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Friday, December 6, 2002 Media Cynic | Forum | Advertising | Classifieds | Jobs Publishing Industry Soundbytes Launches and Redesigns | Miscellaneous People · Borders Group Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer Greg Josefowicz announced that Ron Staffieri, president of Waldenbooks, has resigned effective Dec. 13 to accept a new position. Sue Dasse, vice president of Waldenbooks stores, will assume Staffieri's responsibilities on an interim basis. · PennWell Corporation has appointed William Pryor as publisher of Oil & Gas Journal to replace Tom Terrell, who has retired after 33 years with the company. Pryor, a publishing executive with PennWell since 1989, was also named president of PennWell's Petroleum Group. Terrell will serve as Publisher Emeritus of Oil & Gas Journal, which is ending its yearlong celebration of the 100-year anniversary of this weekly publication covering upstream and downstream news and technology for industry professionals worldwide. · Bob Marbut, 67, chairman of the board of Hearst-Argyle Television, Inc. since January 1, 2001 and previously chairman and Co-CEO of the Company since its creation in 1997, will retire from the chairmanship at year-end. He will remain a director of the Company as well as one of its major shareholders. Marbut announced his planned retirement from the chairman's post at a meeting of the Company's board of directors yesterday. Succeeding Marbut as non-executive chairman effective January 1, 2003, will be Victor F. Ganzi, 55, president and chief executive officer of The Hearst Corporation. Frank A. Bennack, Jr., 69, former chief executive officer of The Hearst Corporation, has been appointed the board's presiding director, overseeing matters relating to corporate governance. David J. Barrett, 54, continues as president and chief executive officer of Hearst-Argyle Television, Inc. Ganzi, Bennack and Barrett have all served as directors of Hearst-Argyle since the Company's formation in 1997. · Freelance writer Ron Levitt, of Weston, whose career has spanned politics, journalism and public relations, has been reelected to a fourth term as president of the Miami International Press Club. The Press Club has a long-term tuition scholarship program to assist journalism students in their collegiate careers. · John Misner was named president and general manager of KPNX-TV, the Gannett-owned NBC affiliate in Phoenix. Misner joined WXIA-TV, the Gannett-owned NBC affiliate in Atlanta, as general sales manager in September 1996 and was named vice president/general sales manager in November 2001. Previously, he was local sales manager at KARE-TV, the Gannett-owned NBC affiliate in Minneapolis-St. Paul. Misner also worked at KSTP-TV in Minneapolis and KJEO-TV, Fresno, CA. · Primedia, a targeted media company, announced that John French has been named Vice President of Sales Operations for Primedia Business Magazines & Media. Mr. French will report to Primedia Business President Ronald D. Wall and will be based in New York. Mr. French will be responsible for sales training and development, coordinating the sales force recruiting and retention process, managing the independent sales representative structure and developing improved sales goal setting. Mr. French joins Primedia Business after most recently serving as vice president/group director for the Penton Electronics Group where he was responsible for managing five magazines and four related trade shows. · Sabot Publishing has announced the promotion of Kristin Bucher to editor of Southwest Art. Bucher joined Southwest Art as assistant editor in 1994 following her graduation from Duke University in Durham, NC. In 1996, she was promoted to senior editor and in 1998, she was promoted to managing editor. Earlier this year, Bucher was named acting editor for the publication. · Acclaim Entertainment, Inc., a video entertainment software developer and publisher, announced that it has strengthened its senior management team with the strategic appointments of five executives, including Leonard Ciciretto - Senior Vice President of Sales, Robert Nashak - Vice President of Product Development, Greg Goldstein - Vice President of Licensing, David Knies - Director of Acclaim Sports, and Edward Slezak - Vice President and Corporate Counsel. · Ziff Davis Media Inc. has announced the appointment of Derek Irwin as Senior Vice President, Finance, effective immediately. Mr. Irwin was most recently Chief Financial Officer, TMP Advertising & Communications, Americas, and he also previously held the CFO positions for TMP's Executive Search and eResourcing divisions in the Americas, and for its Worldwide Executive Search division. Mr. Irwin brings to Ziff Davis Media more than 14 years of finance experience, including the past ten years in senior finance positions with large enterprises. In his new role he will report directly to Bart W. Catalane, COO and CFO. · Reader's Digest and Al Roker Productions, Inc. announced that Al Roker, of NBC's Today Show, will serve as "Quizmaster" for the first annual Reader's Digest National Word Power Challenge. The Reader's Digest National Word Power Challenge is a vocabulary contest designed to encourage children to learn in a fun and competitive environment. The competition will begin locally, progress to state finals on January 21, 2003, and culminate in a National Championship Event on March 24-26, 2003. · Elaine Lintecum was named Treasurer of The McClatchy Company from her previous position as assistant treasurer and director of treasury services. Lintecum will continue to be responsible for treasury management functions, investor relations and Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) reporting. Lintecum joined McClatchy in 1988 as the corporate analyst responsible for external financial reporting and for SEC compliance. She was promoted to investor-relations manager in 1993 and was named assistant treasurer and director of treasury services in 2000. · The New York Times Company announced that Susan J. DeLuca, director of organization and executive development, has been named vice president, human resources for the Company's Regional Newspaper Group effective January 8. The announcement was made by P. Steven Ainsley, president and chief operating officer of the Regional Newspaper Group, to whom she will report. In her new role, Ms. DeLuca, 53, will be responsible for leading the human resource initiatives, including selection, performance management, succession