Theresa Cramer

Theresa Cramer is the editor of EContent magazine and Intranets newsletter. She is a 10 year veteran of the publishing industry with a background in both newspaper and book publishing. Follow her on Twitter @TheresaCramer.

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Articles by Theresa Cramer


By the time you read this column, Facebook's redesigned Timeline and News Feed will be old news. But as I was casting around for column ideas, I instant messaged my friend Mike--otherwise known as @tech_envy--and asked him what he thought I should write about. I was stuck for ideas. He wanted to talk integration. Specifically, he wanted to talk about the changes to Facebook's look, which would put new emphasis on your activity.
Column/T.0 - Posted May 16, 2013
I'm finally getting around to reading Anna Karenina, thanks to modern technology. Seems odd that a book lover like myself didn't download the year's best-sellers as soon as my iPad showed up, right? Well, here's something even stranger. I used my Amazon app to order the hardcover version of Dennis Lehane's new book, Live by Night, and the paperback version of John Irving's latest, In One Person. It seems a bit sacrilegious, huh?
Column/T.0 - April 2013 Issue, Posted Apr 30, 2013
The textbook market has long been ahead of the rest of the publishing industry when it comes to digital books. Textbooks were a natural fit for e-readers, allowing for easy updates and social studying features, but a recent Springer whitepaper, "eBook Use and Acceptance in an Undergraduate Institution," says the proliferation of devices has not necessarily translated to higher ebook acceptance among college students at Wellesley.
News/News Feature - Posted Apr 10, 2013
As with many software providers, WhatsUpGold has an active userbase that has a lot of questions. And like those other companies, WhatsUpGold often deals with this base of users through social media, such as Twitter and user message boards. However, WhatsUpGold's user forums were not quite up to snuff, and the company found itself looking for a new solution.
Editorial/Case Studies - March 2013 Issue, Posted Mar 27, 2013
Lately, I've been listening to a lot of Marc Maron's WTF. It makes for fascinating conversations, but it's also interesting from an econtent perspective. Maron has used this podcast to reach a whole new generation of fans; he has parlayed this connection into new opportunities in TV and beyond. More importantly, he's not the only comedian taking his act straight to fans.
Column/T.0 - March 2013 Issue, Posted Mar 07, 2013
Cassey Ho is not your average media mogul. She started out as a Pilates instructor, who used the web as a way to engage with her students by posting workout videos on YouTube. Eventually she started blogging as well, and she developed a following. FITNESS magazine named her the Best Healthy Living Blogger of 2012, and Sharecare called her the second most influential online personality. EContent talked to her about how the web enabled her to turn a passion into a career.
News/News Feature - Posted Feb 15, 2013
So many people fear the nefarious use of the data that follows us across the internet, but I was starting to fear that it would just be used incompetently and offer me little to no value. If I'm going to leave a trail of puchase and geolocation information in my wake, I like to know that it's being used to benefit me. And this week, marketing gurus seem to being doing well.
Column/T.0 - Posted Jan 24, 2013
Social media often gets a bad rap as the place where self-involved people go to bore their friends-and sometimes complete strangers--with the mundane details of their day, but recently it helped me save my dog's life.
Column/T.0 - January/February 2013 Issue, Posted Jan 22, 2013
Guy Kawasaki probably needs no introduction, but just for the record, he is the author of 12 books, a former chief evangelist for Apple, and an entrepreneur. He is the co-founder of Alltop.com and a founding partner at Garage Technology Ventures. And now he is an "artisanal publisher." Kawasaki teamed up with Shawn Welch to write and publish APE: Author, Publisher, Entrepreneur. Kawasaki is now a bit of an evangelist for "artisanal publishing" and took the time to answer some of EContent's questions about his book and trends in publishing.
News/News Feature - Posted Jan 21, 2013
I am a notoriously light packer. This is, in part, because airlines charge an arm and a leg to check bags, but it's also just a personality quirk. I don't like clutter in my home, and I don't like packing a huge suitcase for an overnight business trip. I especially dislike dragging a suitcase into a conference with me, so I've become quite adept at fitting everything I need into one -- admittedly large -- purse. But on my last few trips, my laptop has been posing challenges. It works fine, but it's heavy and by the time I board the train home I have an aching back and sore shoulder.
Column/T.0 - Posted Jan 08, 2013
Big Data. Pinterest. Ebooks. Mobile. HTML 5. Open source. The Facebook IPO. Content marketing. I could go on and on, but these are just a few of the terms that started floating through my head when I began thinking about writing my end-of-the-year column.It's hard trying to sum up what's been a big-no- huge year in the digital content world. Depending on your job title, you might think 2012 was the year of Big Data, or the year ebooks finally went mainstream, or the year social media went from being a fun way to kill some time to an essential business tool (but a risky addition to your stock portfolio). And any of those conclusions would be right.
