I’ve been chronicling the dynamics of blogs and print magazines over the past year.
Trust me when I say the momentum is shifting from magazines to blogs specifically faster than it’s moving from print to online. Right now, the pioneers who dove into blog publishing, namely Rafat Ali, Nick Denton, Om Malik, Michael Arrington, Richard McManus et al. are easily heading towards becoming the men who are creating the Hearst, Conde Nast, Future Publishing, Time etc. of the 21st century.
To be fair, Jason Calacanis should on that list too, since they (along with his partners Brian Alvey and Peter Rojas) have the only blog empire (Weblogs Inc.) that both put up numbers on the board and cashed its chips. But he’s out of the blog game now, while the abovementioned men are doubling down.
And, don’t let the macho veneer fool you, beneath the external competitive jockeying, all of them understand that it’s their (as a group) game to win, and the magazines to lose. But more on this in a bit.
There’s still room for new players, after all, by 1980, FOX was not exactly spoken of in the same breath as were ABC, CBS and NBC. Today, FOX is on many days more potent that some of the initial 3 combined.
Connecting the dots from print to TV, in 1 or 2 years, blogs will be far more influential and important than they are today, but the pace and velocity of that shift will settle down a bit. By then, you will see an acceleration of TV to online video… something that has started today but will accelerate in a couple of years.
But today, it’s about print, and blogs: one of the first business writers I recall reading, Erick Schonfeld, made the announcement that he was not heading to Fortune, Business Week, the WSJ, but rather, Tech Crunch. Read his comments here. When Business 2.0 announced its last edition, you knew a writer with Schonfeld’s caliber and connections would not remain a free agent for too long, but you also expected him to be lured to one of the venerable print establishments.
And speaking of the print establishments, I’ll hold off judgment, but history will recall that Time Warner decided against keeping Business 2.0 afloat because it meant letting go in the hands of a competitor, Mansueto Ventures.
That says a lot, and maybe that’s why Schonfeld turned his back on print to embrace the web.
That says a lot about the state of the industry; it also speaks volumes about Michael Arrington - who announces the move here - following in the footsteps of Rafat Ali and Om Malik, moving from a one-man show to an actual trade publishing company.
Denton went big from Day 1, and that explains why his Gawker Publishing is ranked as the most valuable blog empire to this day and he the top ranked blogger.
Folks, we’re seeing the lines being redrawn in the sand…
Related:
- More Writers Jump Ship
- From writer/executive to publisher/founder
- Will Blogs displace books?
- Is blogosphere maturing or normalizing?
- Is blogging vested journalism?
- Blogs, blog networks and blogpimping
- USA Today on “Bloguls” Om Malik and Michael Arrington
- Wired and Newsweek Join Michael Arrington/Tech Crunch Roast
- How Bloggers Can Avoid Bloglag
- Does Tech Crunch Need an M&A CEO?
- Nick Denton Leaving Valleywag, to Focus Full Time on Gawker
- Richard McManus’ Empire, Down Under
- Blogs Account for 2-3% of Online Advertising?
- Om Malik’s GigaOm Hires COO
- Read Write Web Hires former Tech Crunch Writer Marshall Kirkpatrick
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September 20th, 2007 at 11:23 pm
[…] with whom I had the pleasure of having dinner with sums up the big shift best in his post: “Connecting the dots from print to TV, in 1 or 2 years, blogs will be far more influential […]
September 21st, 2007 at 7:38 am
[…] Ashkan Karbasfrooshan also discusses here, this is just another in a series of dots connecting the decline of magazines — particularly […]
September 21st, 2007 at 7:39 am
[…] Ashkan Karbasfrooshan also discusses here, this is just another in a series of dots connecting the decline of magazines — particularly […]