloomberg a well known, popular website that has been developing its own community.

Actually, if the economy is rebounding, it doesn't really make sense for McGraw-Hill to unload BusinessWeek. To me, it seems that Bloomberg is betting that the recovery will start being felt in 2010. Even as the new normal means reduced ad spending, at $2-5 million, plus pension liabilities, Bloomberg is buying a respected brand name and robust website that have a global reach at a significant discount to building one itself. Bloomberg will be able to cut huge costs by combining bureaus, including the overpriced McGraw-Hill offices. I don't think they need to reduce costs by $60 million to make this work. They can leverage BusinessWeek's conferences, too.

Media Trends by BusinessWeek's Jon Fine

BusinessWeek's media critic Jon Fine column, MediaCentric, offers worthwhile perspective, focused a bit more on traditional media and advertising, but certainly worthwhile reading.

Fine is taking a leave of absence, but before he left, he listed some good trends and predictions, including:

• Fine says there will be fewer magazines -- a prediction we made back in Jan. However, Fine says that "what happened to city newspapers...will start happening in 2010. Look for the strongest player to outlast weaker rivals in towns and small cities near one another."
  
• Surprising stability among the biggest players. His point: despite their problems, NY Times, Wall St. Journal, Time Warner, NBC Universal, etc. will survive. I agree, though there will be changes (i.e., Comcast's potential investment in NBC Universal).
  
• A bright line divides media haves from media have-nots. Fine feels that people won't pay meaningful sums for content from most terrestrial radio, newspapers, magazines outlets,which are free or cheap to subscribe to. Additionally, most of the biggest comglamerates do not have big print operations, and that those who do want to "switch sides."
  

The implication here is that big media will continue to evolve, and look for ways to bring more value to its users. Fine does not discuss ways this could happen.

That remains one of the big open questions: how to continue to be relevant while establishing a sustainable online business model. I'm not sure what will come first: the sustainable online business model or the way to leverage the online world to provide content that readers/users will value enough to pay for.

For one thing, we still have a ways to go before that happens. I don't think we'll see that yet in 2010.

The Role of PR in Marketing in a Web 2.0 World

There's a lot of concern about the role of PR in a Web 2.0 or 3.0 world.

I don't really believe them.

I think there will be a need for what PR can do for companies, even if print media continues to be replaced by online-only media.

BusinessWeek's current issue has an interesting story that supports that notion. Check out: "The Great Trust Offensive; Companies as diverse as McDonald's, Ford, and American Express are revamping their marketing to win back that most valuable of corporate assets."

I think social media belongs in the realm of PR, not just marketing or customer service.

Is Twitter's $1B Valuation an Example of Dot-Com Bubble Redux?

According to TechCrunch, Twitter is being valued at $1 billion. Meanwhile, one valuation for BusinessWeek came in at $1.00.

Could there really be such a huge gap between the two properties? BusinessWeek reporter Stephen Baker mused about this in his blog posting, "Could Twitter be worth one billion BusinessWeeks?"

Since Twitter has no revenue model in place, it's easy to consider that we're back in the dot-com bubble days. AOL was once considered to be much more valuable than Time Magazine. Does anybody remember AOL?

I like Twitter, and it's certainly generating load of coverage -- Jay Leno mentioned it at least three times during last night's show. But I have to wonder how much can Twitter be worth when the site generates no revenue.

Do you think Twitter is worth $1B? Do you think BusinessWeek is worth $1.00? Let me know.

Understanding BusinessWeek

BusinessWeek, which seems to be overpaying on the rent it pays to parent McGraw-Hill (to the tune of $26 million in charges like overhead and rent, according to the Times), is facing significant challenges. As the deadline for a possible bid approaches, I thought it worthwhile to provide some context to BusinessWeek, some of it gleaned from a New York Times article, "BusinessWeek, on the Block and Ailing."