Column/T.0 - December 2012 Issue, Posted Dec 06, 2012
As I write this column, many of my friends are rushing to preorder the iPhone 5 (and by the time this issue publishes, they will no doubt be enjoying a bigger screen and a better Siri--at least for the first week or so). While they were all salivating over the latest and greatest from Apple, I went down to my local wireless store in the middle of the afternoon, walked up to a sales associate, and promptly asked for the 99 cent iPhone 4. Yes, you read that correctly. I did not even bother to fork over the $99 for the 4S.
Column/T.0 - November 2012 Issue, Posted Dec 04, 2012
So, have you seen Facebook Stories yet? I know you've probably heard about it, but have you actually bothered to look at it? No? Let me tell you all about it.It's a fascinating display of the power of social media on people's lives and, to some extent, on journalism. But it's also sort of a genius marketing tool.
Column/T.0 - October 2012 Issue, Posted Oct 30, 2012
Like millions of people up and down the east coast of the United States, I spent Monday night bouncing between my television screen, my window, my iPhone, and my laptop screen. I was lucky enough to keep power until after midnight - though I woke up to a dark house - and so like the rest of the country, I kept tabs on the "Frankenstorm" with the help of multi-media. If your power was out, your mobile device may have been your only connection to the outside world.
Editorial/Commentary - Posted Oct 30, 2012
A while back I entered my dog in GNC's Healthy Pet, Happy Pet Photo Contest on Facebook. I had not previously "liked" GNC, but I did so for the purposes of entering the contest and possibly winning $5,000. I uploaded her picture and filled out a bunch of information. Once I was done, I started sharing the contest with my Facebook friends and family, urging them to vote for Maybelle. This is where the contest went terribly awry. At first, we couldn't actually find my dog. It took about 24 hours before her picture appeared at all. When it finally did show up, I tried sharing the direct link to her profile. But no matter what I did (i.e., grab the link, use the Share button), anyone who clicked on it ended up somewhere other than Maybelle's voting page.
Column/T.0 - September 2012 Issue, Posted Oct 01, 2012
Long before I was in the business of writing about digital content, I was a big fan of digital content. More specifically, I was a fan of Slate. Founded in 1996, the "daily magazine on the web" is practically the grandfather of digital publishing. Backed by The Washington Post Co., Slate has long incorporated the best of traditional journalism with more bloglike sensibilities. From long-form, investigative journalism to quick, breaking news blurbs to Dear Prudie—Slate's answer to Dear Abby—the site seamlessly blends the more familiar aspects of your local newspaper with new media.
Column/T.0 - Posted Aug 28, 2012
Consumers may have been furious (and vocal) about an April settlement that allowed three publishers - HarperCollins, Simon & Schuster, and Hachette - to settle out of court in regards to an antitrust lawsuit brought against several publishers and Apple for allegedly "price-fixing" ebooks, but that doesn't seem to bother the DOJ. Many people who filed comments with the U.S. District Court in New York have criticized the DOJ for essentially giving Amazon a leg up in the ebook market by taking on its competitors.
News/News Feature - Posted Jul 24, 2012
Earlier this year, Hulu held its Best in Show competition. During the first week of voting, the online video site paired up shows and pitted them against one another. Like Weimaraners and border collies in their breed categories at the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show, TV shows such as Misfits and It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia went head to head, with viewers voting for their favorite. Predictably, Always Sunny won that one, but Misfits—a British show that exclusively airs on Hulu in America—is one of my favorite shows. Much like the American Staffordshire terrier, Misfits seems to be misunderstood.
Column/T.0 - June 2012 Issue, Posted Jul 03, 2012
Seth Godin made waves today when, he launched a Kickstarter Campaign for his new book, The Icarus Deception. The goal was to raise $40,000 over the next month or so -- which basically amounts to pre-ordering the book, since backers will get copies of it for their support -- and Godin was able to meet that goal within a few hours. As I write, he's raised nearly $200,000.
News/News Item - Posted Jun 19, 2012
I started making a lot of hiking plans earlier this spring. I'd adopted a dog in January and had been wandering in the woods almost every weekend since. Then a friend of mine emailed me and asked if I'd be interested in section-hiking parts of the Appalachian Trail-specifically the parts that run through Connecticut and Massachusetts. I'd visited a couple of the Connecticut sections last summer, so I was excited to hit some new spots, this time with the dog in tow.
Column/T.0 - May 2012 Issue, Posted May 30, 2012
The brave folks at the Pew Research Center's Internet & America Life Project interviewed 799 teens to get a better understanding of how the kids interact with online video. From April 19- July 14, 2011 the teens were asked about their online behavior, and Pew put the results together in a report published on its website.
News/News Feature - Posted May 04, 2012
I too was once a Pinterest skeptic. I kept getting emails telling me that friends had invited me to the virtual pinboard site, and I kept ignoring them. Eventually, my friends started trying to sway me in person, and I kept saying, "I just don't want to deal with another social media site."Then, one dark and dreary night, I decided to try it out. At first I used it to organize craft ideas for Christmas. Then I started gathering recipes for an onslaught of holiday and birthday parties I had to throw. One thing is for sure: Recipes and crafts are the gateway pins!
