Radical Reorganization at Source Media

In a way, it will be interesting to see if the change over will allow editorial to be more open to freelancers. Interesting. Dan http://www.banker-info.com/banking_cartoons.htm

Sales and circulation at the larger publishing firms where I have worked (RBI, Times-Mirror, Scripps) have long benefitted from the collaborative environment fostered by talented managers free to allocate staff and resources to the title best positioned to benefit (or most in need of assistance). This is certainly a model for the best websites. Editorial teams fluidly organized can generate content useful in many related titles. I believe Source Media will eventually be able to deliver consistent content shared eagerly by editors... but speaking as a long-time editor it's going to be a lot like herding cats: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pk7yqlTMvp8

Having worked at SourceMedia, let me say there are a ton of great people and products there. However, their problem is they are so incredibly concentrated on the financial markets, and it could be quite a while before this market returns to 'normal', if such a normal can exist again. Unlike other vertical markets where new entrants, and thus new advertisers, can appear, it is much harder in many of the financial markets. It is near impossible to create a new bank, for instance. As they move to bundle editorial, while they might be able to eliminate a number of editors and journalists, ultimately, they make it much harder to possibly spin off titles and consider diversifying their market exposure. As I think of another publisher I spent a short time with, Penton Media, with its hodge podge of titles scattered across a wide variety of industries, I think how great diversity, and how challenging to have one's destiny tied to such a narrow market, especially one going through perhaps the largest correction since the great depression. Has Mr. Malkin charted the proper course through the rough seas they are facing, or are they playing musical chairs on the titanic.

I worked on an editor at several source media publications for five years. What will be interesting to watch -- knowing what I and many of my journalist colleagues were paid -- isn't so much the editorial side, but the business side. Because from my experience, the bloated salaries that strained budgets the most were almost entirely on the business side, with the exception of editors-in-chief and other managing editors, of course. Regarding purely the editorial side, this consolidation can have pros and cons: I remember beating my head against walls trying to run a stories from sister publications in my own, and to now avail. On the other hand, with fewer warm bodies in seats to generate ideas and news, it will inevitably put more pressure and work on those journalists who survive the cuts.

They're not above what's happening in the residential real estate mortgage industry, having been at their core (through various owners lately), everyone in the biz is hurting badly - sounds like maybe they're just cutting the fat out. I have been a loyal reader of their publications for 25+ years; know/knew a lot of people there over the years and I've always promoted them to my peers and others!

not 20 jobs, 70. And yes, more on the business side.

This only sounds like it might make sense because they are combining editorial teams from various "financial" titles into one big pool of content providers and, uh, doesn't that make sense. No! It makes no sense. That's like saying we're going to pool the editorial teams from Boating Magazine and Surfing Magazine and cherry pick content. The various newsletters, newspapers and faux-magazines at SM have some overlap, but not a heck of a lot. What is some registered rep-oriented writer or private placement writer going to have to say about the private equity or bond deals written about at IDD? Nothing. They have a very tenuous relation to each other. The subject expertise is different, the sources are different, the writing style and story length is different. This is just more SM (sado masochism?) flailing around because it can't meet the lofty profit margins desired by overlord Investcorp, a private equity firm so dumb that it bought the editorial component or an editorial/data company that Thomson was desperate to unload! I knew something was up when they replaced the christmas gala at Gotham Hall with a bagel brunch in the company lunchroom! Thank goodness I was gone by then. Jim Malkin, a nice guy to be sure, spent 16 years prior to Thomson at Holmes Transport, which specializes in moving cargo around. Maybe he's approaching the problem in a similar fashion here, but it won't work. The only reason companies like SM can pay writers so little is the vanity associated with writing for a particular title. E.g., I write for The American Banker (even though I'm underpaid), thank you very much." Who are writers going to say they write for when their work is put all over the place? Where's the status or recognition in that? If writers are going to be treated as data providers, they'll either leave or demand more money. There are plenty of jobs in PR or at places like S&P (though perhaps not for much longer) for writers who just want a fat paycheck. For actual journalists, the platform is part of the deal. Kill the platform and you kill the soul of journalism. Pooled editorial is a joke.

I'm rank & file but we do wonder what is going on. First when we were bought we were going to buy other media companies and nothing has happened. Then we were going to launch new web sites that would change the company. Then we heard about the cube and no-one talks about that anymore. Now we don't have town meetings so nobody really knows what to expect. People would leave but there is no place to go. The company has quietly been shedding jobs for over a year.