Publishing Industry Soundbytes 6-20-01

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News, features and resources for media
and publishing professionals.

Wednesday, June 20, 2001

Publishing Industry Soundbytes

· TheStreet.com, Inc., a financial news provider, announced that David Morrow, most recently articles editor at SmartMoney Magazine, will become its editor-in-chief effective in July. Mr. Morrow will succeed Dave Kansas who resigned as editor-in-chief of TheStreet.com. Kansas will not stand for re-election as a director on the company's board when his term ends at the annual meeting scheduled for June 26, 2001.

· Merriam-Webster's website, Merriam-Webster OnLine, has added a new audio feature to its online version of the Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary. Now when site visitors see a red audio icon next to an entry word, they may click on it to hear the word pronounced by real voices. Multiple icons will be displayed when variant pronunciations are available.

· Carrie Donovan, the Old Navy spokeswoman behind the big black-rimmed glasses and former style editor of The New York Times Magazine, is returning to The Magazine as a contributing editor. ``Conversations with Carrie,'' an occasional conversation between fashion's pre-eminent doyenne and a featured designer, will begin Sunday, June 17 when Carrie chats up Marjan Pejoski. Carrie Donovan has worked as a reporter for The New York Times, an editor at Vogue and Harper's Bazaar, and was style editor at The New York Times Magazine until 1999 when she left to make fashion pronouncements for Old Navy.

· Betty Cohen announced that she will leave her post as president of Cartoon Network Worldwide, effective July 16, but will stay within the AOL Time Warner/Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. family. Cohen's immediate plans are to develop multi-platform programs and services for a target audience of young adults and teens. Bradley Siegel, president of general entertainment networks for TBS, Inc., will add oversight of Cartoon Network to his portfolio, which now includes TBS Superstation, TNT, Turner Classic Movies, Turner South and Cartoon Network in a unified Entertainment Networks group. Cohen is a 13-year veteran of Turner Broadcasting, during which time she oversaw the creation and launch of the all-animation Cartoon Network, where she has served as its senior executive for the past 10 years.

· FSB: Fortune Small Business magazine and Netscape Communications announced that FSB.com will be integrated into the Netscape Netbusiness service, with FSB becoming the site's main editorial content provider of news, features and columns. Content from FSB will be integrated throughout Netscape Netbusiness, providing visitors to Netbusiness with breaking news, polls, features and profiles, along with columns from FSB advisors such as the Answer Men and Net Guys. Visitors to FSB.com will be redirected to Netscape Netbusiness.

· Acclaim Entertainment, Inc., an interactive entertainment company, announced that it has appointed Greg Suarez to the position of Vice President of Business Development. Reporting directly to John Ma, Executive Vice President of Product Development, Suarez will be responsible for managing first-party relationships, A&R and general new business opportunities. His office will be based in San Mateo, California.

· Online publisher, just-sites.com, has become the first non-magazine publisher to become a full member of the Interactive division of the Periodicals Publishers Association (PPA). The PPA is the trade association for UK B2B media publishers representing 300 member companies and over 3,000 titles. PPAi -- the interactive division, focuses exclusively on developments in new media publishing. Launched in 1999, just-sites.com runs business-to-business websites for the automotive, food, beverage and apparel, textiles and footwear sectors.

· Penton Media, Inc. has announced the launch of the IT Buyer's Network, an online marketplace designed to connect buyers and sellers of IT products and services. The IT Buyer's Network is a marketplace of IT products and services organized into categories including hardware, network/systems administration, development, business applications, vertical markets, personal software, IT services, and training and certification.

· Franklin Electronic Publishers, Inc. announced that effective Monday, June 18, 2001, its common stock will commence trading on the American Stock Exchange under its existing symbol, FEP. Franklin Electronic Publishers develops handheld electronic book devices and is the designer and distributor of the multimedia eBookMan platform.

· Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc. announced that it will publish a revised printing of its famous 32-volume encyclopedia in the fall of this year, the first revision of the printed set since 1998.

