Digital Breakfast NYC 2007

I am planning to launch a breakfast series this year called, for now, Digital Breakfast. The idea is to pull together people from the worlds of media, advertising, technology and finance who have a personal and professional interest in the future of media.

I am putting this together under the auspices of my new media marketing/pr firm, Gotham Media Ventures, and each month we plan to host an invite with a keynote or panel. The event is modeled after the First Amendment Breakfasts that I produced for many years for the Columbia School of Journalism.

There will be no charge for the events, but they will be by invitation. We plan to pull together a diverse group and generate some great conversation and presentations. I am in the process of pulling together a group of advisors and sponsors, and am soliciting the participation of anyone who wants in. I'm looking forward to this!

Fox Business
It looks like the Fox News business channel may finally become a reality. The holdup since the idea was first floated in 2004 was acquiring adequate distribution. That has now happened in the critical NYC market and Time Warner will be carrying the channel on its system, beginning probably beginning mid-year.

Crain's NY reports that it's part of a four point deal. Included are re-transmission of Fox owned and operated stations, carriage of the new business channel, carriage of Fox Reality Channel, and an extension of the Fox News contract. It's a great deal for Fox, apprently. They will receive 75 cents per subscriber, up from a current 25 cent per subscriber level. The new business channel will be priced at 15 cents.

The online finance space is getting extremely hot. News literally just came to me that Yahoo! will be offering a personal finance vertical on its site. That from Media Post. This seems like a vertical with lots of room for expansion.

Social Media News Releases
There's a lot of controversy in PR about what are being termed social media news releases. These seem essentially to be electronic press releases with lots of links, graphics, widgets, etc. I may be missing something, but I don't see what the big deal is. It seems like a useful tool, but hardly revolutionary.

In a related developed PRNewswire and Technorati announced an alliance of sorts this week. They have entered into an agreement whereby you will be able to connect directly from an electronic press release to the blogosphere to see what people are saying about the press release. It is a marriage of sorts between traditional pr and new media. Will it be a happy marriage? I guess it depends on what people are saying about you press release in blogland.

It seems a bit dangerous to me in that the company or firm issuing the release essentially loses control over the message. Granted, people can always look it up for themselves, but it's an extra step or two that you have to be willing (and know how) to take.