planning, and development, for the Group's 15 newspapers. She joined The New York Times Company in 2001 as director of organization and executive development. · The New York Times announced that Lydia Reynolds, executive director of the newspaper's planning department, has been named vice president, Strategic Planning, effective immediately. The announcement was made by Denise Warren, senior vice president, Strategic Planning, to whom she will continue to report. In her new role, Ms. Reynolds will continue to help oversee the paper's strategic planning initiatives, including overall strategy formulation, current and new product analysis, partnership and other new business development activities. Ms. Reynolds, 43, joined The Times in 1987 as a financial analyst in the Circulation Department. · Dennis J. FitzSimons, Tribune Company president and chief operating officer, has been elected chief executive officer by the company's board of directors. The appointment is effective Jan. 1, 2003. John W. Madigan, chairman and chief executive officer, made the announcement. Madigan also said he will continue as board chairman until Dec. 31, 2003, when he will retire, and that he plans to leave Tribune's board of directors at the May 2004 annual meeting. Digital Publishing · Palm Digital Media, Inc., a publisher and distributor of ebooks for handheld computers, has released its lists of November's top 10 best-selling ebooks. Palm Digital Media Top 10 Best-selling Fiction Books November 2002
· ProQuest Company, a provider of information and content to the library/education, and automotive/powersports industries, reported that it has signed a letter of intent to acquire bigchalk.com, inc. Bigchalk develops and markets products and services for research, curriculum integration and professional development for the kindergarten through twelfth grade educational community. · Factiva, a Dow Jones & Reuters Company, has added premium subscription services from Reuters Health, a provider of healthcare and medical news, to the content available to users of Factiva products. Customers with direct subscriptions to Reuters Health will now be able to access this content via Factiva products. Reuters Health delivers on a daily basis breaking medical news to healthcare professionals, global health industry news to business executives, and consumer health news and information to the general public. · Infotrieve announced that it has signed content agreements with five premier publishers in the scientific, technical and medical (STM) fields for inclusion in its online article retrieval and delivery service. The new publishers include the American Association for Clinical Chemistry (AACC), the American Psychiatric Publishing, Inc. (APPI), BioMed Central (BMC), CSIRO Publishing, and The National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (NAS). · Activision, Inc. announced the company has signed an exclusive multi-title, multi-year agreement to publish real-time PC strategy games developed by Stainless Steel Studios, creators of the bestselling PC strategy title Empire Earth. The game has sold a million plus units worldwide since its release. Stainless Steel currently is in development with the first title under the agreement, which is being spearheaded by Rick Goodman, the lead designer of the strategy game Age of Empires. Launches and Redesigns · U.S. manga publisher TokyoPop announced that it will produce Cine-Manga -- full-color books in storyboard format -- for Disney's Lizzie McGuire and Kim Possible. Each will launch as part of TokyoPop's developing Cine-Manga family, which currently includes Cardcaptors and the forthcoming Akira. · American Experience Online has launched Chicago: City of the Century, the companion site to the television series premiering on PBS January 13-15, 2003. The website allows visitors to to learn more about one of the most dynamic and vibrant cities in the world. Visitors can watch a video re-creation of the Great Fire, play interactive games, learn about labor riots, immigrant neighborhoods, and more. · ProMED-mail, the Program for Monitoring Infectious Diseases, is an Internet-based reporting system dedicated to rapid and global dissemination of information about outbreaks of infectious diseases that affect human health. ProMED-mail uses electronic communications to provide up-to-date and reliable news on disease outbreaks around the world, seven days a week. ProMED-mail is open to all sources and free of political constraints. Sources of information include media reports, official reports, online summaries, local observers, and others. Reports are often contributed by ProMED-mail subscribers. A team of expert human, plant, and animal disease moderators screen, review, and investigate reports before posting to the network. Reports are distributed by email to direct subscribers and posted immediately on the ProMED-mail website. ProMED-mail currently reaches about 24,000 subscribers from at least 140 countries. Miscellaneous · The Online Publishers Association released new data that indicates that users of branded media Web sites are more likely to read, watch or listen to those same media brands offline. In a recent OPA survey among 4,980 Internet users aged 14+, 56% of online media users indicated that they are more likely to read, watch or listen to the offline component of the brand. Furthermore, those users with high affinity toward a particular media website are even more likely to watch the companion network or read the companion publication (66%), versus only 23% of low affinity users. The research also found that users of Special Interest (70%) and Sports (60%) sites are particularly likely to translate into offline readers/viewers/listeners of the corresponding brand. · The Ziff Davis Media Game Group announced that it is increasing the rate base of its video game magazine Electronic Gaming Monthly from 500,000 to 600,000 in September 2003. Ziff Davis also said that Xbox Nation (XBN) magazine will increase its publishing schedule from quarterly to bi-monthly beginning with the February/March issue, with six issues planned in 2003. Xbox Nation debuted in December 2001. Xbox Nation provides information on Xbox games and accessories, offering news, game reviews and previews, along with targeted tips and strategies. Click here to return to the homepage of The Write NewsTM Click here to subscribe to our free weekly email newsletter.  www.writenews.com Copyright © 1997-2007 by Writers Write, Inc. All Rights Reserved. |
