|
Homepage
| Archives
| The Dead List
The UnDead
| Report a Passing
| Search
Click here to return to
The Editorial Dead ZoneTM
Homepage.
May 2002
- Editor and Publisher reports on how Wal-Mart can
damage newspaper ad revenue. According the article, Wal-Mart
places little advertising in newspapers and often destroys
competiting stores that place regular newspaper ads.
Source: Editor and Publisher 5-30-02
- Kazaa, a file-swapping
peer-to-peer network, could collapse because
of hefty legal bills and potential damages from lawsuits.
Source: BBC 5-30-02
- Punch Magazine Folding
Punch Magazine, a 161 year old British satire
publication, is folding. The website will continue
to provide archives and new content.
Source: The Guardian 5-30-02
- Ziff Davis Media has ceased publication of
The Net Economy magazine and is selling the assets to
Advanstar. Advanstar will incorporate The Net Economy's
subscriber base into America's Network, a
telecommunications industry magazine.
Source: The Net Economy,
InternetNews.com,
DMNews.com 5-24-02
- The Ingram Book Group, a leading
book distributor, has laid off 54 people
from its Management Information Systems department.
Source: Publishers Weekly 5-20-02
- The World Wrestling Federation Entertainment has
announced it is changing its name to World Wrestling
Entertainment, Inc. (WWE). The company's website
will now be found at WWE.com.
Mrs. McMahon said the company began considering dropping
the word "Federation" from its name when World Wildlife
Fund prevailed in a recent court action in the United Kingdom.
The court ruling prevents the World Wrestling Federation from
the use of the logo it adopted in 1998 and the letters WWF
in specified circumstances. 5-20-02
- Author David Baldacci has won a preliminary injunction stopping
publication of one of his short stories in The Mighty
Johns, an anthology from publisher New Millennium Press
being edited by Otto Penzler.
Baldacci agreed to contribute to the anthology but was
surprised when the finished anthology contained only five short
stories (instead of 14 as Penzler and Baldacci expected)
and looked less like an anthology and more like one of
his bestselling novels.
Michael Viner, chairman of New Millennium Press, has agreed
to create to comply with the court's decision and create
a new cover for the book.
Source: New York Times 5-17-02
- Editor & Publisher is reporting that
Monster.com misattributed
a quote from new media consultant
Gordon Borrell to Editor & Publisher. Monster.com used
the quote in a presentation at a show, but E&P says the quote was
from an article for an American Press Institute newsletter
and that it has no relationship with Borrell. In addition, Borrell
wishes Monster.com had used a different one of his quotes instead --
"which is that the combination of newspapers and Internet will
basically kick Monster's butt to the Moon."
Monster.com has been growing its online recruitment advertisement
business at a time when newspapers have been losing
job ad revenue.
Source: Editor & Publisher 5-17-02
- Geocities.com,
a free and fee-based web hosting service from
Yahoo, is being shut down for the entire weekend.
Users with the most expensive Geocities hosting accounts
will remain online for the weekend.
Yahoo is using the downtime
to move the GeoCities' servers to Sprint's hosting service.
Source: News.com 5-17-02
- AOL Time Warner is
cutting 100 jobs from its America Online division.
Source: Washington Post 5-17-02
- Washingtonpost.Newsweek Interactive, the
digital publishing division of The Washington Post Co.,
is closing the popular
Newsbytes.com technical
news websites and Washtech.com technical news site.
Newbytes and WashTech will be merged and relaunched as
TechNews.com, a new website The Washington Post Co.
is launching in June.
Five Newsbytes and WashTech employees were let go.
Source: The
Washington Post, Internetnews.com 5-17-02
- Ziff Davis
is ceasing publication of the print edition of
Smart
Business magazine, its tech business title. The
publication could continue in a website and email newsletter
form. Ziff Davis reported that Smart Business suffered a
37.7 percent decline in advertising pages in the first quarter
of 2002.
