Loren Feldman Vinterviews Duncan Riley
That 1938 man Loren Feldman, who had some fun with us a few weeks ago, gets into his time machine again with a vinterview (video interview — or maybe that should be vintage video interview) with Duncan Riley, formerly of b5media.
Duncan is in New York right now fresh from his Julius Caesar moment in Toronto. Et tu, Brute is the unspoken phrase in this interview, and even Loren’s subtle wheedling can’t get him to expand on it.
What interested me was how close Duncan’s own thoughts are to my own (as expressed here many times) and to a select few in the industry. That is, the need to become more mainstream, to bring in a wider range of advertising, and to improve the content platform we work with to attract it.
I can see now why Duncan would clash with what’s beginning to look like the old guard at b5.
And it was the Pretorian guard that did for Caesar too.
I could not get him to talk, I tried.
By Loren Feldman on November 18th, 2006 at 9:08 pm
Duncan didn’t clash with me and I’m not part of the old guard. Hail b5media!
PS For anyone who doesn’t know, I’m the editor for the Family and Relationships as well as the Science and Health channels at b5media.
By Hsien Lei on November 19th, 2006 at 12:03 am
Loren, you were heroic, but you should have dangled a six-pack of Fosters in front of him
By John Evans on November 19th, 2006 at 10:36 am
I can believe that, Hsien. You were always among the most valuable people at b5.
Good to see you expanding your base there. It’s a pity they have to be called channels, though — such an oily-rag engineering term. Why not change that to … ummm …. magazines?
By John Evans on November 19th, 2006 at 10:40 am
I prefer kingdoms myself.
By Hsien Lei on November 19th, 2006 at 10:49 am
[...] Sholar Group Architects « Loren Feldman Vinterviews Duncan Riley [...]
By » SYNTAGMA - the home of Syntagma Media on November 19th, 2006 at 12:01 pm
I personally don’t think channels is a bad term - works for TV anyway, and that’s mainstream enough
Looking forward to seeing how your magazines turn out, John.
By Andy Merrett on November 21st, 2006 at 11:00 am
Why not Condominiums, Hsien, condoms for short.
By John Evans on November 21st, 2006 at 1:20 pm
Thanks, Andy. The first, Allusionz is up — and getting great traffic. The second, 21st-century Phi, has just been launched.
By John Evans on November 21st, 2006 at 1:21 pm
John, I’ll just assume that’s odd British humor you’re exhibiting. Getting used to it after about 10 months here in London. haha
By Hsien Lei on November 21st, 2006 at 1:23 pm
BTW, New Scientist also has “channels.”
http://www.newscientist.com/channel/
By Hsien Lei on November 21st, 2006 at 1:28 pm
There’s a channel between England and France too, Hsien. But magazines should be called “magazines”, don’t you think?
By John Evans on November 21st, 2006 at 1:37 pm
Yeah, and portals should be called portals :p
By Jeremy Wright on November 24th, 2006 at 7:27 pm
A magazine is a publishing term, and that’s how I see Syntagma Media — as a publisher. We’re not civil engineers, so we don’t deal in channels.
It may be “branding”, but how people see you — the signals you send out — are very important in business.
By John Evans on November 24th, 2006 at 8:13 pm
Magazines are publishing concepts. Channels are TV concepts. One isn’t better than the other. Certainly one reflects your pesrpective. And the other reflects ours.
But, yes, a magazines should be called magazines. Rebranding our portals as magazines doesn’t mean others have to use the same terminology though. Anymore than we could require any other network to use Channels.
By Jeremy Wright on November 24th, 2006 at 8:17 pm
Sure. That’s absolutely true, but there is a convergence going on between print publishing and online publishing. So far, print is far more powerful than online stuff, except in an atomized way. There is a niche opening up for a native, online magazine industry, and blog networks are the starting point for that. Only a Google can get into IPTV with any chance of success. But small operators have a chance with online mags.
That’s my essential point, Jeremy.
By John Evans on November 24th, 2006 at 8:24 pm
Again, you’re defining other’s success by your terms. Which is disingenious and intellectually dishonest. Which is my point.
I don’t care what you call what you’re doing. All you’re really saying is “content is king”. Which I agree with. But “content” isn’t “magazines”. And “online content” isn’t “online magazines”.
Continuing to try and frame the debate based on your internal terminology makes you look overly desperate.
Call your portals magazines. Totally cool. As I told you today you’ve done great with them. Just don’t make others call them the same. And don’t reference what others are doing as “magazines”.
By Jeremy Wright on November 24th, 2006 at 8:28 pm
I think “intellectually dishonest” is a step too far. To put a point of view is not intellectually dishonest. I’ve made the point in a long line of posts here and in some detail. Here it is again in condensed form.
