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b5media Offers To Buy Know More Media Blogs and/or a Full Corporate Acquisition
Written by Allen Stern - July 25, 2008
Jeremy Wright, b5media CEO, has posted an open letter this evening to the staff and bloggers from Know More Media. He opens the letter by saying that various sources are telling him that Know More Media is closing shop soon, as early as next week. I sure hope that the KMM bloggers and staff already know this and aren't first learning about it here or on Jeremy's blog!
Jeremy notes that bloggers will have the option to buy their Know More Media blogs and run them on their own. Jeremy says that he is open to acquiring the blogs and incorporating them into the b5media blog network. He notes, "We will ask that you blog for $50 for the first month, while we ascertain the value and advertising potential of the blog. After that month, we will likely need to restructure the network (there’s a reason it wasn’t making any money), redo the pay structure and even let some bloggers go. But, if you let us, we will turn the network around and make it profitable. We are fully committed to doing what’s fair (and in many ways, being more than just fair)."
Jeremy also is willing to discuss hiring the staff at Know More Media along with attempting to contact the Know More Media owners to look at a full acquisition. He says that b5media is the only blog network that can takeover their network with little muss or fuss.
Check out my interview with Jeremy and all of our b5media coverage to learn more about their blog network.
COMMENTS - Add New Comment
Yep, we just want to do our best to save the network, save the bloggers, save the team :)
Allen, thanks for writing about this.
On Monday, July 21, Know More Media announced via its internal company blog to all KMM authors that we will cease operations as of Friday, August 1, 2008 (unless something like a proposed takeover by b5media occurs). That means the blogs will stay live, online, but we won't be paying anybody who chooses to continue to post (and some have said they will). And the full-time team will dissolve.
For clarity, I'm going to re-post a comment I just left at Jeremy's blog. Hope that's okay. :)
I’ve been a full-time editor at Know More Media since we launched in 2005. Speaking for the others on the full-time team, let me say that we’ve done all we could to make it a successful business and to treat our authors well. I’ve poured my energy into it from day one and have no regrets about my efforts as a writer, editor, promoter, advertiser and trainer.
I understand that Jeremy is waiting to hear from Hal Halladay, our CEO, about this open letter. I hope whatever communication may come of it will be satisfying to all parties.
I am personally grateful to every person who has worked for Know More Media (KMM) in any capacity. I am happy to say that I have been able to work alongside dozens of fantastic people there - the several on the full-time team and the dozens of wonderful blog writers.
I’m sad, of course, that Know More Media has reached the point that it has as a business - but I am confident that everyone who has contributed to it will find success in their future if they hold to the publishing standards we tried to uphold and teach.
As to why Know More Media hasn’t performed better as a company, I’ll defer to Hal (our CEO) on that. He is my close friend and mentor as well as an excellent boss. He has done far more than most of our writers realize to try to make our network succeed. I do know with absolute certainty that we haven’t failed because of any lack of effort on the part of any employee.
I’m available at 970-372-6630 or myfirstname at knowmoremedia dot com if anyone wants to talk to me. Also twitter.com/easton or contact me via the form on my personal blog consulting site, visionaryblogging.com. I do want to make sure nobody gets misunderstandings about this discussion.
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