|
|
writenews.com
|
Friday, June 13, 2003 Media Cynic | Forum | Advertising | Classifieds | Jobs Publishing Industry Soundbytes Launches and Redesigns | Miscellaneous People · Martha Stewart and the Board of Directors of Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, Inc. have agreed that Ms. Stewart will relinquish her responsibilities as Chairman and Chief Executive Officer and continue to serve the Company as its Founder and Chief Creative Officer, as well as a member of its Board of Directors, effective immediately. Accordingly, the Company put into effect senior management and governance changes designed to ensure MSO's continued progress. Specifically: Sharon Patrick, the Company's President and Chief Operating Officer, has been appointed by the Board to be Chief Executive Officer; Jeffrey Ubben, a founder and Managing Partner of ValueAct Capital Partners, L.P., an investment partnership that owns 22% of the Company's class A common stock, has been elected Chairman of the Board; and Arthur Martinez, a director and former Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Sears Roebuck, has been named Lead Director and will preside over all meetings of independent directors of the Board. · The New York Times announced that Joseph Lelyveld, former executive editor of The Times, has been named interim executive editor, assuming the responsibilities held by Howell Raines, who has resigned as executive editor. Gerald M. Boyd has also resigned as managing editor. No one will be named interim managing editor. · Playboy Enterprises, Inc. (PEI) has appointed Diane Silberstein publisher of Playboy magazine and vice president of the Publishing Group. She formerly served as associate publisher of the magazine. In her new position, she will continue to be based in New York. She replaces James Dimonekas, who has left the company to pursue other opportunities. He has served as vice president and publisher of Playboy since 2001. Silberstein, 46, joined Playboy in February from Yahoo! Internet Life Magazine, where she served as publisher. · Yahoo! Inc., an Internet company, has announced the appointment of John E. Marcom Jr. as senior vice president International Operations. Reporting to Daniel Rosensweig, chief operating officer, Marcom will oversee Yahoo!'s international business operations. Marcom will be based at Yahoo!'s headquarters in Sunnyvale, Calif., and will assume his duties on July 14, 2003. Most recently, Marcom, age 45, served as president of the Americas for the Financial Times. Yahoo! Inc. also announced the appointment of Cammie Dunaway as chief marketing officer. Dunaway will oversee all consumer, enterprise and partnership marketing initiatives, from product planning and positioning to execution of customer acquisition and retention strategies for Yahoo!'s premium and subscription services. Dunaway will report to Chief Operating Officer Dan Rosensweig and will assume her role in late June. Dunaway, 40, is a seasoned marketing executive with nearly 20 years' experience in building brands, launching successful premium products and leveraging consumer research and insights. She has spent the last 13 years at Frito-Lay Company. · James Pavia has been named editor of InvestmentNews. Most recently, he served as editor in chief of National Jeweler, a semimonthly news magazine covering the jewelry industry. · Emmy-nominated actor, producer and director Tim Reid will serve as Senior Executive Supervising Producer for TV One, the new cable television network targeting adult African American and urban viewers backed by Comcast Corporation and Radio One. Reid's New Millennium Studios will also play a significant role as a content provider for the new channel scheduled to launch in January 2004. The announcement was made at the National Cable and Telecommunications Association (NCTA) convention in Chicago. The Reader's Digest Association, Inc. has named Laura McEwen as Vice President and Publishing Director of Reader's Digest magazine, Reader's Digest Large Print Edition, U.S. Selecciones and RD Specials. McEwen joins Reader's Digest from YM Magazine, a Gruner + Jahr USA publication, where she was Publisher. McEwen will lead the publishing activities of the flagship Reader's Digest magazine and its market-specific extension publications. In her new capacity, she will be reunited with Jackie Leo, Editor-in-Chief of Reader's Digest, with whom she previously formed the nucleus of a successful team at Family Circle magazine. · Meredith Corporation, a home and family media company, has named Steven M. Cappaert Corporate Controller, effective June 23. Cappaert brings nearly 20 years of accounting, auditing and senior financial management to the position. Most recently, he spent two years as Senior Vice President and Controller for United Stationers Inc. of Des Plaines, IL, a wholesale distributor of business products with annual sales of $3.7 billion. · Ziff Davis Media has appointed Elda Vale, Vice President of Research and Market Intelligence. She was recently a Principal of EV Associates, a strategic research organization. In her new role, she will be responsible for developing quantitative and qualitative research programs that help Ziff Davis' customers identify key market drivers, define strategy for business growth and evaluate new products and services. Ms. Vale will also direct the company's own research efforts, examining issues that impact technology marketing and support sales and business development opportunities across multiple platforms. She will report directly to Jasmine Alexander, Senior Vice President, Technology and Sales Operations. · EduLink, Inc. announced that its Board of Directors has appointed Mr. Charles Guy III as its new Chief Executive Officer, replacing Michael Rosenfeld who shall remain as Co-Chairman of the Board of Directors and Executive Vice President of Business Development. · New Line Cinema veteran Mary K. Donovan has opted to depart her post as executive vice president of corporate affairs at the end of July, it was announced by Russell Schwartz, the studio's president of domestic theatrical marketing. Donovan joined New Line in 1989 as director of publicity and was promoted to vice president of east coast publicity in 1992 and to senior vice president in 1996. In 1998, she took over the national publicity department and in 2001 formed the corporate affairs division. She also oversaw the release of such hits as Rush Hour 2, The Wedding Singer, Blade, Magnolia and Pleasantville, among others. · Amanda Bennett, editor of the Lexington Herald-Leader, was named editor of The Philadelphia Inquirer by Bob Hall, Publisher and Chairman. Bennett, 50, spent 23 years as a reporter and bureau chief at the Wall Street Journal, working in New York, Detroit, Canada, Beijing, Atlanta and Washington, D.C. As Atlanta