Our end of year review+fix of the Syntgama network is now almost complete.

We’ve stabilized to 27 active sites, down from 55 at peak, with 9 archived. That includes three new sites : Sideways Health (now purring along quite healthily), a new role for Moneyizor, involving the topic of the moment : macroeconomics (should be relaunching very soon), and the first site of a local West Country of England sub-network, Devon and Cornwall (coming in a week or so).

Underneath all this runs our Specialist Information Online strand, which is not public but deals directly with corporate clients.

Economic conditions are, as the saying goes, falling off a cliff now. When the money men start fleeing their markets you know there’s a war on. And boy have we got a war!

Syntagma’s notorious prudence over money matters is paying off now with cash reserves to see us through the crunchy times ahead and zero borrowings or obligations of any sort.

Marshall Sponder, our man in NYC, has been writing about all the businesses shutting up shop in New York over at Art NYC. It’s quite a bloodbath by the sound of it.

Here in the UK the blows are only just beginning to land, but they’re coming thick and fast now. People with fixed-term mortgages are trapped like rats in a sack. Nowhere to go. Three million families are already moving into negative equity. Dangerous times.

Still, the show must go on, and Syntagma’s sails are furled ready for the perfect storm. (Note to self : I must stop mixing these metaphors!).

There’s always a silver lining, though. When asset prices fall some great business opportunities arise for those with the cash to buy them. No wonder economics is called the dismal science.

Syntagma Digital is delighted to announce the launch of our fourth network magazine, Moneyizor, specializing in Finance and Business.

Designed by Thord Hedengren in his now familiar style, the portal will aggregate our money and business sites.

Two more sites will be launched in coming weeks as part of this package : Innovation Latest and Entrepreneur Latest.

This is an unusually quiet period here at Syntagma, helped by the English weather, which thinks it’s mid-summer.

Meanwhile, Thord is working hard on our new network magazine, Moneyizor, from his Swedish castle, amid the snows of the North Lands — and between watching the world snooker championships on TV. He’s busy forging our newest design, which should be unveiled next week. Mark it in your diary.

As we have now got the office in some order, after building work and new computers, I thought I would regale you with some pics taken on my morning walk. I know, I’m too good to you!

The Morning Walk has taken on added significance since we’ve been looking for a replacement for Syntagma Towers. Regular readers will know that we were beaten to the punch on Rougemont Castle, which was sold to a property company, by Charlie Falconer of dubious provenance.

However, my early morning trek of around five miles takes in some of the most historic sites in East Devon, so should provide possible substitutes. Not this next building though :

For it is Exeter Cathedral, and even I can’t bring myself to covet it, given its present owner (touches forelock).

Apart from the castle and the cathedral, the route takes me through our Farmers’ Market (pictured) :

and through some very ancient buildings and byways. I’ll show you Parliament Street at a later date. Astonishingly, it’s only 3 feet wide. Don’t believe me? Wait and see. Who says size zero is a modern phenomenon?

The route also takes me into the most spectacular development in Devon — the new shopping and chill-out zone at Princesshay. Most of it is still being built, but the bits that are open for business have attracted some upmarket clients, including a genuine Spanish tapas bar (which takes me back to the seven years I spent in Andalucia) a Trattoria and French coffee shop. Whatever happened to Anglo-Saxon England?

I’ll show you some pics of Princesshay tomorrow.

My route then circles round the historic centre and rises up and out of the city back to Syntagma Towers, from whose heights you can see America (I jest), and which makes the Leaning Tower of Pisa seem an upright sort of edifice.

One final glimpse then of Rougemont Castle and thoughts of what might have been :

Ah, the impregnability of the place!

What with builders in the office, and designer Thord Hedengren moving house, we’ve been held up getting our fourth network magazine, Moneyizor, up and firing on all engines.

However, we’re now breaking surface after a long period without the oxygen of productive activity. Happily, we’ll be starting on the portal next week and it may even be visible by then.

So all of you who can’t wait to start making money with Moneyizor don’t have long to wait. Just to remind you, the mag covers finance, business, startups, investments and all things moneyizing.

We also have two sites to get going to make up the full complement of the magazine, but they shouldn’t be long in coming.

Stay close.

To all of you who have emailed inquiring about my absence from the Syntagma battlements in recent weeks, thank you.

I’ve been completing the last of my contract obligations for a media company with strong ties to the retail sector. Now that it’s complete, I can concentrate totally on Syntagma’s weighty world affairs. Exhaustion, however, may slow me down in the first few days. Bear with me if I don’t get round to you immediately.

We do, though, have a fast-track channel for anyone wishing to pay us.

Apart from the routine operations always present in a large network, we have a huge slew of new projects and maturing older ones to tackle after Easter. Here’s a taster :

* Moneyizor network magazine to be designed and launched, including three new webtitles to be set up.

* Final proofread of Syntagma Media’s first print book of the new season : Naked Tales — Stories By Writers Who Blog, which is being published by Humdrumming in May.

* Complete switch over to new Windows Vista systems for all activities. We’re also making the move to Microsoft Office 2007 in one fell swoop. I’m really looking forward to all the glitches.

* Work on Dial Publishing’s new edgewise general trade imprint. The first print title will be Steve Newman’s brilliant fictionalized biography of Ernest Hemingway, currently being serialized here by Syntagma Digital.

* Initial work on our Retailz USA retail portal, due in May/June.

* Something called “real life”. What can that be?

One morning I’ll wake up with absolutely nothing to do all day. Then I’ll know I’m dead.

In the meantime, raise the bugle and signal the advance.