Joe Wikert's Publishing 2020 Blog

Brookstone's Content Opportunity

While dining with the family and waiting for a table at The Cheesecake Factory Saturday night I decided to kill some time in Brookstone's.  They had a device on display that really caught my eye.  It's called the SportCast Wireless Baseball Scoreboard.  It's a simple LCD display that provides up-to-the minute box score and standings information, all received through a satellite feed. 

I'm a baseball junkie but even I feel the $99 price tag for this was way too high.  I look at something like this and think of what it could become though...

The device's dimensions are ideal for placement on a desk or shelf.  Sitting next to your computer you'd have a bit of additional content surface area that could be used for a variety of things.  It's also a great size to take with you.  I could see them adding a flap that's set up to serve as both the stand and a protective cover.

Why make it more portable?  Because I think there's a great opportunity to provide more content.  Think of this as a stripped-down Kindle.  Thanks to the satellite feed it could receive all sort of additional content.  Would I want to read a book on this thing?  No, but it would offer a great way to take newspapers, magazines and other short form content on the road, always up-to-date.  If there's not enough memory already built in to house the content, just add an SD slot for customers to increase it on their own.

Then there's the advertising component.  It would be pretty simple to create an additional revenue stream by including banner ads, for example.  They could offer two subscription models: One that's less expensive with ads and an ad-free one that's a bit pricier.

(Speaking of advertising, when we finally got seated at The Cheesecake Factory I noticed that every other page of the menu is an ad for another store in the mall.  Pretty smart, especially when you think about the captive audience reading the menu and the fact that they're already at the mall.)

Suddenly that $99 price tag wouldn't seem so expensive, especially if this device could be my gateway to portable content that's priced at the same level as what Amazon charges for the same content on the Kindle.  I wouldn't need the sexier eInk technology for this...a simple LCD would do the trick.

First BusinessWeek, then Medco

The Internet giveth and the Internet taketh away.  I had two noteworthy online experiences this past week that made me scratch my head in wonder.

First up, the subscription geniuses at BusinessWeek.  It's one of the few remaining magazines I subscribe to, er, subscribed to.  My account was up for renewal next month and they offered me the one-year rate of $60.  As a completely new subscriber I could get that same service for $40.  A quick back-and-forth e-mail thread with their customer service team got me a better deal than $60 but still not as low as $40.  It looks like they offer the full magazine content for free online so I'm letting this one lapse.  When will the magazine industry ever figure out that they can't keep overcharging their most loyal customers?!

Next up, Medco.  Like millions of others, I take a statin every day to keep my cholesterol in check.  Medco's online prescription service has always been extremely reliable...up to now.  When I ran out of refills in the past Medco would check with my doctor to renew the prescription.  It always worked so well.  This time though, Medco contacted my doctor and said they got no response.  I contacted my doctor and they confirmed they faxed the prescription once and did so a second time late last week.  Medco confirmed they got the fax but still said they couldn't refill it (for some unknown reason!).  So now I'm forced to do this the old-fashioned way: take the prescription to my local drugstore and get it filled there.  Sometimes the online world just isn't as smooth and efficient as I'd like it to be.

Opinionated: A Kindle Exclusive

Thanks partially to the Kindle's Whispernet connection feature, new and innovative ways of distributing all sorts of content are likely to emerge.  For example, this week's announcement by Tribune Media Services (TMS) to create a Kindle-exclusive magazine called Opinionated: Voices and Viewpoints on America and the World.

The print magazine business is currently going through some challenging times.  If it's not higher paper costs, more advertisers going online or a decline in subscribers you also have to face the fact that Walmart is cutting almost 1,000 titles from its shelves.  Why fight those odds when you can launch in the happy world of no inventory management or manufacturing costs?

The only real question is whether enough Kindles can be sold to make this a profitable venture for TMS.  Since it's exclusive to the Kindle, I have to assume Amazon was willing to make this a sweeter deal for TMS than they've done for other magazine publishers, especially in the short term while Amazon works to address the Kindle supply issue.

Chris Anderson on the Value of Free

You probably remember that Chris Anderson launched his Long Tail book idea with a feature article in Wired magazine a few years ago.  He's at it again with this article called Free! Why $0.00 is the Future of Business.  As is the case with everything Chris writes, it's well worth reading.  It's also a nice teaser for his next book, simply titled FREE and due out next year.  (See the pattern?... ;->)

The article lays out several options on how to leverage "free" in a product mix.  Here's my favorite excerpt:

People think demand is elastic and that volume falls in a straight line as price rises, but the truth is that zero is one market and any other price is another. In many cases, that's the difference between a great market and none at all.