• BusinessWeek founding missions was to summarize the week’s business news. It soon became a handbook for managers, covering strategy, marketing and the big issues affecting business, like policy, energy and debt.
• In Feb. 2009, BusinessWeek updated its mission: to focus on what executives needed to know for their jobs -- business leaders, and not consumers. In so doing, the magazine droped "sports, lifestyle and politics articles." According to a mission statement unveiled then, “Our mission is to move business forward....(and to help readers) make smarter decisions in their businesses, careers and investments.”
• However, to succeed,“They have to be unique, must-read,” Stephen B. Shepard, who had served as editor of BusinessWeek for 20 years and is now dean of the Graduate School of Journalism at the City University of New York.

That's just from a journalism perspective.

From a business perspective, BusinessWeek is losing money, even without the overpayment to McGraw-Hill.

According to the Times, ad revenue for BusinessWeek dropped to "an estimated $60 million this year, from almost $110 million in 2006." Meanwhile, its website has been doing very well in generating traffic, yet web-based ad revenue increased by less than a million to an estimated $20.5 million this year.

To understand the gap between web traffic and web revenues, it's important to understand this:
45 percent of pages views of BusinessWeek.com are from slide shows. Apparently, slide shows are considered to be gimmicky. (That may be, but as I wrote earlier today, Using The Power of Multimedia to Make a Point -- Will this be the new journalism?, such gimmicks actually take advantage of the Internet so perhaps that mindset will change.)

In fact, only 16 percent of page views came from original articles, and BusinessWeek.com pulls in just $19.28 per thousand ad views, almost a quarter lower than what it was earning three years ago. And it sells only about 38 percent of the available ads, down from 79 percent in 2006, according to a document cited by the Times.

What this means is that, despite six companies interested in bidding on BusinessWeek, its long-term prospects are not great. BusinessWeek seems to have fixed its journalism model, but it still needs to solve its business model.

Lifelogging...BusinessWeek's Look at Gordon Bell

Good article on Gordon Bell in the current BusinessWeek, "This Is Your Lifelog: Gordon Bell sees beyond the Twitterverse, when we'll be documented in digital detail." If you're interested in blogging you're entire life, check out the article, which includes a look at some tools to use.

Peter Drucker and Why Companies Fail -- and the Reset Economy

A lot of people have been talking about needing to hit the reset button on business and the economy, but are we really ready for the Reset Economy?

BusinessWeek certainly seems to think so.

It used the term in at least two articles in the current double issue -- averaging, of course, one per week.

But in one article, aside from referring to the new normal -- a term we started using in Jan. 2009 --Paul Laudicina of A.T. Kearney referred to something I found quite interesting:

"Peter Drucker used to say that companies fail not because they do the wrong thing or because they do the right thing poorly, but because they fail to understand a fundamental shift in the theory of business. (GE CEO Jeff) Immelt calls it an economic reset. Drucker called it a change in the theory of business. But you could call it a fundamental transformation. The most important thing any company could or should be doing now to prepare for the post-recession environment is to look at all of the fundamentals and reexamine what changes in the theory of business might mean for their core competencies, for their ability to meet the new consumer demand."

Living in a Distributed World

Remember the paperless office? That was a hyped trend of the future, based someone in the 1970s. I know that hasn't happened yet, because I spent a weekend earlier this month, cleaning out old papers from my office. (It's been two weeks, and I've been able to maintain a low-paper office.)

In the early 90s, came the officeless office. In other words, companies tried to reduce their costs by "hoteling" office space for their sales force, who were out on the road most of the time, and only occasionally needed to work from a corporate office. "Hoteling" referred to the fact that these always-on-the-road employees would reserve space in the corporate office when they needed to come in from the cold.

The officeless office, however, has evolved, with " third of the more than 150 million working Americans telecommute at least occasionally," according a Wired article, "Home Sweet Office: Telecommute Good for Business, Employees, and Planet," Branden Koerner.