bureau chief, Bennett was a part of a 1997 Pulitzer Prize-winning team. As managing editor/enterprise at the Portland Oregonian, she led a team of reporters that won the 2001 Pulitzer Prize for public service for documenting the mistreatment of immigrants by the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service. In August 2001, Bennett was named Editor of the Lexington Herald-Leader, where she made substantial improvements in the newspaper's content, Hall said. · Electronic Arts, a leading developer and publisher of interactive entertainment, announced the appointment of Gregory B. Maffei to its Board of Directors. Mr. Maffei is Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of 360networks Corporation and a former Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of Microsoft. He has also served as Chairman of the Board of Expedia. Digital Publishing · E-Book Systems has introduced FlipPublisher, which creates dynamic 3-D page-turning digital "FlipBooks" with rich media content such as text, audio, video, photographs and music. FlipPublisher allows users to "turn" pages like they are reading a hard copy of a book, eliminating the need to scroll through documents. Once a FlipBook is created, it can be electronically delivered via the Web, or formatted onto CD-ROM for offline delivery. The CD-ROM can be viewed on any PC. · Palm Digital Media, Inc., a publisher and distributor of ebooks for handheld and desktop computers, has released its list of April's Top 10 bestselling ebooks. Palm Digital Media Top 10 Bestselling Fiction Books May 2003
· The Deal LLC, a media company providing news, statistics and analysis to the deal community, has announced an agreement with Yahoo! Inc. to make TheDeal.com's top articles of the day available through Yahoo! News. As part of the agreement, Yahoo! News will host top stories from TheDeal.com each day and promote subscriptions to The Deal's print and electronic publications via The Deal's subscription center. · Pulitzer Newspapers, Inc. (PNI), a subsidiary of Pulitzer Inc., the owner of The Napa Valley Register, has announced the purchase of the assets of the St. Helena Star and The Weekly Calistogan from Krsek Publishing, LP of St. Helena. With this acquisition, The Napa Valley Register, Napa County's only daily newspaper, will combine resources with the two Upvalley weeklies. The St. Helena Star and The Weekly Calistogan have a combined circulation of 6,300. The Napa Valley Register, circulation 19,000, is the oldest continuously printed paper in Napa County. · Aspen Publishers, Inc., a provider of legal and business information and a Wolters Kluwer Legal, Tax & Business North America company, announced that it has acquired Manual Industrial Property, a privately owned publisher based in Utrecht, The Netherlands. Manual Industrial Property's premier product, Manual for the Handling of Applications for Patents, Designs and Trademarks Throughout the World, more commonly knows as the "Brown Book," is a comprehensive reference book on international intellectual property. Manual Industrial Property will become part of Aspen's Kluwer Law International (KLI) group. Launches and Redesigns · Martha Stewart has launched a personal website at MarthaTalks.com. The site is Stewart's method of choice for talking directly to her "Friends and Loyal Supporters". In the site's first day, more than 2 million hits were logged and more than 20,000 visitors took the time to send messages. · Information Today, Inc. (ITI) has announced the launch of the Streaming Media Industry Sourcebook, a new annual publication for technology managers and executive decision makers who are implementing rich media within their organizations. The Sourcebook, appearing in print in December 2003, will reach 25,000 recipients. The Sourcebook will blend a comprehensive directory of solution provider companies with articles on choosing, installing, and justifying a streaming initiative. · The PR Survey Observer is a new resource for marketing and public relations executives interested in innovative ways to raise brand visibility and protect corporate reputation. The new resource center is designed to highlight the use of survey strategies in public relations and marketing campaigns by enabling visitors to locate surveys by topic, keyword or company name. A free monthly enewsletter featuring survey releases of interest is also available. · E-Book Systems has introduced FlipPublisher, which creates dynamic 3-D page-turning digital "FlipBooks" with rich media content such as text, audio, video, photographs and music. FlipPublisher allows users to "turn" pages like they are reading a hard copy of a book, eliminating the need to scroll through documents. Once a FlipBook is created, it can be electronically delivered via the Web, or formatted onto CD-ROM for offline delivery. The CD-ROM can be viewed on any PC. Miscellaneous · Steven Aaron, Senior Vice-President, Group Publisher of American Media, Inc. (AMI), announced that AMI's Country Music will publish its final stand-alone edition on July 15 when the August-September edition goes on sale. After that, Country Music Magazine will be folded into AMI's Country Weekly, a magazine covering country music, country stars and the country lifestyle. · The newest installment in the Harry Potter series continues to shatter records for online retailer Amazon, with more than 1 million copies of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Book 5) ordered to-date at Amazon's websites worldwide. With 17 days remaining before the book's June 21 release, Amazon has already received more than twice the worldwide advance orders for Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix that it received for Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Book 4), making the fifth book Amazon's largest new product release ever. · IDT Corporation announced that Liberty Media Corporation has acquired a 5.6% stake in IDT Media. IDT Media is a division of IDT Corporation, a multinational carrier, technology and telephone company. IDT Media's assets include: Talk America Radio Networks, a syndicated radio network with over 700 national affiliate stations, WMET1150AM radio in Washington, D.C., IDT's flagship radio station, the IDT Owned and Operated Radio Group and Digital Production Solutions, IDT Media's 3-D animation unit. · iVillage Inc., a women's media company, announced that it has received notification from The Nasdaq Stock Market, Inc. in a letter dated June 9, 2003 that the Company has regained compliance with The Nasdaq SmallCap Market's minimum $1.00 closing bid price per share requirement. Accordingly, the Company has regained compliance with Nasdaq Marketplace Rule 4310(c)(8)(D) and Nasdaq's delisting matter has been closed. 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. |
