Today is my last day at Reed Business Information, after a decade of service. It has been an incredible journey, and I wanted to reflect a bit on it. I started in December of 2000, just as the first dot com bubble was popping. The past decade was the perfect time to be within a [...]
Archive for June, 2010
Crowd vs Community
Posted in community on Jun 25th, 2010
Earlier in the week, I talked about how the word ‘expert’ is being thrown around too often on the web. Today, I want to talk about another term that is used so often that it is losing it’s meaning: community. My goal here is not to complain about trendy words (that in itself would just [...]
Media is a Service, Not a Product
Posted in magazines, media, newspapers on Jun 18th, 2010
A reporter interviewed me this week for an article about the future of local newspapers. At first, he referred to the terms ‘newspaper’ and ‘journalism’ interchangeably, and I clarified that the lack of a definition for journalism is what hobbles many conversations about the future of newspapers. Newspapers are not a product, they are a [...]
Having Goals is 90% of Achieving Them
Posted in web metrics on Jun 15th, 2010
image by Jon Rawlinson Many business conversations I have start with me asking: "What are your goals?" It’s a surprisingly challenging question. We often talk about ‘what we are trying to do,’ but rarely talk about where we are going. Goals are often vague and distant. Without focused, measurable, short-to-mid-term goals, how do we know [...]
What Publishers Can Learn from Gorillaz
Posted in Publishing on Jun 4th, 2010
This week, I’ve been obsessed with the band Gorillaz, and considering what the publishing industry can learn from them. Gorillaz started out in 1998 as a concept, founded by the singer/musician Damon Albarn, and artist/illustrator Jamie Hewlett. Okay, I don’t want to bore you with background, let’s dig into why this group is so fascinating [...]