Here are some interesting facts about telecommuting:

• Only 40 percent of companies permit any sort of work-at-home arrangement, which means most insist on full-time attendance.
• According to a 2006 survey by the Telework Exchange, the top fear among resisters is that they'll lose control of their employees.
• Researchers from Penn State analyzed 46 studies of telecommuting conducted over two decades and covering almost 13,000 employees. Their sweeping inquiry concluded that working from home has "favorable effects on perceived autonomy, work-family conflict, job satisfaction, performance, turnover intent, and stress." The only demonstrable drawback is a slight fraying of the relationships between telecommuters and their colleagues back at headquarters — largely because of jealousy on the part of the latter group.
• An IDC report from Asia found that 81 percent of managers believe telecommuting improves productivity, up from 61 percent in 2005. The increase is attributable largely to the proliferation of unified communications technologies — tools that connect mobile and remote workers. These include products like LifeSize Express, the first hi-def videoconferencing system priced at less than $5,000, as well as Web-based services like Google Docs and Glance, which let users view a remote colleague's onscreen work in real time (in the case of Glance, with cursor movements and all).

Interesting facts to support telecommuting -- which we believe is the wave of the future, that more companies will embrace remote workers to improve their costs as the tools improve to enable us to collaborate more.

Also interesting is an article from BusinessWeek that looks at the impact of stimulus funds on pushing broadband service into rural areas, "A High-Speed Race for Broadband Billions: Companies are jostling for the stimulus spending earmarked to deliver faster Internet to rural America" by Rachael King.

In a sidebar, King notes "for every one-point increase in the percent of U.S. households with broadband, nearly 300,000 jobs will be added to the economy." That's significant!

BusinessWeek's Jon Fine Agrees with Us: Local Media

In Jan. 2009, we issued our annual list of media predictions. One of them was that local cable/TV operators will have a bumpy road but will survive.

In the Aug. 3rd issue of BusinessWeek, media critic Jon Fine wrote that when the recovery returns, local TV is likely to see the biggest return.

Of course, since his column validates our prediction, I agree with him. Check out, "The Big Bounceback? Local TV; Why local TV stations may have several advantages over other media such as national TV and newspapers when the ad market finally turns."

Keep in mind:

"Make no mistake: TV station groups won't be rolling in the roses once a recovery finally arrives. The business will still face numerous challenges. The sector may not be the play so much as picking its survivors—the stations and companies that will best endure. I'm not sure anyone looking to invest in traditional media companies these days is wise, but if you're determined to make this bet, local TV may be where to place your chips."

In other words, it's going to be a bumpy road, just like we said.

Can Local Bloggers Replace Local Newspapers?

According to BusinessWeek's media critic, Jon Fine, one of the problems facing advertisers -- and I'd add PR functions -- is that the demise of local papers makes it much more difficult to reach local markets.

In "Taming the Web for Local Advertisers," Fines' focus in on a company, GrowthSpur, that aims to connect businesses with fragmented audiences.

Fine makes the point that what's replacing local media are local bloggers, but that they're often one or two person operations for whom blogging is a hobby.

What's more, the problem with the fact that a "zillion local blogs have popped up" is that "some of them have real value. But the thing is, there's a zillion of them, and few have followings of any size, so you have to amalgamate ad buys across 10 or 15 blogs to get anything resembling a decent audience."

This fragmentaiton of local media is a significant challenge for organizations that want to reach local markets. GrowthSpur aims to assemble a network of local bloggers for advertiser. That may work nicely for advertisers, because they're paying bloggers for ads, that doesn't work as well for PR efforts since we don't pay for coverage.

And while some bloggers do expect swag or payments from companies to blog about their products or services, that's not appropriate or acceptable for many organizations, including our clients. Even if the bloggers disclose the fact that they've received payment or gifts in kind in exchange for a positive mention in their blogs.

In PR, we've got the same problem: We've got to target more local bloggers than we once had to when we targeted only local newspapers. Clients sometimes think that social media is a ticket to quick and inexpensive buzz -- but it often takes more effort to reach a similar result to a media campaign a few years ago.

Can This Business Model be Saved? Thoughts on BusinessWeek & the 5 Percent Problem

The news that McGraw-Hill has put BusinessWeek, the prestigious magazine it has owned for 80 years and that has a paid circulation of 900,000 that has held steady over the past few years, is a sign that we still have a way to go before a recovery.

But the news has also generated an interesting look by Stephen Baker, a 22-year BW veteran, to ponder, "How to remake BusinessWeek."

