Aram Zucker-Scharff

“Ms. Lawrence and the other victims have absolutely nothing to apologize for in terms of the contents of the photos or the nature in which they were leaked. The story itself should not be addressed as if it were a scandal, but rather what it is: A sex crime involving theft of personal property and the exploitation of the female body.”

– Jennifer Lawrence Nude Photo Leak Isn’t A “Scandal.” It’s A Sex Crime.

The newsonomics of Forbes’ real performance and price potential:

Financial documents being shown to potential buyers raise questions about its future growth. Has Forbes peaked? And can it justify the high price it’s seeking?

Forbes’s ‘buzzy’ new content initiatives meant spending $10.9 million to make $11.9 million. 

In reality Forbes is likely worth less than $200 million, regardless of what it expects people to pay. It looks like the innovating financial media giant may end up being another magazine purchased more for it’s respected brand than anything else.

Forbes loses two more bidders:

The ranks of potential suitors for Forbes Media is growing smaller now that German media giant Axel Springer and Spice Global Investments have reportedly dropped out of the bidding. One insider, ho…

Latest estimate of Forbes actual value places it at $120 mil total, far below the asking price of $400 mil and still less than the latest rumored investment of $250 mil. 

For more:

• Rumor Mill Grinds Up Fosun’s Bid.
• Steve Forbes Vows to Keep Stake 
• The Newsonomics of Forbes Real Performance and Price Potential. 
• Bloated Sale Price for Forbes Media. 
• Time Inc. Out of Race for Forbes Media.

With respect to the awesome Ken Doctor who looks at Forbes’s estimates as very optimistic, I’d say that the rapid drop in bidders marks them as nearly delusional.

I strongly suspect, based on my experience in worlds like Forbes UGC machine, that no one bothered to do the math on the cost of people hours to manage BrandVoice and the rest of the freely (or sometimes not so freely) contributed content compared to the earnings on that content. 

Likely, the real issue is that the ROI on the human-hours involved in these UGC projects is in the negatives; leaving Forbes Media to pray that they can sell their pageviews for higher rates, or simply gain more, until they reach scale, something extremely unlikely in the current advertising climate, especially when one considers that not all inventory may end up being filled, a problem Tumblr is quite familiar with.  

Ads can be done the right way or the wrong way. Intrusive, auto-playing videos, gigantic banners that hide content below the fold and “Click here to continue” pages are some examples of what you are about to see.Clipped from thenextweb.comFrom reputable news organizations to gossip magazines, everything is moving online. And to keep the flow […]