Column/T.0 - April 2012 Issue, Posted May 01, 2012
In 2008, Barack Obama turned to the web for everything from campaign fundraising to training volunteers. Now, as the Republican field is finally narrowing down and we move closer to the 2012 election, Conductor, Inc. is taking a look at the web-habits of the candidates. The study suggests Mitt Romney -- the Republican frontrunner -- has a steep hill to climb to win the battle for voter attention as November nears...at least online.
News/News Feature - Posted Apr 18, 2012
Have you ever had the pleasure of walking into a production editor's office in a major publishing house? No? Well, you're missing out. It usually resembles an episode of Hoarders. Picture this: Stacks of paper teeter perilously around a desk while a stressed-out individual sits behind an ancient desk, washed out by fluorescent light bulbs. Hundreds if not thousands of books line the shelves, and if you're really lucky, you'll spot the ancient artifact referred to as a Fuji ... yes, like the film. A Fuji is a plastic sleeve filled with (hopefully) the final version of a cover sent by the printer for approval.
Column/T.0 - March 2012 Issue, Posted Mar 27, 2012
Sometimes it may seem like everyone has a blog, but a new study from Percussion Software says that isn't quite true. "The Paradox of Blogging and Content Marketing," focuses on the rise of content marketing as a discipline and the use of blogging as an engagement platform, and its finding suggest that while many companies know blogging is an important marketing tool, they just aren't on board.
News/News Feature - Posted Mar 07, 2012
From People magazine's "Sexiest Man Alive" to Esquire magazine's "Sexiest Woman Alive," readers sure do love them some lists! It's a well-documented fact. If you throw a numbered list into your publication or onto your website, it's like catnip for your audience. (It doesn't hurt if you also throw a shirtless Bradley Cooper on the cover either.) As a result, editors like myself have to produce these things.
Column/T.0 - January/February 2012 Issue, Posted Feb 28, 2012
We all know Twitter is a powerful tool, but many publishers aren't sure how to build goodwill while still promoting their own content. Here are a few quick tips for publishers looking to implement a simple social media strategy that doesn't give community short shrift while building traffic and brand awareness.
News/News Feature - Posted Jan 11, 2012
A few days before the wedding, I found myself sitting with my laptop searching YouTube for makeup tips. In a matter of seconds, I'd found exactly what I was looking for. I discovered a channel called The MakeUpChair With Sineady Cady (she has a really lovely accent, and the videos are worth watching just to hear her). Sineady is a young makeup artist living in Ireland, who uses a blog and her YouTube channel to promote her brand and find new clients. Her email address is posted right there on the channel, so if you're looking for someone to do your makeup for a special day, you can shoot her a message.
Column/T.0 - December 2011 Issue, Posted Dec 27, 2011
On Wednesday morning, HBO co-president Eric Kessler told a group of industry wonks that despite the success of digital offerings like HBO GO, it plans to remain true to its cable roots.
News/News Feature - Posted Dec 02, 2011
I recently jumped on the Mad Men bandwagon. That Jon Hamm sure is handsome, and boy oh boy, did they smoke a lot. There's plenty to gawk at-and cringe at-on that show. The sexism. The debauchery. All those pregnant ladies hitting the bottle and smoking up a storm. As I watch--floating somewhere between awe and disgust--the goings-on of Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce have got me pondering the modern business of advertising.
Column/T.0 - November 2011 Issue, Posted Nov 29, 2011
In 2008, Rafat Ali sold ContentNext media--the company behind paidContent.org--to UK-based Guardian News and Media, Co. for a reported $30 million. He left the company in 2010, and now Guardian is looking for a buyer for the property. Based in New York City, the company covers the business of digital media, serving decision makers within the media, entertainment, publishing, advertising, marketing, and technology sectors.
News/News Feature - Posted Nov 22, 2011
My family has a long history with the border town of Laredo, Texas. As a child my mother moved around a lot along with her six older siblings, as part of an Air Force family. Laredo just happened to be one of the towns that stuck. Two of my aunts and one of my uncles still call it home, along with their families. As a born and bred New Englander, it's pretty much another planet to me.
Column/T.0 - Posted Nov 19, 2011
If you pre-ordered a Kindle Fire, you better be sure to check your mailbox today. This morning Amazon announced that the new members of its Kindle family will ship to buyers early. The Kindle Touch and Kindle Touch 3G will head out to early buyers beginning tomorrow, November 15, several days earlier than the previously announced November 21 shipping date. Perhaps more notably, the Kindle Fire will head out a day early. This comes on the heels of last week's "leaked" announcement that Barnes & Noble would be introducing the Nook Tablet and making it available in stores on November 17.
