This Week's Featured Video: Highlights from the 2010 Publishing Business Conference & Expo
With a trying 2008 and 2009 behind us, most publishers who attended the 2010 Publishing Business Conference & Expo (PublishingBusiness.com), March 8-10, seemed, at the very least, less worried about the future than they were last year and, in fact, most were quite optimistic. The conference theme, “Publishing at a Tipping Point,” was the unifying force behind more than 60 educational sessions presented by 150 speakers from all walks of the publishing industry.
The presentations and discussions focused on industry shifts and practical information to help publishers adapt and thrive in both book and magazine publishing, and featured industry-leading executives such as Steve Forbes, Chairman and CEO of Forbes Media and editor-in-chief of Forbes magazine; David Granger, Esquire magazine editor-in-chief; Cathie Black, president of Hearst Magazines; Jane Friedman, CEO and co-founder of Open Road Integrated Media (and former president and CEO of HarperCollins Publishers Worldwide), among many others.
The show, held at the New York Marriott Marquis, Times Square, drew more than 2,000 registrants, and registrations to the conference program were the highest in the show's history. The exhibit hall was filled with leading technology, solutions and services providers serving the publishing industry.
"Two-thousand eight and 2009 were really difficult years for the industry, and I think that this year, publishers realized that they really needed to come together to address the major issues we're all facing and to develop concrete plans for moving forward successfully," said Noelle Skodzinski, editorial director of Publishing Executive and Book Business magazines and the Publishing Business Conference director.
Skodzinski also commented on the generous support from the industry in pulling off an event that exceeded expectations, especially in a year when many trade shows are still suffering losses and even closing down due to the economic impact on virtually every industry. "The support we received from industry thought-leaders, our conference chairs, our advisory board, our exhibitors and sponsors, and our attendees was amazing. … People (including me) were excited to be a part of it."
The conference was chaired by Chris Foster, President & COO, GIE Media; Samir Husni, aka "Mr. Magazine" and founder and director of the Magazine Innovation Center; Clint Greenleaf, president and CEO, Greenleaf Book Group; and Evan Schnittman, vice president, global business development, Oxford University Press.
Speakers for the magazine-publishing-focused sessions hailed from companies and magazines such as Hearst, Hanley Wood, Hoffman Media, Food Network Magazine, Reader's Digest, Dwell, FierceMarkets, Popular Science, The Week, Questex, Consumer Reports and many others. Book-session speakers included executives from Scholastic, Springer Science + Business Media, Chronicle Books, Chelsea Green, Hachette Book Group, Daily Lit, Melville House Publishing, Baker & Taylor, Ingram, ScrollMotion, Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, Macmillan and many others.
Download Audio and Video of Conference Sessions
If you weren’t able to make it to the 2010 Publishing Business Conference, you can still learn from industry experts how to adapt to the dramatically shifting publishing marketplace. High-quality audio and video downloads of the sessions are available for purchase at Napco.webcredenza.com. You can buy individual sessions or bundles to get more sessions at a greater value. (If you were a paid attendee to the conference, watch your e-mail in-box for special discount notifications.)
