ChristopherWhite.info

I’m not much of a one for aphorisms, despite having one rather permanently drawn on my arm, but that old cliche “knowledge is power” is pretty accurate.

Today we had the privilege of Kim Hollamby, the man in charge of IPC Media’s electronic delivery. One of the many, many things he told us was that their websites’ stat counters have picked up quite a large number of hits from people just looking at the “Next month” web pages - to see whether the next issue is worth buying. Knowing that gives them a big advantage in marketing their magazines, and deciding what stays in dead-tree form and what goes on the website.

It illustrated nicely the point about having the magazine and its website almost as separate, but interlinked, products: and he reaffirmed that the whole content will never be given away on the net.

(On an entirely separate note, he also made me feel better about my incessant pedantry, having told us that he switched off in an interview when someone called the company “ICP Media”.)