Slashdot Mirror
Electronic News Is Shutting Its Doors
ahess247 writes "You probably missed it, but last week, the publication that helped give Silicon Valley its name announced that it will be shutting down its paper edition next month. Electronic News is one of the oldest trade publications covering the electronics and semiconductor industries. Launched in 1957, it predates its main competitor EETimes by more than a decade. One of its main claims to fame is it was the first publication to ever use the phrase "Silicon Valley" in print. A reporter for the weekly paper, the late Don Hoefler wrote a series of stories entitled "Silicon Valley, USA" that started the week of Jan. 11, 1971. The name, as we all know, stuck. It was also within the pages of Electronic News that Intel Corp. first advertised its 4004 Microprocessor. Once considered the bible of the electronics industry, its last printed issue will go out to subscribers on Dec. 2. According to this press release from its current owner, Reed Business, the publication will shift to an "all digital format." All but three staffers have been let go, and they will produce what essentially amounts to an online newsletter. Not a fitting end for a publication with such an important place in the history of the semiconductors industry."
what is wrong with that?
Wasn't this the publication which was also, in part (at least from the "advertising", responsible for the widespread popularity of the Altair as well?
moto411.com
Or perhaps it is...
[Electronic News] will produce what essentially amounts to an online newsletter. Not a fitting end for a publication with such an important place in the history of the semiconductors industry.
Call it irony or call it poetry, but isn't this the most fitting end imaginable?
I am a Karma Library.
We are in the age of information, electronic information for that matter. This could be the start of a very big trend. Publicationscan save millions by providing their pubs online with a nominal subscription fee. Of course there will always be those who prefer their hard copy.
[n8.r0n] http://petesweb.spymac.net/
All joking aside, I liked electronic news a LOT more than I liked EETimes. EN actually sent me relevant, interesting stories whereas EETimes only publishes articles based on the IEEE's agenda du jour
Am I the only one who notices that EETimes articles are almost always political in nature whereas EN just reports the facts? I will miss EN for sure.
This is typical of the IT industry. IBM - the pioneers of the homePC lost out to other companies like Dell/Compaq/HP. The GUI pioneered by Xerox (poor sods) lost it to Apple and then finally to Microsoft. Even the console market - Sega and Nintendo are losing out to the playstations and maybe the Xbox(still to be seen). SO why not a newspaper ?
|/________
|\A|ALYS|
1957? I can just imagine the first "Hardware Review":
We started our review of this machine several years ago and we are pleased to unveil our 3Dmark results for the IBM 608...
So much to do, so little bandwidth.
--
Try Mozilla
Interesting picture of the 4004 processor. The interconnects are nearly the size of the bonded wires to the chip.
Can a person still buy one of these gems? Surely, they have educational possibilities. They get down to low level logic and would be fascinating to program.
Well, I suppose if they are going into an all-digital format, "Electronic News" will finally be electronic! Ha!
George W. Bush
President, United States of America
Change, and the new superseding the old, is what the Silicon Valley is all about. Yes, companies come and go, but it isn't the companies, per se, that make SV what it is. It's the human infrastructure, the critical mass of talent that is always ready to move on and create the next "great thing."
Slashdot story re-written:
In the past, whenever Electronic News wanted to publish, we first engaged in a violent attack on trees that resulted in their deaths. Now we are publishing with re-cycled electrons that have been re-used continuously for 14 billion years.
My question: Isn't this a happy story? Why does the Slashdot story read like a funeral?
It would be nice if they straightened out who can call themselves Silicon Valley North; Calgary, Ottawa, Seattle, Portland or Markham (Toronto)?
And, online versions mean that you don't have to toss out a pile of mags every so often.
I'd have a personalized plate on my car, but "toxic bachelor" won't fit into 7 letters.
The name of this publication and it's significance needs to be added to Eric S. Raymond's New Hacker Dictionary so it can be preserved and passed down to our child processes.
I'm not talking about Electronic News, I'm talking about this particular reply.
/.
Look at the numbers - barely a quarter of the normal replies, and a tenth if it was a story about William Shatner doing an interview. That tells me two things:
1) This article does not belong in
2) It's no surprise that EN is dying.
I did read EN back in the 80's and 90's (it was good), but I haven't picked up a copy since then.
BTW - it would come as no surprise to me that this is neither read, replied to, or moderated, but you can prove me wrong. Go ahead.
It was inevitable. Faithfully following Moore's law, the volume of semiconductor news has been doubling every 18 months since the invention of the integrated circuit. The last issue of the Electronic News was about 43 billion pages long, and the print run consumed the entire output of the British Columbia pulp and paper industry.
Please donate your spare CPU cycles to help fight cancer and other diseases
If something bad is happening, why is Electronic News publishing great articles, like this one about the conversion of cars from 12 volt systems to 42 volt systems: Gearing Up to 42V?
Well, I just had to reply. I thought it would make you feel better that your words were not wasted. :) I have to agree with you though on the interest level of this story. I am actually surprised I got to your comment. It's a slow day at work an' all.
BTW, I don't recall ever reading, or even hearing about this publication. Maybe Hemos has some sort of attachment to this?
Life moves pretty fast; if you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it. -FB
As I write this, the main article is about to roll off the /. front page, yet there are only 66 follow up replies posted. That would seem to indicate a less than enthusiastic following for this rag.
One more freebie trade rag bites the dust. I promise you, your local landfill is thankful.
.nosig
It was fine when the 4004 represented the majority of the industry, but they tried to cover MCU, ASICs, design software, systems, you name it. That became impossible ten years ago, and they basically scrambled for the past decade to try and keep up and stay in business. (Also, we'd use them as a farm team and hire away all their best reporters...)
I always thought Silicon Gulch predated Silicon Valley.
The all time low came when one of the trade papers ran an article with the headline "Cat Fight Looms in Logic Analyzers". I don't recall if this was EN, but...
Perhaps there was a time after that when it improved for a while. I don't know - EET became the main source of my industry news and I never looked back. Now, with more of my information wants met online, I just spend a few minutes scanning through someone else's paper copy of EET.
Paper has the great advantage of being readable while on the toilet.
Way back I asked myself "How can anyone stay in business publishing on paper with the printing costs etc with the net?"
I got my answer more recently with the dot com bust.
Not enough readership is online. Advertising isn't priced right and advertisers fear online media.
But thats changing.
For Electronic News it's already changed. It's readership is totally online by now with out exception.
The advertisers aren't affrade.. Microsoft, IBM etc all cutting edge companys use electronic marketting and prefer it to print.
It's priced right. They are premiuim ad space in the e space but not so much in the paper world.
Your subscription to your local newspaper covers some of the printing costs.
Ads take up the bulk of the papers operating costs. Those ads have to be pricy to pay for everything.
That's how it works.
With free web publishing your publishing costs are slashed to a much more managable price level but unless you can pull in the same money with e-ads the transition dosen't pay.
I don't actually exist.
www.electronicproducts.com
Read a preview of my novel CYBERCHILD at www.smartalix.com/cyberchild
Though memory can be flawed, I have a strong one of visiting a cousin in San Jose in 1962 and his driving me through Mountain View, while telling me "And they're calling it "Silicon Valley."
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