News/News Feature - Posted Nov 14, 2011
In a recent Q3 earnings report and call with shareholders, AOL CEO Tim Armstrong was positive, stressing the benefits of the company's acquisition of The Huffington Post and the success of its local news network AOL Patch-which the company hopes to expand from 500 sites to 1,000 sites.
News/News Feature - Posted Nov 02, 2011
According to comScore, the U.S. mobile social media audience grew by 37% over the past year, a significant increase by anyone's standards. It seems only logical that smartphone users access social media more regularly--after all, they aren't paying those high fees for data plans just to read the occasional email. But what does it really mean?
News/News Feature - Posted Oct 28, 2011
For the past week or two I've been dealing with friends and family clamoring for the iPhone 4S. One friend called me from her new phone to tell me all about the ridiculous and hilarious conversations she has with Siri. Apparently, if you threaten to buy an Android phone, it will yell at you. In light of all the "I will destroy Android" coverage the Steve Jobs biography has been receiving, I like to think of him showing up in the Siri labs with a smirk on his face, suggesting his programmers make Siri share his hatred of Droid phones.
News/News Feature - Posted Oct 24, 2011
With newsrooms shrinking, journalists need somewhere to peddle their wares. But needs don't generally go unmet in the digital age. Enter MediaCooler. In a Q&A with Journalism.co.uk the CEO of Media Cooler, Alison Yesilcimen, describes the site this way: "It's an online content market place that allows professional journalists to showcase and sell features and columns to global publications."
News/News Feature - Posted Oct 19, 2011
Much like the average American family farm, it seems like content farms may be struggling -- if this week's news about Demand Media is any indicator. One of the biggest and most well-known mass producers of content on the web is cutting back the number of articles it produces, and enraged its freelancers in the process.
News/News Feature - Posted Oct 12, 2011
Much like print publishers have stood by and watched their customer base dwindle as the web took over, cable companies have been watching as their customers found new alternatives to shelling out hundreds of dollars for the privelege of watching The Jersey Shore. Accounts vary, but so far "cord-cutters" have represented a relatively small drop off in revenues. As internet connected TVs become more popular and a whole new generation of kids come out of college without any intention of ever getting a cable hook-up, smart pay-TV providers are looking for new ways to offer their consumers value.
News/News Feature - Posted Oct 10, 2011
It is autumn in New England-my most beloved time of year. Apple fritters, harvest festivals, and all sorts of baked goods covered in cinnamon: These are a few of my favorite things. Outside the EContent office windows the leaves are turning, and inside there's plenty of change afoot. Yep, 2011 has been a year of reimagining for us, and it's all starting to come to fruition.
Column/T.0 - October 2011 Issue, Posted Oct 10, 2011
I have fallen under the spell of one of the most sinister forces in the digital universe. Yes, I'm talking about Angry Birds. I managed to avoid the birds' pull for a long time. In fact, I refused to even download the game until the rest of the world had more or less stopped incessantly talking and tweeting about it. I mean, how great could one game be?
Column/T.0 - Posted Sep 26, 2011
When I graduated from college and moved into my first place with two roommates, it was months before we decided to get cable. We used rabbit ears to get the basic channels. The images were fuzzy, but it was enough to watch the Red Sox games and Gilmore Girls. That was all we needed, because we spent most of our free time sitting around the kitchen table playing UNO and drinking cheap beer anyway. Now I'm down to zero roommates and back to no cable. Yes, I've cut the cord, so to speak.
Column/T.0 - Posted Aug 29, 2011
During a trip down to the Information Today, Inc. offices, I listened to one of my favorite new-to-me podcasts: the Slate Audio Book Club. It's been a long time since I was in a literature class where I argued the merits of Toni Morrison's Beloved or gushed about To Kill a Mockingbird, and I miss it. Moreover, I loved the convenience of using what could have been a tedious 3-hour car trip to let the folks at Slate tackle David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest for me because I just don't know if I have that kind of reading stamina.
Column/T.0 - June 2011 Issue, Posted Jun 06, 2011
I have a not-so-secret secret. I like to write fiction and hope to someday write the great American novel, leave behind my glamorous life as a technology journalist, and retreat to the woods of New Hampshire to become a Salinger-esque recluse. Of course, that little confession could have been made by just about anyone who makes his or her living as a writer of any sort. But wait … I am, as aforementioned, a technology journalist! Shouldn't I be leaving the fuddy-duddy world of publishing behind and hawking my works of literary genius on the web?
Column/T.0 - May 2011 Issue, Posted May 16, 2011
I've been reserving comment on The Daily - the world's first daily newspaper for tablets, brought to you by Rupert Murdoch and News Corp. - because I am having trouble truly deciding what I think about it. As a technology journalist, the concept fascinates me. The iPad was, after all, said to be the publishing industry's savior. As a reader, though, I wasn't all that interested.
Column/T.0 - April 2011 Issue, Posted Apr 04, 2011
The winds of change are blowing-and not just through the EContent office. Sure, I've moved my desk into Michelle's old office, gotten a new view, and taken on a whole new set of responsibilities, but that's not what I'm talking about. No, this past holiday season I headed out to buy an iPod nano as a gift for my brother.