· Stewart House Publishing Inc. announced the creation of its inaugural imprint, called ``Winding Stair.'' Stewart House will begin to brand their products during production of their fall 2001 list with titles such as ``Best of Bridge'' (a series of cookbooks), ``Tributes'' (a chronicle of the legends of professional wrestlers), ``Creative Decor'' (an illustrated collection of home decorating ideas), and ``Angelmouse'' (an inspirational children's property that includes video, books and plush). Stewart House intends to create a heightened awareness of its position in the children's and family markets that they serve.

· Universal Music Group announced the completion of the acquisition of EMusic.com, Inc. As a result of the merger, EMusic is now a wholly owned subsidiary of Universal Music Group.

· Jim Wolf was named National Advertising Director and Robert Klein was named Director of Strategic Partnerships for Village Voice Media, whose properties include the alternative newsweeklies, The Village Voice and LA Weekly. In this newly created position, Mr. Wolf will be responsible for establishing a centralized, national advertising department, which he will oversee. Robert Klein will work closely with Village Voice Media's national sales team, in this newly created post, where he will strategize and implement sales tactics that are consistent with the overall business plan for all Village Voice Media publications and properties.

· Douglas T. Parrish has been named senior vice president, technology and chief information officer for the Walt Disney Internet Group, it was announced by Steve Wadsworth, president, Walt Disney Internet Group, and Michael Tasooji, senior vice president and chief information officer, The Walt Disney Co. In his new position, Parrish is responsible for overseeing the technology platform, infrastructure and applications for The Walt Disney Co.'s Internet properties. This includes networking infrastructure, Web hosting and serving, applications and tool development, and advanced and new technologies development. Parrish joins The Walt Disney Internet Group from Polaroid Corp., where he served as chief information officer for the company's consumer imaging business and director of Polaroid's worldwide information technology and eBusiness strategy.

· netLibrary, a provider of ebooks and content management services, announced an agreement with R.R. Bowker that incorporates netLibrary's ebook titles into R.R. Bowker's Books In Print book information database.

· Harcourt elearning, a leading provider of online courses to colleges and universities, announced a partnership that will allow it to offer content through Fathom, a knowledge and education website. This summer, Harcourt elearning will begin rolling out its entire catalog onto the Fathom site, starting with 22 of its most popular general education, business, health science, and information technology courses.

· Alibris, a supplier of hard-to-find books, and Baker & Taylor, an information and entertainment services company, announced an agreement. The Alibris inventory of out-of-print, out-of-stock, and rare books will soon be accessible to users of Baker & Taylor's The Title Source(TM) II, acollection development database tool for librarians. This will allow librarians looking for out-of-print, out-of-stock, or rare books to link directly from The Title Source II's bibliographic record to a listing on the Alibris website.

· VNU, Inc. has named Michael P. Connors chairman and chief executive officer of VNU Media Measurement & Information, comprising all of the media and entertainment information units of VNU and ACNielsen. In addition to his new post, Connors, 46, will continue as vice chairman of ACNielsen, a research firm, which VNU acquired in February 2001. He will also remain a member of the ACNielsen Board. Hobbs said Connors will be charged with linking the efforts of each business unit in the new VNU group, ensuring that they collaborate on new product development and other growth initiatives to benefit the group's media and entertainment customers.

· WorkInSports.com, an online sports employment resource, has partnered with CNN/Sports Illustrated, as the official sports employment provider on CNNSI.com. Scottsdale-based, Work In Sports, L.L.C. was co-founded in February 2000 by Jason Backs, business operations/client services and John Mellor, business development/strategic partnerships.

· Bill Keller, currently the managing editor of The New York Times, will become an Op-Ed columnist and senior writer for The New York Times Magazine as well as other areas of the newspaper in the fall. His column will appear alternate weeks on the Op-Ed page. Mr. Keller, 52, joined The New York Times in 1984 as a Washington correspondent. In 1986 he transferred to Moscow, where he was promoted to bureau chief in 1989. He won a Pulitzer Prize for his coverage of the Soviet Union that year. He became Johannesburg bureau chief in 1992 and foreign editor in 1995.

· USA Today and the Gannett Newspaper Division have announced the launch of the ``USA TODAY Careers Network.'' The new national online employment site is a co-venture among the Gannett Newspaper Division and its 97 daily newspapers, USA Today and USAToday.com. Employers whose ads have traditionally appeared in local papers will now be able to advertise both on local newspaper websites and on the new website. The new site will launch in the third quarter of 2001.

