Alberta Venture launches microsite with 5 years of Venture 100 data

Alberta Venture magazine has compiled the last 5 years of data from its annual Venture 100 ranking of top-grossing Alberta-based companies and put it on a dedicated microsite. It contains data that can be sorted by specific size, industry, growth rate, annual revenue, rank and other metrics, along with articles from the past 5 years and some expanded web-focussed editorial content. The site also

CBC radio podcasts are downloaded by the bunch

Though it's peripheral to the usual focus of this blog, many of its readers are regular CBC radio listeners. A friend has sent some ineresting data on the weekly average downloads of CBC radio podcasts between the end of August and the end of October, drawn from Web Trends. Among the highest numbers wereQ -- 90,141
The Current -- 80,857
Vinyl Cafe -- 61,231
As It Happens -- 61,157
CBC News: The

ABC measured Canadian magazines down about 5.4% in first six month circulation

Among the Canadian magazines tracked by the Audit Bureau of Circulations, in both English and French, the majority saw a decline in circulation during the first six months of 2010 compared with the same period a year earlier.

Circulation overall declined about 5.4% (5.6% in paid subscriptions). This is somewhat more than the U.S. market where total circulation declined 2.3%. However, Canadian

U.S. consumer mags slide 2.27% in total circ in first half of 2010

The latest FAS-FAX from the Audit Bureau of Circulations shows that total paid and verified circulation of the magazines it tracks slipped 2.27% in the first six months of the year; total paid subscriptions fell 1.96% and newsstand sales fell 5.63%. Comparative figures were based on 440 titles that reported in June in both 2009 and 2010. According to a story in Folio:, Of the top 25 consumer

Controlling their customer data big challenge of iPad for magazine publishers

With the announcement today that Research in Motion (RIM) will be unveiling a tablet in November, the burgeoning of this form of delivery will further whet the appetites of magazine publishers, but...One of the things that magazines particularly value and cultivate is their customer data. But the business model being pushed by Apple with its iPad and its iTunes store is such that magazines who

Chatelaine, despite drop in revenue, tops Masthead list of top 50 magazines

Masthead online magazine has released its annual special report of the Top 50 Canadian magazines, based on imputed revenue for 2009 (estimates of advertising and circulation) and there is identical rankings as last year among the top 5, though revenues were down for some.Chatelaine is still the country’s number one moneymaker, based on the Masthead annual ranking of the country’s Top 50 magazines

More than 80% of Canadian magazine $2.4 billion in revenues were in Ontario and Quebec in 2008

Some highlights of Statscan's just-released comparative data for the periodical publishing  industry in Canada for the year 2008:Total operating revenues for the periodical publishing industry reached $2.39 billion in 2008, up 1.2% from 2007. Operating expenses totalled $2.10 billion, up 0.1% from a year earlier. As a result, overall operating profit margins increased to 12.3% from 11.3% in 2007.

Paid subs down 3.25% for first 6 months of 2009 according to ABC

The latest Fas-Fax data from the Audit Bureau of Circulations (ABC) -- which tends to represent the larger circulation titles in the marketplace -- says that Hello! Canada enjoyed a circulation increase of more than 15% in the first six months of 2009, mostly made up of 66% in subscription growth. Maclean's magazine saw its circulation increase by 3%, based on a 5.5% increase in subscriptions;

Most pay walls will be temporary in 2010, says ratings firm

Pay walls may be erected, only to be mostly dismantled, next year in most U.S. print media, according to a new forecast from global credit ratings firm Fitch Ratings, reported in AdAge.
Media companies with print products will erect and then dismantle online pay walls next year. With exceptions like The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, small local papers with limited competition and

Magazine fact book brings good news in the face of hard times

Magazine's Canada today released its 2009 magazine fact book, which casts a distinctly positive light on magazine publishing in this country and provides lots of ammunition to push back when the next person tells you that magazines are doomed. While the purpose of the publication is unabashedly to spin a good story, it is hard not to come away from it without feeling that we're in a robust and

Spun sugar coating won't hide bad magazine news

Dylan Stableford, a columnist for Folio:, asks an apt question about the "happy talk" approach of such organizations at the Magazine Publishers of America (MPA) and American Business Media (ABM) in reporting what are -- by anyone's definition -- lamentable information about the state of the U.S. magazine industry.He says that the organizations do no one any good by "burying the lead", such as

Doubtful data can do real damage to trade publishers

There's an awful lot of self-serving spin going on about the internet's displacement of traditional media. The so-called facts that come from these efforts gain currency often based on a press release from someone or some company with a fairly large axe to grind. As a result, the data gains a life of its own without the reader being aware of (or being made aware of) its source. And the drumbeat

Why is data about the magazine industry so hard to come by?

To return to an occasional obsession: where are we going to get reliable data about Canadian magazine publishing? The one source we had, a bit quirky but at least thorough and compulsory, was the Statistics Canada biennial census of the industry.As you may know, Statscan has (for cost reasons) dropped that system in favour of a "lite" version that reflects the data that is gathered for other