Column/T.0 - March 2011 Issue, Posted Mar 01, 2011
At the very time that library budgets were being slashed, demand for the services provided by these institutions was increasing in the communities they served. Libraries have had to reprioritize and get creative with budgets. A new study called "Funding and Priorities: The Library Resource Guide Benchmark Study On 2011 Library Spending Plans" takes a look at how these pressures are manifesting in all types of libraries across the country. Produced by the Library Resource Guide (LRG) in conjunction with Unisphere Research, the market research division of Information Today, Inc (ITI), research was conducted in October and November 2010 among libraries listed in ITI's American Library Directory.
News/News Feature - Posted Feb 15, 2011
Every once in awhile a story comes along that allows us to see how the wonders of modern technology can help us better understand and preseve our past. One such story hit the wire back in December when Gale, a part of Cengage Learning and McMaster University announced an agreement that allowed Gale to digitize McMaster University's collection of materials related to the Holocaust, propaganda, and the Jewish underground resistance movement during World War II.
News/News Feature - January/February 2011 Issue, Posted Feb 07, 2011
All eyes are on Las Vegas this week as the shiny, new tech toys for 2011 are being unveiled at International CES, held January 6-9. One company launching its products at the show is Live Editions, which provides a range of professional digital publishing products and services that let publishers and information-intensive organizations publish rich, interactive multimedia ebooks or "live editions." The company debuted its products at the Lunch at Piero's media event January 6 and 7."Our solutions enable our clients to repurpose their content by automatically transforming documents into interactive enhanced ePubs, creating new revenue opportunities and leverage their existing content assets," says co-founder Eric Kmiec.
News/News Feature - Posted Jan 06, 2011
The Madison Avenue of the Mad Men era is long gone. Gone are the days of Don Draper and the simple, catchy jingles of yesteryear. Advertising is a much more complicated business these days, with savvy customers, multi-channel campaigns, and global markets.
News/News Feature - Posted Nov 09, 2010
Empowered: Unleash Your Employees, Energize Your Customers, and Transform Your Business; I Live in the Future & Here's How It Works: Why Your World, Work, and Brain Are Being Creatively Disrupted; What's Mine Is Yours: The Rise of Collaborative Consumption
Editorial/eReader - November 2010 Issue, Posted Nov 03, 2010
Sometimes it can be easy to forget just how broad the term "publishers" can be, but attending the MarkLogic Digital Publishing Summit 2010 on October 28 was a great reminder. Publishers come in all shapes and sizes: From book publishers to legal publishers to app builders, publishing is a diverse, if sometimes floundering, industry.
News/News Feature - Posted Nov 02, 2010
Social search is still so new, it can sometimes be hard to get experts to agree on what it is or, more importantly, what it has the potential to be. As even major search engines such as Google and Yahoo! offer social search results and new specialized tools pop up, the face of search may just be changing forever.
News/News Feature - November 2010 Issue, Posted Oct 27, 2010
For almost as long as there have been books, there have been authors trying to get their manuscripts in front of an acquisitions editor. Today, there are many roads that can lead writers to professional publication. While the destination is often the same, new routes are emerging all the time.
Editorial/Feature - October 2010 Issue, Posted Oct 13, 2010
Like so many other organizations, Fort Smith and the National Parks Service (NPS) are trying to figure out how to engage a new, digitally oriented generation that would be just as content watching Old Faithful erupt on a web cam as actually visit Yellowstone National Park. With money tight everywhere, engaging this new generation of park visitors had to be done inexpensively. In this case, QR codes seemed to be the answer.
Editorial/Case Studies - October 2010 Issue, Posted Oct 06, 2010
App Savvy: Turning Ideas into iPhone and iPad Apps Customers Really Want; Attention! This Book Will Make You Money: How to Use Attention-Getting Online Marketing to Increase Your Revenue; MicroMarketing: Get Big Results by Thinking and Acting Small
Editorial/eReader - October 2010 Issue, Posted Oct 01, 2010
For the past few years, one could hardly turn on the television or open a newspaper without hearing about healthcare reform or the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA). Outsell's David Bousfield has taken a deeper look at how content companies can use one to improve the other in his report "Growth Trends in the Market for Clinical Decision Support Tools."
News/News Feature - October 2010 Issue, Posted Sep 27, 2010
UnMarketing: Stop Marketing. Start Engaging; Good Faith Collaboration: The Culture of Wikipedia; Marketing Lessons from the Grateful Dead: What Every Business Can Learn from the Most Iconic Band in History
Editorial/eReader - September 2010 Issue, Posted Sep 01, 2010
If you're not lucky enough to live in a town with a truly good local newspaper, you're missing out. I'm not just talking about a regional daily, either. No, I'm talking about the little weeklies churned out by hardworking folks who spend more time at town meetings than the average person can bear.
