I love soap operas. Especially online soap operas. I get some of my best ideas from watching people go at it in drama. This is old news from the Arts Beat Section of The New York Times. A few months old actually, and it involves Publisher’s Weekly. One Sara Nelson, formerly the editor-in-chief of PW, had — notice the past tense — been laid off in a very ”quick” restructuring by Reed Business Information. What does this mean? Well, perhaps you should read for yourself. Better yet, just fast-forward to the comments by some of the smelliest people you’ll ever meet. Yes, grown adults with money and living on Lexington Ave. or Penthouse Duplexes do this kind of stuff, too.
Top Editor at Publisher’s Weekly is Laid Off:
http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/01/26/top-editor-at-publishers-weekly-is-laid-off/
Cited from the Times, and in italics below…
Such nonsense being spouted in these comments….
Speaking as a long-time member of the publishing industry, PW ceased to be relevant, important, or even interesting years ago (for the last several years, most editors and agents I know haven’t bothered to give it more than a very occasional and cursory glance), and Sara Nelson did nothing to turn it around. Publishers stopped advertising in PW because there was ZERO return on investment.The big accounts (who now generate the vast majority of sales) don’t read PW to get the scoop on what publishers are planning so why pay to advertise to gain the attention of the few remaining independent bookstores, when you’ll never recoup the cost of the ad in increased sales?
Nelson was an industry joke, as indeed is the whole magazine, which was outpaced many years ago by PublishersMarketplace.com as the primary source for industry news and information. I’m sorry for the few remaining fans out there, but the publishing industry (which is, after all, ostensibly the audience for this trade rag) wouldn’t even notice if the magazine stopped publishing tomorrow. — what magazine?
OR:
To What Magazine,
Even though you are a “long-time member of the publishing industry” you should avoid speaking for others. I’m guessing you work in some ancillary department. Or perhaps you are a freelancer. Or perhaps Sara Nelson once was mean to you in high school.
In the publishing company I work for we all read PW; Sara Nelson had a great persective on the industry and she was often quoted (as the voice of reason) in articles in other periodicals. It really is a shock and a shame that she was let go.
— sparky
AND:
Hi sparky, no, actually I’m a senior editor at one of the major houses.
Sara’s perspective alone–which in any event I found more often risible than “great”–hardly makes a magazine worth buying, and more importantly, advertising in, and PW offered very little else. What do you read it for? Industry news? It was long ago superseded by a combination of Pub Lunch and PW Daily so that no actual industry news has been broken in the print magazine for years. Bestseller lists? Also easily available and rarely relevant. Reviews? My publicity dept circulates the PW reviews of our books, which are occasionally useful, but again, it’s been years since a starred review in PW was a crucial buzz generator for a new book. Blogs long ago usurped that function and now the PW reviews just serve as back-cover blurb copy. Oh, everyone at my house subscribes to it for the sake of appearances, but I’ve noticed that it languishes ignored in in-boxes week after week…. — what magazine?
THEN MY FAVORITE:
Effective immediately, the entire book-publishing industry will be converted to an avatar-based Internet game. Players will be free to barter or swap their unlimited return credits for all kinds of virtual merchandise, non-existent employment opportunities, ersatz promotions, expense-accounted lunches, and even sexual favors. The object of the game is to eliminate as many as your competitors in as short a time as possible through vicious gossip, byzantine corporate reorgs and downsizings, and character assassinations. The last two competitiors standing will face off over lunch in a web-enhanced facsimile of the cloak room at Michael’s restaurant. — Danton
BRAVO, DANTON!… AND THEN…
What a gutless wonder you are, Mr. or Ms. “what magazine?”, to post such vicious, shortsighted nonsense and not have the intergrity to attach your name. I’d say your “major house” is minor just by your affiliation with it. Your day will come, and, judging by your personality, sooner rather than later.
Sara, Daisy, you fought the good fight and have brought tons of illumination to this business. I’m sure you’ll flourish in the future.
Carlin Romano
The Philadelphia Inquirer
SURPRISE APPEARANCE BY CARLIN, BUT WHAT MAGAZINE STILL WINS:
To “what magazine?”
Perhaps in the next round of industry-wide lay off when you are laid off – it will be sooner than you think (I am psychic!) – you will have plenty of time to think, and you will have a different perspective.
I used to read PW on line, and I always found interesting, entertaining, and enlightening information in the magazine: about new contracts, authors’ agents, book tours, publicity, new writers, etc. Unpublished writers often derive encouragement reading about the contracts signed for huge sums. I know I used to marvel about the lucky writers who found famous literary agents willing to represent them.
Sara Nelson has earned very good reputation, and at PW she was without a doubt a star. She was laid off only to save money, I think.
— Yesh Prabhu
THIS GUY ABOVE SOUNDS JEWISH, THEN:
Sara Nelson and Jane Friedman both belong where they are: out of the business. Neither were visionaries, leaders or good managers. Neither understood the book business and both were entitled and grandiose. They spent most of their time gossiping about the real winners in the business and they PREVENTED innovation. The reason the publishing business is in the toilet is because people like Sara Nelson and Jane Friedman didn’t have a clue about how to move it forward. PW was an industry joke. Sara and Jane were industry jokes. These two were hell bent on destroying innovation. Jane Friedman killed the goose that laid the golden egg—Judith Regan –and Sara tried to roast her.
Now they have each other for consolation. — Jeff Gander
THE TRUTH, AND THEN:
For me, the sign that PW had gone way past its prime was its monthly features on “30 under 40″–30 notable people in the publishing industry under 40 years old–which it ran last year. I think the feature was meant to make the magazine look young and hip, but ended up making the industry look old and decrepit. Most of the people PW choose were in the 35-39 age range, and one or two even were 40. Few seemed like innovators. Sadly, other websites that are edging PW out of its market aside, I think that PW is so caught up in their antiquated business model that they can’t even really see where the publishing industry is going, much less craft a vision for what it should be.
I have no strong opinion about Sara Nelson in particular, but the magazine is definitely out of date. It often reads like one big advertisement (they regularly sell their cover for ad space, except for when they can’t find buyers) and the “news” is both unfocused and a week too old. If PW doesn’t come up with a new business model soon, Sara Nelson will be a symbol of more to come for them, I fear. — Michael
In closing…
There is a reason these people in their fifties and sixties are out of work. Sometimes even their forties. They chose old-school (bad move), and all hegemonies must fall to give rise to new ones. New methods. They fail to compute the economy and also the future of publishing. They fail to envision true creative spark and evolution. The same way JD Salinger’s Holden Caulfield character is just a whining preppy to the younger masses. It just doesn’t go anymore. One must change with the times. I hope Sara has found employment since then. I sincerely do. :/
That’s our soap opera for this time.
