Double Trouble

DON'T SAY WE DIDN'T WARN YOU.

Direct magazine staffers will descend on Atlanta this week with two things on our minds: to serve up the dish in our show blog DirectBuzz, and to cover the big news stories in our daily e-mail newsletter Direct Newsline. (Of course, we also intend to do some partying, but let's not get into that here.)

Allow us to offer some shameless self-promotion.

DirectBuzz will be updated throughout the day on site at DMA05. It will report what's happening when it happens — as we see it — and add behind-the-scenes stuff that no DMA press release is going to tell you.

As our blogmeister Brian Quinton puts it, the items will be “conversational and informal, a smart person saying what everyone's thinking.” And we will not spare anyone's sensibilities.

Looking for fully developed news stories from the conference? As in the past, you can find them on Direct Newsline, the DM industry's first news daily.

This double dose is designed to serve both conference attendees and non-attendees.

Speaking of double trouble, let's welcome our two newest columnists to the Direct fold: Brian Quinton and Ken Magill. You will find their debut columns in this issue.

Brian's column WebSight will tackle issues involving online marketing (see page 76).

Brian, who joined Direct last year, formerly served as an editor of our sister publication Telephony. He now edits SearchLine, our e-mail newsletter on search engine marketing, which soon will go weekly.

Ken's column is Don't Get Him Started (see page 24). As the title implies, he will take on all forms of marketing and regulatory idiocy. He is well positioned to do so, having been founding editor of iMarketing News.

Ken, too, is about to get active in the e-mail newsletter arena with the impending launch of Magilla Marketing, a highly personalized newsletter on e-mail marketing.

While we're at it, let's not forget our veteran staff columnists Beth Negus Viveiros (Pushing the Envelope) and Richard Levey (Loose Cannon). And we should mention the all-star team of professional experts who write for us: Tom Collins, Gene Del Polito, Herschell Gordon Lewis, Katie Muldoon and Ruth Stevens.

One final note: As you probably read in the newspaper, Direct has a new owner.

PBI Media Holdings Inc. finished its acquisition of the former Primedia Business Magazines & Media earlier this month. The sale includes Direct, Promo, Multichannel Merchant and many other magazines and Web sites.

Despite the sale, we will be moving forward with the same management team we've always had — Jeff Reinhardt and Leslie Bacon. Please stop by our booth and say hello.