In trying to figure out "how to turn a business news operation built primarily as a weekly magazine into a profitable franchise for the age of near ubiquitous and real-time information," Baker refers to the "the last 5%."

According to Baker, "It involves a large team of professionals engaged in tweaking, polishing, compressing and dressing articles--hopefully giving them the gleam, smarts and clarity of a top-rate product...This last 5% consumes a sizeable effort and expense. The question the next (or current) owner of BusinessWeek is going to have to grapple with is whether such attention to detail is worth it, or, alternatively, whether there's another way to achieve the same goal."

From Baker's perspective, "the last 5%" is a significant problem. Yet the work that gets done during "the last 5%" is also what separates BusinessWeek from commodity journalism.

Having worked as an editor in newspapers and book publishing, and in PR, I know that there's a lot of effort to get the final product to be right, paying attention to commas, hyphens and other grammatical minutiae that most people will overlook as they scan the page. There's a pride of ownership in a final document and a sense of responsibility to get it right.

Baker suggests that may no longer be necessary in a real-time, social media space. After all, as noted before in this blog, there are a lot of people who consider speed to publish is more important than accuracy. That would include, but is not limited to, grammatical accuracy, too.

I think Baker's right that "the last 5%" consumes more energy than the reader may value. But I don't think that's the only problem facing the traditional print business model. The problem also can be attributed to a lack of accountability in how newspapers and magazine spent their money.

In another blog post, "After the Madison Avenue bubble," Baker wrote about how BusinessWeek overspent when he first joined the magazine: requesting and paying for an additional apartment in Mexico City so the magazine could claim to have a bureau office there, along with a secretary -- when Baker could have just worked at his own (subsidized-by-BW apartment). How he lived well in Paris (in another expensive, subsidized-by-BW apartment), sent his kids to subsidized-by-BW private school, etc.

From my perspective, people still want news, still want content that requires the effort of "the last 5%" -- that demand for news has nothing to do with the actual business model. The real problem is the debt many built up and now can't service. Bankruptcy may help some publishers restart their business, by reducing their debt loads.

But it may be too late to stem the tide, to save print media from itself.

What The Selling of BusinessWeek Tells Us about the Economy -- That BusinessWeek Hasn't Told Us

The news that McGraw-Hill is trying to sell BusinessWeek, "McGraw-Hill Is Said to Be Seeking a Buyer for BusinessWeek," tells us something imporant about the media business -- something that you won't find inside the pages (hardcopy or otherwise) of BusinessWeek itself.

It's that the Great Recession has not started rebounding.

Circulation for BusinessWeek is holding steady at about 900,000, but advertising is declining.

BusinessWeek is a great publication, does a terrific job covering news and trends. And its website and BusinessWeek Exchange community are very popular.

Doesn't matter, though, because advertising pages has dropped 40% since 2004.

Here's what Peter F. Appert, an analyst at the Piper Jaffray Companies, said to the New York Tmes about the potential sale: “It certainly makes all the sense in the world for them to sell it, even though in my view there is likely to be minimal proceeds, if any. There could be buyers, if the definition of a buyer is someone who’s willing to take it off their hands.”

That last part of his statement is worth repeating: "There could be buyers, if the definition of a buyer is someone who’s willing to take it off their hands.”

What that tells us, unfortunately, is that BusinessWeek is in trouble. That a high profile, important business publication will be spun out, its future uncertain under new owners looking for a bargain.

It means, if McGraw-Hill feels it makes sense to ditch BusinessWeek now, that we're far from being out of the woods, that a recovery is not just around the corner.

Meanwhile the list of failed magazines continues. Former Mets (and Phillies) Lenny Dykstra had filed bankruptcy, and shut down his finance magazine, according to Forbes. "Dykstra Done In By Debts: Ex-ballplayer goes bust, owes millions after failed investment in glossy finance magazine for pro athletes."

In the short-term, we should expect further belt-tightening at the BusinessWeek and other major publications -- that layoffs and offers for buy-outs will continue, that print will continue to look for ways to shrink their publications to save money, continue to look at ways to increase revenues (the problem with a recent Washington Post pay-for-access salons), and that more publications will shift to an online-only business model.