Blog networks will not develop by size alone, unless they become Adsense gamers. What they mostly lack is publishing values, the basis of all great media businesses.
To break out from this, it’s necessary to use — or import — publishing skills to add an extra layer on top of the tech that Web 2.0 is all about. The Semantic Web (Web 3.0) will be different in that it will seek to add meaning to the tech of 2.0. In other words, publishing skills.
Some networks are crying out for skilful branding and meta-publishing. They won’t make the jump without them, funding or not. That’s what I think. And that’s not intellectually dishonest.
By John Evans on November 24th, 2006 at 8:39 pm
You are always entitled to your thoughts. However those thoughts have nothing to do with you saying things like “b5media really needs magazines”. When we don’t. We might need portals. But we don’t need magazines. Because “magazine” is your internal terminology.
It’s kind of like when phone companies say “we are the only one who do Pay As You Go(tm)”. Of course they are. They trademarked the damn thing!
And if they then publicly chided another phone company for not offering Pay As You Go(tm), that *would* be intellectually dishonest. Especially if you believe what you’re saying.
Again, though, per this morning, watching you try and take a step back and talk about the future of the web as some kind of expert while simultaneously taking under-handed jabs just ruins your entire point.
After all, if I was writing about what you guys were doing with your magazines, I wouldn’t say “Syntagma has relaunched their channels with portals”. That’d be unfair. “Syntagma Media has extended their ‘magazine’ metaphor by creating portal-like properties that are well-designed and appeal to readers” would be far more accurate and fair.
You, however, choose to use the first style week in and week out. There are currently more than 45 posts on syntagmamedia.com that cover b5. Every one of them contains this type of jab.
If you want to comment on the industry, go ahead. If you want to honestly criticize b5 (constructively or not), go ahead. If you want to toot your own horn, go ahead.
But trying to do all 3 and then couching it in some elite publishing-background framework clouds everything but your judgementalism.
Your blog, your voice. But you’d gain far more respect and profile if you stopped stepping on others and pulling others down to further your own goals.
Besides, if you really want to separate yourself from the blog network world, the fastest way to do that is to stop writing about that world, commenting on that world and dissecting that world on your corporate blog. And, yes, that is intellectual dishonesty as well John.
By Jeremy Wright on November 24th, 2006 at 8:57 pm
OK, you don’t like the word “magazine”. Let’s try it another way — avoiding “intellectual dishonesty”, of course.
I liked the portal that Ben Bleikamp did for you. Technically it was fine. But it was like Stalag 39, bleak and empty of any kind of personal presentation and, yes, publishing skills. You’ve still got b5media as the name of the network, when b5media is the operator. Does Vogue call itself Conde Nast?
I really would like to see b5 succeed, so I may go over the top occasionally when I see you making a portal that dies in the mind and in the heart.
And, yes, I promote my own business to the hilt. That’s what business owners do, but it’s not “intellectual dishonesty”.
By John Evans on November 24th, 2006 at 9:10 pm
Your problem with the b5 homepage is that you see it as a portal. It’s not. It’s a corporate homepage. Your problem with the network structure in terms of branding is a good one. That said, it’s something we’ve been talking about since you were part of b5 (ditto on doing portals) - so no surprise that we’re thinking that way
By Jeremy Wright on November 24th, 2006 at 9:12 pm
Well, I would thoroughly recommend it. Blog networks were never what they seemed anyway. WIN was based on two great professional blogs in areas that transcended blogging, ie, tech and cars, where the traffic was tech savvy in any case.
The WIN example was a false trail which we all followed. Now we have to restructure around more successful values. For me that’s magazines, for b5 that’s … well .. we’ll see.
It’s not just me that’s saying this either. It’s all across the top tier of the blogosphere.
I wish you well at b5 and hope you can craft something more discernible out of your huge Web property.
By John Evans on November 24th, 2006 at 9:21 pm
For the record, we never followed WIN. We did basically the opposite to everything they did in many, many ways.
By Jeremy Wright on November 24th, 2006 at 9:28 pm
So what’s the b5 product and business philosophy, Jeremy? I’ve been very frank about mine from the beginning.
By John Evans on November 24th, 2006 at 9:35 pm
We don’t talk about stuff we haven’t done yet. That’s the reason you got so much flack for calling Syntagma a magazie for so long is that you were just a blog network until you showed something different.
By Jeremy Wright on November 24th, 2006 at 9:37 pm
Sure, but next time I announce something in advance, they may just give me the benefit of the doubt.
Also, there’s only me, you know, and a couple of wonderful helpers officeside. I’ve funded it entirely by myself on the back of cashflow techniques, as well as funding my new print publishing business.
You wouldn’t get so much flak if you weren’t so tight about your aims and ideas.
By John Evans on November 24th, 2006 at 9:43 pm