How true.  I can think of plenty of times where I started to sign up for an online service because it seemed free but then I either had to commit a very tiny amount or give my credit card number for charges after the "free" period.  I typically abandon the sign-up process at that point, so yes, there's a huge difference between zero and any other price.

I'm curious to see how Anderson's publisher (Hyperion) is going to leverage the obvious angle of "free" for this next book.  At the very least I would think they'd take a page out of the Oprah/Orman book and have a limited time free e-book promotion.

In the Online World, Distribution is King?

So says this article today on The Guardian.  (The writer must have found a special version of Amazon's Kindle, btw, as he talks about its wifi capabilities...  I'm pretty sure the only model that currently exists uses cellular technology, not wifi.)

The article goes on to talk about how the real money is in distribution, not content.  He makes it sound like the telecoms and other providers are the place to be and will find themselves in a much more lucrative spot than the content providers.  While there are certainly plenty of free content providers out there, and that number will continue to grow, I tend to think the telecoms and other broadband providers are in more of a commodity business than the typical content creator.  At the very least I think it's safe to say there's likely to be more brand loyalty for a particular author than a cell phone provider, for example.

To be fair, taken as a whole, "free content" is one of my biggest and most challenging competitors.  I'd like to think the availability of free content forces me to come up with new and better ways to distinguish our products from the free alternatives which are often deemed "good enough."  Despite this challenge, I'd rather work on building memorable content and brands than fight to earn someone's broadband loyalties.  Then again, I know there's money in those pipes...I generally curse and scream every time I get my family's cable and cell phone bills!

A Good Magazine Indeed

Although my reading habits have shifted dramatically over the past couple of years, opting for RSS feeds over print magazines, I just discovered a new magazine that's worth a closer look. It's appropriately called Good, and based on the issue I just read, I think they could have also called it Great.

I just finished their "High Tech/Low Tech" issue and found more interesting articles in this one magazine than I typically find in a handful of others.  Think Wired without all the annoying artwork and gratuitous neon ink.  That's right.  It's full of...wait for it...great content!

New issues come out every other month and a one-year subscription is $20.  And get this...  Every penny of your $20 subscription goes to one of 12 different nonprofit organizations that have partnered with Good.  The list includes Room to Read, Teach for America and several others.  I just signed up for a subscription and selected Kiva as my nonprofit recipient.

Scott Karp on the Virtues of Paid Content

Scott Karp's recent post about how creating a paid content revenue stream is "hard but not impossible" is valid.  In his eyes, success comes from two key factors: a great brand and content that's better than the free alternatives.  Building both of those is definitely a challenge.

There's one other factor to consider in the Consumer Reports example that's featured in this post and it has to do with the unique nature of Consumer Reports content.  Although there's plenty of free rating information available from a variety of sources, people who tend to use Consumer Reports are frequently looking at making a big-ticket purchase.  Sure, they review cereals in there from time to time, but it's the annual automobile edition and other pricey reviews that make Consumer Reports so special; after all, a Fruit Loops vs. Lucky Charms review isn't as compelling as the latest one comparing the Camry and the Accord.

My point?  Most consumers are probably more willing to pay a few bucks for solid, trustworthy reviewer information when they're talking about an expensive investment like a car.  The brand is critical but it helps that plenty of consumers are always looking for that "expert advice" when they're about to make a large investment.  It's a great combination and a luxury that most providers don't get to enjoy because their content isn't applicable in a big-ticket purchase.

JPG: A User-Generated Content Magazine

Who says user-generated content is only for the web?  According to their website, JPG magazine is aimed at "people who love imagemaking without attitude."  The magazine is built around a website where you can submit your best photos.  Community voting determines which photos will make it into the print magazine which has six issues per year.

As far as I know, JPG is the first magazine that's built from user-generated content.  Are you aware of anything else like this?  It's an interesting concept and worth keeping an eye on.

Print Is Dead, by Jeff Gomez

Given Amazon's recent release of the Kindle ebook reader, the timing of Jeff Gomez's Print Is Dead couldn't be better.  Regardless of your beliefs about print vs. e-content, you need to read this book, especially if you're in the publishing business.  You might not agree with Jeff's opinions but I guarantee you he'll make you think about the industry in ways that you've never thought about it before.  Even if you're just a fan of reading in general you owe it to yourself to read this excellent book.

