New York Times Trying To Abuzz Again?

errrr





<i play around every day>

Journalists swarmed Times execs when The New York Times Co. bought About.com. Here, the About.com head tells his side, dispelling Guide compensation myths and explaining just how tough it would be to duplicate the site.
By Mark Glaser
Posted: 2005-03-07

This didn't happen when Dow Jones bought MarketWatch. It didn't happen when the Washington Post bought Slate. But when The New York Times Co. bought About.com from Primedia for $410 million, some pundits were quick to criticize the Times for overpaying for a property they deemed easy to duplicate. About.com has a hoard of 500 freelance "Guides" who write a series of blog posts and articles on everything from Children's Books to Day Trading.
When the Times announced the purchase, Web usability expert Jakob Nielsen wrote in to PressThink's Jay Rosen: "The real secret of About.com is that they have figured out a way to get 500 domain experts to work for peanuts, in return for the exalted status as 'Guides.' But the NY Times could probably have done that on its own by throwing a little prestige and a few thousand dollars at the top bloggers in each of the targeted areas they wanted to cover. Somebody who already has a prestigious brand could duplicate About.com in a year for less than $50 million. And anybody could do it in two years for $150 million."

And Poynter's Online News mailing list lit up with new media types aghast at the purchase. Adam Gaffin, executive editor of Network World Fusion, told me off the list that he did see some merit to the move as adding traffic and ad inventory for the Times. But still, Gaffin couldn't help himself in an e-mail to me: "Are they out of their frickin' minds? They're paying $410 million dollars for a bunch of Weblogs! And in 2005, no less! Yes, it takes time to build up a brand and the resulting page views. But Nick Denton shows how it's possible to do it in a fraction of the time it took About.com at a fraction of the cost. Imagine Denton set loose with, oh, only $100 million."

While Rosen and others talked to Martin Nisenholtz at the Times, few reporters bothered to directly ask About.com what they thought -- even as they were in the eye of the storm. (Forbes.com senior editor Penelope Patsuris says About.com was not willing to talk after the sale, referring her to the New York Times.) I talked to both the current CEO of About.com, Peter Horan, as well as a former editor, Gian Trotta, who both filled me in on the history of the site and its current incarnation.

Trotta, who now is managing the Web presence for Infinity Radio's WCBS 880 AM in New York, told me that About.com wasn't originally run by content people and that the Guides did work for very little compensation in the early days -- except for stock options.

"I went nuts trying to teach the Guides grammar and journalism," Trotta said. "The real key is not that the Guides weren't necessarily great journalists, but they had in-depth knowledge of the off- and online facets of their subject areas and were able to present it in a way that engaged, informed, empowered and entertained their audiences over a consistent level, much as bloggers aspire to do now. It also didn't hurt that About's first marketing director Victoria Bianchini was especially skilled at teaching viral marketing."

While the Guides now use a Weblog format for some of their entries, they land somewhere in between unsupervised bloggers and polished journalists, having some editorial oversight and the backing of About.com's brand name. But the site has a history of using intrusive advertising from pop-ups to poorly demarcated sponsored sections. And don't get me started on the quicksand of navigation ...

Primedia brought in Horan as CEO of About.com in December 2003, after he had headed DevX.com and had worked in the business side at tech trade publisher IDG. Horan, 50, helped optimize the site for search engines, just as the online advertising market started to explode. About.com was in the sweet spot of covering niche, targeted subjects right as targeted advertising and paid search ads swept the Net.

"If the Times and other folks that were in the [buyout] process really thought that they could recreate [About.com] that easily, they would not be stepping up to pay a premium," Horan said.

The following is an edited transcript of my interview with Horan over the phone and e-mail, as he explained the editorial process -- and compensation -- of Guides, while giving ample reasons why the Times got its money's worth.

Given who's in charge here, I still think of A2K as an Abuzz spinoff. Better run, true, but ultimately inspired by the original.

It is so strange how life goes on. At one point I was heartsick about Abuzz. Now I couldn't care less. I think that a lot has got to do with the fact that many of my Abuzz cronies are still around on A2K!