Column/Guest Columns - Posted Aug 24, 2010
I am one of those millions of people you're always hearing about who have abandoned traditional cable television and started using the internet for all my viewing needs. Between my Roku box and laptop there isn't much I can't watch when and how I want-with the exception of some live sporting events, for which I frequent my local sports bar. So, I consider myself a bit of an online video connoisseur.
Column/Guest Columns - Posted Jul 27, 2010
On May 4, The Wall Street Journal reported that Google planned to begin selling ebooks in June or July with the introduction of the Google Editions. However, in an already crowded and chaotic ebook market, one has to wonder where Google will fit in.
News/News Feature - July/August 2010 Issue, Posted Jul 02, 2010
Less than one month after the May 12 introduction of its Real Real-Time ID Service, a platform for real-time identification of business web traffic, Demandbase, Inc. has announced the product's first significant integration partnership. Demandbase and LivePerson Inc., a provider of online engagement solutions that facilitate real-time assistance and expert advice, are teaming up to provide a new application on the LivePerson Business Application Platform that combines real-time business identification with Web chat.
News/News Item - Posted Jun 08, 2010
While certain segments of the economy are rebounding, the content industry has continued to struggle to get back on its feet. With that in mind, many of the top executives from companies across the content spectrum gathered on April 18-20 at the 11th annual Buying & Selling eContent conference in Arizona to discuss Reigniting the Content Economy.
News/News Feature - June 2010 Issue, Posted May 19, 2010
While the U.S. military saw the potential that social networking tools held, its privacy concerns surpassed those of even the most secretive company. After all, broadcasting the status of your top-secret project to a LinkedIn network could have truly disastrous consequences. So when the DoD started thinking about how it could use these Web 2.0 tools to enable communication within the military community, it was that clear that widely used public-facing tools were not going to work for its unique needs.
Editorial/Case Studies - April 2010 Issue, Posted Apr 09, 2010
I am addicted to National Public Radio (NPR). Ask anyone here at the EContent office: there is a near-constant stream of talk-radio coming from my desk. It always gets me thinking, but one day, during a pledge drive, I heard a particularly interesting claim: NPR is one of the few news outlets continuing to grow. Since we here at EContent spend a lot of time thinking and writing about the fee vs. free debate, I couldn't help but wonder what member-supported NPR was doing so right that they convinced listeners to voluntarily give them money for what is essentially a free service.
Column/Guest Columns - Posted Apr 08, 2010
Nothing is free ... usually. But from March 15 to April 15, Alacra is offering free, unlimited access to its updated PulsePro, a configurable desktop and mobile solution that detects key business events from 3,000 hand-curated news feeds and blogs, extracting business intelligence in near-real time and delivering it to users.
News/News Feature - April 2010 Issue, Posted Mar 16, 2010
Socialtext announced the 4.0 iteration of its enterprise social software platform on Wednesday, March 3, including some major additions and updates. The latest version brings enterprise customers many of the tools that users of public social networking tools have become accustomed to, yet with the needed structure and security companies require.
News/News Feature - Posted Mar 05, 2010
Speakers at the Information Industry Summit (IIS) held in New York, Jan. 26-27, agreed about one thing: Content providers can survive. However, everyone seemed to have a different idea about how.
News/News Feature - March 2010 Issue, Posted Feb 22, 2010
In the spring of 2009, Anne Zafian, VP, deputy publisher, children's books, says Simon & Schuster found itself with a "bestselling paranormal young adult series, The Mortal Instruments, by Cassandra Clare, whose sales we wanted to support and grow into the summer and beyond." More important, Zafian had a specific target audience in mind: "This is a paranormal series with lots of crossover appeal to adults, and we wanted to specifically target that crossover audience and to incrementally build Cassandra's audience."
Editorial/Case Studies - January/February 2010 Issue, Posted Jan 29, 2010
In late November, news broke that Murdoch was reportedly in talks with Microsoft to negotiate a deal in which the giant media conglomerate would pull or deindex its content from Google-keeping the search giant from crawling its content and making it exclusively available to Bing. Unfortunately, the major players are not going on the record regarding this controversial speculation. And if you believe the blogosphere, the whole thing might just be a bluff.
News/News Feature - Posted Jan 20, 2010
It's no secret that "cloud computing" is fast becoming one of 2010's hottest buzzwords. With this in mind, Alfresco, an open source enterprise content management system provider, announced on Tuesday, January 12, the company the availability of Alfresco Enterprise Edition 3.2 - the new features of which focus largely on cloud capability.
News/News Feature - Posted Jan 15, 2010
This year's Enterprise Search Summit West was a bit different than previous years; aligned closely with the co-located KMWorld program, the more streamlined conference allowed search-focused attendees to take full advantage of the three day event or to maximize their knowledge seeking across the larger KMWorld conference.