Source: Internet.com 5-15-02
- End Maybe Near for Napster
Napster's CEO Konrad Hilbers has quit and it looks as if the
company could be filing bankruptcy in the near future.
Napster, a music file-swapping Internet tool, has never
recovered since it was sued by music companies for copyright
violations. The company was expected to launch a paid service at
some point. Napster has been offline since July, 2001.
Source: Newsbytes 5-14-02
- Book Publishing Death Spiral
After seeing a recent Book Industry Study Group report
Michael Cader, publisher of Cader Books and Publishers
Lunch, said the book publishing industry is in a
"death spiral". Cader said the report shows that estimates of
total book sales in 2006 will be less than the total amount
of books sold in 2001. Random House spokesman
Stuart Applebaum disagrees with Cader and the BISG's
predictions.
Source: Washington Post 5-14-02
- Harvard Business School Publishing, publisher of the
Harvard Business Review, has fired 14 employees.
Source: Boston Globe 5-14-02
- RealNames, which sold Internet keywords that could
be typed directly into the address bar of
Internet Explorer, is closing its doors. An email to users
said that, "Keywords
will continue to resolve in Internet Explorer until June 28,
2002, at which time the service will no longer be available."
Microsoft did not renew a major contract with the company
forcing it to shut down. All employees were let go.
Source: Newsbytes, News.com 5-13-02
- Now the U.S. News is covering the shrinking book coverage
in newspapers. The article mentions that the
Boston Globe, San Jose Mercury-News, and St. Paul
Pioneer Press and the New York Times have all
cut back on their book-related editorial. Some publishers
defended the cuts -- saying they are unable to sell enough
advertisements in these sections and that the sections do
not attract enough readers. The topic of shrinking book
review sections in newspapers been covered several times over
the past few months.
Source: U.S. News 5-13-02
- J.K. Rowling's new Harry Potter novel (the fifth book
in the series) is overdue and might
not be published until next year according to the author's
spokeswoman. However, the book could still be out later this
year according to U.K. publisher Bloomsbury and U.S. publisher
Scholastic. Fans were hoping the book would be out this summer.
J.K. Rowling's spokeswoman ruled out writer's block, but the
length of the book could explain the delay --
the last Harry Potter novel ran over 700 pages.
Source: Washington Post, E Online 5-9-02
- General Publishing Co. Ltd.,
a Canadian publisher and book distributor which
filed for bankruptcy protection on April 30, has now
laid off 23 employees. The situation is so bad for Canadian
book retailers that some admit to breaking Canadian copyright laws
by purchasing foreign titles from U.S. and British book
wholesalers. The retailers claim that General Publishing
is unable to fill their orders in a timely manner.
Source: Canoe, The National Post 5-9-02
- BusinessWeek reported that Barnes & Noble plans
to fill 10% of its store's
shelves with its own books within five years. BusinessWeek
also reported that there was an "undercurrent of hostility"
toward Barnes & Noble's publishing plans at BEA in New York.
The New York Times reported similar hostility towards
B&N's attempts to sell its line of books to independent
booksellers.
Source: BusinessWeek, New York Times 5-6-02
- Newsletter publishers are facing a growing threat: The Klez
virus which comes in several variations. To make a long
story short, the virus can spoof the email FROM:
field and force infected computers to
send subscription requests to email newsletters. This causes people
to be automatically subscribed to newsletters that do not
require a confirmation from the subscriber (double opt-in).
It can also confuse people that receive a confirmation request
from double opt-in newsletters because of the Klez virus.
Source: ContentBiz.com, McAfee 5-3-02
- The financial difficulties of General Publishing Co. Ltd.,
which distributes books for Canadian publishers, is causing major
concern for the Canadian book publishing industry.
Source: National Post, Canoe 5-3-02
- Poetry Northwest, a poetry quarterly from the University of Washington,
is ceasing publication. The Spring 2002 issue will be its last.
The literary title was published for 43 years.
Source: Seattle Post-Intelligencer 5-3-02
Archives Homepage:
Click here to
return to the Archives homepage.
|
|