What that also means for PR functions is that the competition for ink will continue to be tough since the number of organizations trying to get into a publicaiton seems to be holding steady while the number of actual pages is shrinking.

Killer App for Online Content: Getting Consumers to Pay for Content

The killer app and Holy Grail of web content is not for people to access content but to get them to pay for that access.

It may have been true, as Samuel Johnson is oft quoted as saying, that "No man but a blockhead ever wrote, except for money."

But there are a lot of us blockheads out there, writing for reasons other than making money.

BusinessWeek's Jon Fine discusses the latest attempts to monetize content in the current issue,
"Charging for Online Content Gets Closer, Two startups, Journalism Online and ViewPass, aim to help battered publishers find ways to get paid for their Web offerings."

ViewPass and Journalism Online are making valiant efforts, but their approaches are still problematic.

Either way, what seems likely is that the business model known as "freemium" will win out. Freemium is a mix of free and premium access.

Free access is better for internal PR functions and their agencies, because it means a wider potential audience for content, and free content is searchable while paid content is often behind a wall so fewer people will access it and the content remains hidden from search engines.

Not much that internal PR functions or their agencies can do right now, but watch and make suggestions how to best understand how to work with whatever the outcome.

Mark Anderson & Tech Trends for 2009

We listed our predictions for the media in 2009. Mark Anderson's trends, discussed on the BusinessWeek video (below) are some of the most interesting tech trends I've heard for 2009.

One tech trend piece, dated for 2009, was written by an editor who should know better -- but most of the trends could have been written in 2007. There was nothing new in it (and I won't name the editor or tech publication by name). In contrast, Anderson's were quite intriguing.

Tech Predictions for 2009

Can Marketers Learn Something from the Obama Campaign?

Last month, I wrote about an article in the New York Times Magazine that looked at McCain's campaign from a messaging perspective. Check it out here: New York Times Magazine Article Looks at McCain's Campaign: The Making (and Remaking and Remaking) of the Candidate -- fascinating. I still think it's an interesting look at the McCain campaign.

Jon Fine, media critic at BusinessWeek makes some interesting, contrarian points in his recent column, "Marketing Lessons from Obama's Campaign: Why the winning Presidential strategy, though remarkable, won't sell yogurt, cars, or virtually any other consumer product."

Namely, "a candidate's brief is much different from a product's. Coke may seek to get drinkers of other sodas to try its wares once, or try them again, because in mature categories your gains come only at your competitor's expense. Not so in politics, wherein you do three thins: build awareness, turn on (and turn out) supporters and try to sway undecideds."

To target undecideds, political campaigns generally launch negative ads, which most consumer products avoid.

Fine makes some good points, as usual.

But the Times article also makes some good points. Read 'em both.

If News Embargoes are Dead, What about Press Releases?

There have been separate discussions about whether the news embargo is dead.

Jeremy Wagstaff, a former Technology Columnist at The Asian Wall Street Journal and Wall Street Journal Online, and Stephen Baker, a senior writer at BusinessWeek who writes the Blogspotting blog, both say the news embargo is dead. (Check out my previous blog on the topic here.)

I think that except for embargoes for peer-reviewed articles at top publications like New England Journal of Medicine or the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), embargoes are dead.

However, that doesn't mean "advanced looks" are dead.

Mark Harrison of Abraham Harrison said that giving bloggers a heads' up to news before it hits can be a good approach. And Stevie Wilson of LA Story has posted a comment to this blog that touches on the value of getting a heads' up so that bloggers are not at a complete disadvantage.

The difference is that when you give reporters and bloggers an "advance look," you don't mind if they immediately post information about the news. With an embargo, you want all coverage to hit after the embargo time: news that hits before 11:10pm, for example -- bad; news that hits after 11:11pm is good.

Is that clear?

Now, back to the topic based on the headline: what's the deal with press releases in a Web 2.0 world?

In a panel discussion turned blog article, "PR in the Face of Web 2.0 and Social Media - Part II," Brian Solis discusses the state of the press release. Is it dead? let me know what you think.

On a related topic, check out "Does Good Tech Need PR?" on the ReadWriteWeb blog, written by Richard MacManus.