News/News Feature - Posted Nov 24, 2009
When the Rhode Island School of Design began populating its website with video content, problems began to arise. The videos were isolated from each other and difficult to manage. It quickly became clear that RISD needed a video platform solution to manage its content, and the school turned to Brightcove for help.
Editorial/Case Studies - October 2009 Issue, Posted Oct 07, 2009
Small- and medium-sized businesses' data needs are rarely in line with their budgetary realities - especially if they have their eye on expansion. In order to target smaller-scale companies ready to test enterprise-level functionality without committing to a solution suited to large corporations, Kapow Technologies has teamed up with StrikeIron, Inc. to create Kapow Web Data Services 7.0.0, the latest version of its web data service technology that's priced on a flexible per-use and volume basis.
News/News Feature - Posted Oct 02, 2009
Business & Legal Reports (BLR) is making a change, albeit a subtle one. Now known as Business & Legal Resources, the company is, like so many others, realizing the value of its online business and making the changes needed to beef it up-which includes a website overhaul and a rebranding as of Sept. 22 that will highlight more than a year of strategic content initiatives.
News/News Feature - October 2009 Issue, Posted Sep 25, 2009
Everybody is doing it: "tweeting," that is. Yet like so many other things that are all the rage, Twitter has a bit of a dark side. No, I'm not talking about users who detail their entire day via the microblogging site. Recently, concerns about hacking and "maltweets" have plagued users of the popular free social networking site and others.
News/News Feature - September 2009 Issue, Posted Sep 01, 2009
The conflict between publishers and search engines heated up once again when disgruntled publishers put Europe's media commissioner, Viviane Reding, on notice last month. Publishers from across the continent got organized and signed the "Hamburg Declaration Regarding Intellectual Property Rights" at a meeting of the European Publishers' Council and the World Association of Newspapers on June 26. This is just the latest in a string of complaints from publishers about search engines making money off the work of others. However, it has once again brought up the all-important question: How do publishers get their web content in front of readers without losing out on monetizing opportunities?
News/News Feature - Posted Jul 21, 2009
Whether it's the Seattle Post-Intelligencer giving up the printed ghost and going all-digital or the Rocky Mountain News going out of business, the world of journalism has been in a constant state of flux lately. As media giants such as News Corp. CEO Rupert Murdoch reconsider the possibility of making users pay for content, there are emerging solution providers, such as Journalism Online, LLC, that hope to make the task of monetizing content easier for content providers and consumers alike.
News/News Feature - July/August 2009 Issue, Posted Jul 16, 2009
Founded in 1979, Whitelaw Twining is a Vancouver, Canada-based boutique law corporation. The firm is highly specialized, with about 25 lawyers focused on litigating for customers in the insurance and construction industries. Because of the firm's highly specialized nature, it is fairly large, with about 15,000 open cases.
Editorial/Case Studies - June 2009 Issue, Posted Jun 08, 2009
If you've been in the market for a new web content management system lately, you may have found yourself overwhelmed by the plethora of choices. There seems to be a never ending list of companies who can satisfy your every need, and each one claims to do it better than the next. Sitecore hopes to set itself apart from the competition with its newest offering, released June 2, the Sitecore Online Marketing Suite.
News/News Feature - Posted Jun 02, 2009
Hartford, Conn., may be well-known for its insurance companies, but on April 24, the Hartford Business Journal brought people from across the business spectrum together at itse-Technology Summit and 2009 Strateg-e Awards to talk about growing their businesses through the use of (surprise, surprise) technology. Gathered together in South Windsor, Conn., attendees spent the day learning about everything from how to set up a corporate blog to the legal concerns that blogs might raise.
News/News Feature - June 2009 Issue, Posted May 28, 2009
Most of the country has been looking at President Obama's stimulus package and wondering just what's in it for them. Among the millions of people wondering what economic relief might come their way are researchers—people whose success, and sometimes their jobs, rely on government funding. With $10 billion earmarked for the NIH and another $3 billion of stimulus funds set aside for the National Science Foundation, researchers will be scrambling to compete for the highly sought-after funds.
News/News Feature - May 2009 Issue, Posted Apr 30, 2009
It would have been hard to avoid news of Autonomy's acquisition of Interwoven last month. In some cases of acquisition or merger, things go dark for a long time, leaving consumers to wonder what is happening with affected products. Not so Autonomy. On Thursday, April 2, though, the company announced that the company's flagship document management solution for the legal market, iManage WorkSite (previously known as Interwoven WorkSite), is now powered by Autonomy's Intelligent Data Operating Layer (IDOL). This represents the third major product integration since the acquisition, with IDOL already having been teamed up with Interwoven TeamSite and iManage Universal Search.
News/News Feature - Posted Apr 03, 2009
Endeca announced the McKinley release of its Information Access Platform yesterday, Monday, March 23. The company says the new platform is an enterprise search innovation based on a fundamentally new architecture for building standards-based search applications. The new platform wasn't the only release, though. The company separately announced the release of the Endeca Commerce Suite and the Endeca Publishing Suite.
