‘Facebook editions’

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Forbes is reporting that “about a dozen news outlets” (including my employer) are preparing “app versions of [their content] that can be read and consumed right there on Facebook. … The first Facebook editions are expected to arrive later this year, perhaps in September.”

Implicit in this, I guess, is the conclusion that legions of people consume the world solely through Facebook. People, that is, who won’t bother to go to washingtonpost.com or even to click a hyperlink that takes them out of the FB garden. Interesting.

Before that book leave, 2 thoughts

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“The sales cycle of the typical popular book, for example, has a half-life of about two months. After two months, the book will probably have made half of all the sales it will make in its entire lifetime.”

– Seth Godin, “Half Life”

“Why, in fact, would anyone want to [write a book]? … Sales of print books in the U.S. peaked in 2005 and have been in steady decline since, according to publishers’ net revenue data reported to the Association of American Publishers. …

“[B]ook-writing is agony — slow, lonely, frustrating work that, unless you are a very rare exception, gets a lukewarm review (if any), reaches a few thousand people and lands on a remaindered shelf at Barnes & Noble.”

– Bill Keller, “Let’s Ban Books, or at Least Stop Writing Them”

Blind spots: a hazard of the 80/20 formula

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“The conversation always goes back to your top customers, and they would always take your eye off the ball. That’s really, I think, the fundamental disruption and what’s driving a lot of company failures: listening too closely to their best customers.”

– Horace Dediu on “Synchronized Failure,” an episode of 5by5.tv’s podcast “The Critical Path”*

* – The episode focuses on Nokia and RIM, and specifically their relationship with network providers. But Dediu’s statement rings true for many types of business.