· Freedom Technology Media Group (FTMG), publishers of CRM, Field Force Automation and Knowledge Management magazines, announced the launch of FTMG Consulting. The new division will offer highly-specialized consulting services for the CRM, knowledge management, and mobile field markets.

The Village Voice announced the appointment of Thulani Davis as City/State Editor. An acclaimed novelist, librettist, poet and Grammy-Award winner, Ms. Davis will edit the Voice's City/State section, which focuses on political and social issues concerning New York City. Ms. Davis is also a member of the Dramatists Guild, the Authors Guild and PEN American Center. Inducted into the Black Writers Hall of Fame in 1998, Ms. Davis has also been the recipient of many prestigious honors including: Lila Wallace Reader's Digest Award, PEW National Theater Residency Fellowship, The Paul Robeson Award from the Chicago Center for Arts Policy, The, NYS Council on the Arts Writer in Residency Award, and an American Book Award.

· It has been five years since Slate opened its edoors. In celebration of its birthday, Slate has announced an eBook that compiles the best of Slate's content. The Best of Slate will be available on barnesandnoble.com for $2.95 starting June 22.

· The Knot, a wedding resource, has teamed up with Lifetime Entertainment Services to offer the network's viewing brides access to wedding-planning information, including advice from Carley Roney, editor in chief of The Knot, and the opportunity to win a honeymoon of a lifetime in the ``Weddings of a Lifetime'' Sweepstakes.

· The Deal, LLC, a media company providing editorial content to corporate and financial dealmakers, and NewsStand, Inc., a publishing technology provider, announced a one-year agreement for NewsStand, Inc. to serve as the digital circulation service for The Daily Deal.

· ContentGuard, Inc., a provider of Digital Rights Management (DRM) solutions and Sandlot Corporation, a provider of subscription revenue management solutions for ecommerce, announced a strategic alliance to offer content owners combined DRM and subscription management technology and services. The two companies will integrate ContentGuard's DRM technology and services, RightsEdge, with Sandlot's subscription management product, EclipseNet, to provide content owners with a digital content management solution.

iVillage Inc., operator of the iVillage Network, which includes Lamaze Publishing, The Newborn Channel, iVillage Solutions and Astrology.com, announced that it has completed its acquisition of Women.com Networks, Inc. The acquisition received stockholder approval at special meetings of iVillage and Women.com stockholders on June 15, 2001. When combining the unduplicated unique visitors in May 2001 from a custom report by Media Metrix, the merged company would have more than 12.1 million unique visitors.

· Light Reading, an ptical networking industry resource, announced that it has launched a new publication, Byte and Switch, dedicated to covering the storage networking market.

· RealNames Corporation has announced the promotion of Terri Holbrooke to the post of chief operating officer. Holbrooke joined RealNames in April 2000 as senior vice president of marketing, bringing with her more than 20 years of marketing, management and operational experience at such blue chip technology companies as Ziff-Davis, Softbank and Novell. In her new position, Holbrooke will be responsible for the day-to-day operations of the company, including sales, channel management, marketing, engineering, operations, human resources, finance and legal. She will report directly to Keith Teare, founder and CEO.

· Construction.com announced at the A/E/C Systems conference, that is has re-built its site to coincide with the construction industries business process. The redesign, enacts a strategic transformation from a brand centric/editorial model to one that is built upon the construction industry business process. Construction.com is an online marketplace for construction professionals and part of The McGraw-Hill Companies' Construction Information Group (CIG).

· Cigital, Inc. a software risk management (SRM) solution provider that helps companies protect themselves from the business risks of software failure, announced the launch of its Cigital Labs website, designed to be a technical resource for application developers and software engineers. The site addresses software assurance issues arising throughout the entire product development life cycle as well as research and SRM-enabling technologies developed by the intellectual property division of the Company, Cigital Labs.

· WizardWorld, an online marketplace for sports cards, comic books and pop-culture collectibles, launched a redesigned website that includes improved site navigation and personalization capability; easier access to buy & sell services and more in-depth editorial content.

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