News/News Item - Posted Mar 24, 2009
Ross Mayfield, chairman, president, and co-founder of Socialtext—a provider of Web 2.0 solutions for the enterprise and other organizations—heard the news about massive layoffs at companies across the country. But unlike many of us, he was in a position to help.
News/News Feature - April 2009 Issue, Posted Mar 20, 2009
Elsevier, a global healthcare and scientific publisher, announced the four finalists chosen in the first Elsevier Grand Challenge on Jan. 6. The competition invited researchers to prototype tools dealing with the ever-increasing amount of online life sciences information. With cash prizes of $35,000 for first place and $15,000 for second, the winners have quite a bit at stake. Finalists will move on to present their solutions for the judges via webinar at the Experimental Biology conference in April.
News/News Feature - March 2009 Issue, Posted Feb 25, 2009
An idea that has been years in the making will finally come to fruition at the ALA Midwinter Conference, Jan. 23-26, in Denver. A new, online open access journal called Collaborative Librarianship will see its inaugural issue be released to the public at the conference; and it should be no surprise that working together is at the heart of this project.
News/News Feature - January/February 2009 Issue, Posted Jan 23, 2009
On Tuesday, January 20--while the rest of the country was glued to their television and computer screens, watching an historic inauguration--MarkLogic, provider of XML servers, announced two new offerings. Like President Obama's inaugural address, MarkLogic's Connector for SharePoint and free Toolkit for Word seem to have been shaped, at least in part, by the struggling economy.
News/News Feature - Posted Jan 23, 2009
Take a closer look at Autonomy Corp., one of the 12 companies that inspired the most banter among the EContent 100 judges during the voting process.
Editorial/Feature - December 2008 Issue, Posted Dec 01, 2008
If you're tired of watching video after video online, only to realize halfway through that it is not what you were looking for, then an Israeli company called Taboola may be just what you've been looking for. After three years in development, including one year of limited release with selected partners, Taboola announced on November 18 the official launch of its ViDiscovery, Taboola Analytics, and DiscoverAd offerings--as well as $4.5 million in second round funding, led by Evergreen Venture Partners.
News/News Feature - Posted Nov 25, 2008
President Bush signed The Prioritizing Resources and Organization for Intellectual Property Act of 2008 (PRO-IP) into law on October 13. The act is designed to give the government more leverage in pursuing pirated or counterfeit media software, and pharmaceutical drugs. The act also creates an IP enforcement coordinator—or IP czar—position to oversee and enforce the new, strengthened laws.
News/News Feature - Posted Oct 21, 2008
It seems that everyone is blogging these days. However, despite the proliferation of blogs that range from diaries and niche subjects to celebrity, corporate, and expertly written blogs, some publishers are still hesitant to add blogging to the mix. The web has opened up a world of communication to people across the globe, but the new culture of user-generated content can mean a lot of things to those in the publishing industry, good and bad.
News/News Feature - November 2008 Issue, Posted Oct 10, 2008
Can't find video about the latest news without searching dozens of websites? Are you sick of sitting through 5 minutes of an audio clip just to hear the 30 seconds you're interested in? These problems could be things of the past. Last February, Massachusetts-based EveryZing announced the debut of its ezSEO and ezSEARCH, designed to make audio and video content more searchable on the web. In October the company will launch its new media player, hoping to go a step further and change the way users interact with multimedia content.
News/News Feature - October 2008 Issue, Posted Sep 22, 2008
New York is hoping a partnership with Trafficland might help clean up the state's skies and will conduct a one-year investigation into the energy and environmental benefits of improving the delivery of traffic video information to the public.
News/News Feature - Posted Aug 26, 2008
When one thinks about the attacks of 9/11, and the ensuing national security hysteria, anthrax scares, and the impact it all has had on daily life and our government, the first thing that comes to mind probably is not the workings of the United States Copyright Office. Yet the effects of this tragedy resonate throughout the nation and into every aspect of our government activities.A lot of attention has been paid to the restructuring of the FBI and CIA, but the Copyright Office has also undergone a major overhaul as a result of that infamous day. On July 1, 2008, the Copyright Office (USCO) went public with the eCO (Electronic Copyright Office) after beta testing the system for about a year, and the all new FormCO, as part of a major overhaul of its system. These developments are, in many respects, a result of changes in Washington, D.C., following the anthrax scares of 2001, says David J. Christopher, associate COO at the USCO.
News/News Feature - Sept 2008 Issue, Posted Aug 18, 2008
Attivio's Embedded Active Intelligence Engine (AIE) search engine was specifically designed from the ground up for the OEM Search market. The 1.2 version made its debut earlier this week with a few big changes, query-side JOIN, real-time processing with alerting, comprehensive connectivity and language support, and enhanced user experience with easy navigation. This version also marks Attivio's move from strictly-OEM into the direct-to-enterprise market.
News/News Feature - Posted Aug 01, 2008