The way I test the value of a book is by looking back and seeing how many times I've folded over a page or highlighted a passage that got my attention.  My copy of Print Is Dead has so many folds and highlighter marks that it looks like it's been read by 10 different people.  Here are some of my favorite excerpts:

Many of those in publishing see themselves as guardians of a grand and noble tradition, so much so that they sometimes suffer delusions of grandeur.

...pretty much anyone under the age of thirty qualifies for being accustomed to a 'constant stream of digital stimulation.'  And so to expect future generations to be satisfied with printed books is like expecting the Blackberry users of today to start communicating by writing letters, stuffing envelopes and licking stamps.

Today's kids are not going to want to pick up a big book and spend hours in a corner silently, passively reading.  Why in the world would they do that?  It's not interactive.  They can't share the experience with their friends.  There's no way to change the book to suit their own tastes.

The publishing industry needs to realize this, and it needs to also find a way to get to these kids by making content available in a way that will first reach them (i.e., digitally) and then will give them the tools to interact with it and share it (post excerpts on their MySpace pages, email chapters to friends, IM paragraphs across class, etc.)  If not, there are dozens of ways this generation will choose to spend their time, and none of them will involve books.

Of course there are many who contend that books are works of art and shouldn't be reworked or touched at all.  The latter is of course a silly view since readers 'rework' these books all of the time by skipping whole sections as they read, the same way that people rarely ever listen to the entirety of "The White Album."

The ability to alter, and then share, text to this degree would mean that you could edit a book to your own liking and then send an amazing chapter or even a couple of sentences to someone, via email or a webpage, along with a message that says, 'Take a look at this; I think it's amazing.'  Imagine all of the sharing of literary material that would occur if the reigns were loosened just a little.

Most of the early ebook formats and devices tried to faithfully mimic the ink-on-paper experience, and they failed not because they didn't look like real books, but because they looked too much like traditional books.

In the same way that Jimmy Buffett has created a multimillion dollar business around the success of his 1977 song 'Margaritaville,' so too will future authors create online communities and brands built around their works that have the potential to be even more popular than the works the communities were built to support.

Writers who are unskilled in the ways of the Internet, or just don't want to play any part in the online discussion and want to write their books and be left alone, will be like movie actors at the end of the silent era who were forced to have elocution lessons when talking pictures were suddenly the brand new thing.

If publishing can't find a way to tap into this need for discussion, then it's going to find itself and its product increasingly left out of the conversation.

...one day (perhaps soon) a printed book in a digital world will seem as quaint and as antiquated as a watch or a fountain pen feels today.

It's simply not possible that the Internet is going to have an effect on every area of our lives except reading books.

If I had to rank the 12-15 books I've read this year this would be #1 by far.  It's extremely insightful, well written and is one of those gems that makes you stop and think.  I've only hit some of the highlights in this post.  You need to read the entire book to appreciate the vision Gomez has for print and e-content.  Highly, highly recommended!

Maghound: Interesting, but Not "Netflix for Magazines"

Great logo, interesting idea but not the silver bullet for the magazine industry...and certainly not "Netflix for magazines", as they're touting it.  That's how I'd assess Maghound, Time's forthcoming subscription program described in this article.

The idea is to offer monthly subscriptions to 3 magazines ($4.95/month), 5 magazines ($7.95/month) or 7 magazines ($9.95/month) with a twist: You can change from one magazine to another at any time.  The example given is that you tire of reading Time and decide to switch to Newsweek for a bit.  Does that really happen?  Am I the only person who really appreciates (and generally looks forward to receiving) every issue in my subscription?  When I lose interest I'm gone and am never coming back, period.

My magazine subscription stack is less than half the height it used to be.  I've abandoned at least a dozen different subscriptions over the years, not because I couldn't switch from one to another, but because I'm now able to find much of what I'm looking for online.  Maghound has a cute logo but I'm not sure it's going to solve the real issues that plague the magazine industry.

P.S. -- The article also mentions the irritating "Please allow 4-6 weeks for delivery" nonsense that's famous in the magazine industry.  I recently canceled my Sports Illustrated subscription and am returning to ESPN The Magazine.  I subscribed online and paid with my credit card.  ESPN comes out every couple of weeks, so why can't they take my subscription info and get the next issue to me in a couple of weeks?!