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November 2003
Vanguarde Media
is ceasing publication and laying off
about 70 of its employees. Vanguarde Media publishes the
African-American magazines Savoy, Heart & Soul and Honey.
The company is also filing for bankruptcy protection.
Source: AdAge.com,
New York Times11-26-03
The Boston Herald has reduced its staff by 19 employees through
layoffs and buy out agreements. The weak economy was blamed
for the cuts.
Source: Boston.com, Seacoastonline.com11-15-03
Adobe Systems, a developer of ebook, publishing and graphics
software, has laid off 100 employees, about 3% of its
total workforce.
Source: SeattlePI.com11-15-03
BookZone.com
has closed its doors.
BookZone was one of the earliest publishing industry
resources and was launched by founder and chairman
Mary Westheimer in 1994. A message on the website
reads: "BookZone is now closed. Thanks to all of you
in the publishing community for your years of support."
Magazine Ad Pages Decline Again
Magazine ad pages fell again in October
for the fifth straight month, according to
the Publishers Information Bureau. Ad pages
for October 2003 were 3.2% less than ad pages
in October 2002. This is pretty grim considering
2002 was also a bad year for magazines.
Source: New York Times, PIB11-13-03
Facing Change in the Music Industry
Music publishers are cutting staff as music sales
continue to fall. Laid off employees have to make a
tough decision: try and find work in the shrinking
music business or start over in a new industry.
Source: Nashville City Paper, WWForums.com Discussion11-12-03
CNN Plants Question?
A student has accused CNN of planting a question at a
recent debate CNN held for Democratic presidential candidates.
The student said CNN handed her a note card with a question on
it and told her to use the question on the note card instead
of her own.
Source: Boston.com11-11-03
Random House has laid off about 29 employees from its
sales and technical support departments.
Source: PublishersWeekly11-10-03
McDonalds McMad About McJob McDonalds is very upset with Merriam-Webster for including the
word McJob in its college dictionary. Merriam-Webster's Collegiate
Dictionary defines McJob as "low-paying and dead-end work".
Source: BBC11-9-03
Yahoo is closing its enterprise software division and
is laying off employees at its Sunnyvale, Calif., headquarters
and Dallas and Atlanta offices.
Source: News.com11-1-03
Most Blogs Are Never Updated
A recent survey by Perseus Development Corp. found that
most weblogs are never updated. About 2.72
million blogs (66% of those surveyed) have been abandoned.
The survey also reported some interesting demographics about
blogging. According to the survey, the typical blog is
written by a teenage girl who uses it twice a month to
update her friends and classmates on happenings in her life.
Source: The Write News11-1-03
Spammers Target Blogs
First email got spammed and now weblogs are also receiving spam
messages. Spammers are posting ads onto the comments area of
weblogs. They typically include a comment like "interesting
weblog" followed by a link to a porn or Viagra website. So far,
there is not much that can be done about the spam other than
watch it carefully and frequently delete the spam or allow
only members to post comments on the weblog. However, the
second option could really limit the number of posts.
Source: BBC11-1-03
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November 2003
