Rafat Ali got the ball rolling at the big The Future of Business Media, quarterbacking a Q&A with rock star private equity banker Roger McNamee of Elevation Partners and Forbes.com CEO and President James Spanfeller.
Forbes.com has always been a leader or best practices case study for how established, successful and respected print media can blossom online. The company’s appeal has long been going away from hard core business pieces to include lifestyle bits.
Bear in mind, I’m a finance guy and I welcome Forbes.com non-finance and business bits. But, this is something that Rafat hammered away at: “some would say that you put images and articles on lifestyle to boost numbers,” suggested Ali… “and your point is?” countered Spanfeller?
“Well, if I were to put a picture of a naked girl on PaidContent.org it would get a lot of hits… but I’m not sure I would,” explained Ali… to which McNamee or Spanfeller replied: “I’m not sure we do that.”
Am I the only one thinking: “why don’t they?”
Anyway, McNamee “gets it” and in today’s crazy new media landscape simply means he understands that there’s a lot of things he does not get, and he’s honest enough to admit that… he gladly admits that planning three years out is out of the question, and by virtue of being a privately held asset, he can do that… of course, not sure he does much day to day managing, that, of course, falls on Spanfeller. And there’s no doubt that he clearly gets it because Forbes.com is firing on all cylinders.
Of note was the motif of old media companies trying to stick to old business models and their reluctance to release control. The margins in print were inflated.
Also covering the event, of course, is David Kaplan of Paid Content. Part 2 of our coverage here.
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