Sixty AAN members and 83 film-industry clients attended the Sept. 14 "AANtourage" reception on the roof of the Bel Age hotel in Los Angeles. The event was so successful that publishers and ad buyers continued the party afterward in the hotel bar. In a post-event survey, 100 percent of respondents thus far said that AANtourage was a success.
Tasha Ho-Sang (pictured) parlayed an insightful letter to the editor into a summer internship at the Philadelphia City Paper, with funding assistance from AAN's Diversity Internship program. Ho-Sang had a wealth of story ideas, and during her two months at the alt-weekly she was able to develop a few of those ideas into successful articles. "Stories she pitched came from a realm that we wouldn't have found if we hadn't had the chance to bring Tasha on," Managing Editor Brian Hickey says.
In briskly paced sessions, the two-day Web Publishing Conference will cover everything AAN members need to know about the Web: revenue models; online advertising operations and technology; user-generated content; multimedia; search-engine optimization; social networking; Web analytics; usability best practices; wireless Internet; legal issues; and writing and editing for the Web. The October 5-7 meeting in San Francisco will also feature big-picture overviews, vendor presentations and member roundtables. The deadline for reduced rates is Sept. 12.
The newly announced schedule includes several confirmed speakers: Thomas Burke, a lawyer with the firm Davis Wright Tremaine; Xavier Casanova, CEO of Perenety; Bruce Dobie, owner of Dobie Media LLC; Bowen Dwelle of AdMonsters; Michael Gold and Susan West of WestGold Editorial; R. Scott Horner, co-owner of Swarm Interactive; Thomas Kenney, president of Verve Wireless, Inc.; and Dave Morgan, the founder and chairman of Tacoda Systems. Additional speakers and seminars for the October conference may be added at a later date.
Fran Zankowski (pictured), CEO of the Colorado Springs Independent, will fill the position vacated by Rob Jiranek until an election is held at the June 2007 annual meeting. Zankowski is a veteran of the AAN Board of Directors who also served on the Admissions Committee for eight years. Jiranek resigned last week after announcing that he had accepted a position as vice-president of sales and strategic planning with the Memphis Commercial Appeal.
Register for "Perestroika" before Sept. 12 to get the discounted rate. The conference, which is open only to AAN members, will be held Oct. 5 - 7 in San Francisco. Programming details are still being finalized, but topics that will be covered include Web-publishing essentials like revenue models, online advertising operations and technology, user-generated content, multimedia, search-engine optimization, and writing and editing for the Web.
On Sept. 14, AAN will host AANtourage, a reception for film-industry ad buyers designed to showcase the alternative-newspaper business and demonstrate gratitude to our clients for their support. AAN members who attend will have an opportunity to schmooze with studio and ad-agency reps while enjoying gourmet food and an open bar poolside at the Bel Age Hotel in West Hollywood. "Many of the regional agencies that we used to visit on a regular basis are no longer placing the media buys (for movies)," notes Austin Chronicle's Carol Flagg. "This party will allow us to introduce ourselves directly to the L.A. agencies that place this business."
Program details are still being finalized for AAN's first-ever conference dedicated to electronic publishing, but the time and place have been set: October 5-7 at the Holiday Inn Golden Gateway in San Francisco. AAN editors, publishers and web personnel won't want to miss this opportunity to learn, strategize and discuss having a significant online presence and keeping up with the rapidly changing news business.
From young reporters needing basic skills to veteran editors in need of a recharge, alt-weekly writers of all experience levels will find training and inspiration at AAN's eighth annual Alternative Journalism Writers Workshop, on August 11-12 at Medill School of Journalism in Evanston, Ill. Presenters will include Laura Dell, Bruce Shapiro, Michael Tisserand, Alan Prendergast, and AAN editors Patricia Calhoun, Julia Goldberg and Donna Ladd.
