 May 1996, Vol. 7, No. 5
Nothing but 'Net
The latest features of publishing technology now emphasize Intranets
Iota Internet: The Israeli firm has opened a U.S. office and offers Internet-based search.
There came a moment in late 1993, where if you got distracted for a month or so, you would have missed being in on the start of the Internet revolution.
I know, because I was working on a project that emphasized Adobe Acrobat as a technology for distributing digital information. We were so wrapped up in setting up pages to work correctly in Acrobat that when a college kid dropped by to demo his World-Wide Web site, we didn't take but a few minutes with him.
Though Acrobat has proven itself adept at a variety of tasks, it has taken the might of an alliance with Netscape Communications Corp. -- Adobe’s crosstown friends in Mountain View, Calif., who created Navigator, the ubiquitous web browser -- to give Acrobat the potential to really take off on the Web. (We're still waiting for beta testing of the Amber plug-in, which allows Acrobat files to be read in the browser, to be completed.)
Whereas, in the same time frame, the Internet has exploded.
This is all to say that the latest explosion -- one that I think will affect publishers not only as information providers but also as information users -- is the Intranet. As the Internet is a collection of networks worldwide, the Intranet is a collection of networks within your organization.
For publishers, what this means is that many of the features of their front-end publishing systems -- mail, wire collection, libraries of text and images -- can be emulated in an inexpensive manner with an Intranet.
Think about it: most of these features can be built with cheap server technology, and the viewer for interacting with them -- a web browser or an e-mail client -- is now being distributed as freeware (or with an insignificant licensing fee).
Recently I downloaded a calendar/scheduling program that runs on Internet protocols that could easily be adapted to newsroom use for handling news calendars -- as well as enterprise-wide meeting scheduling.
For now, that product is being distributed free.
With this in mind, we dispatched Correspondent John Bryan to find out what the purveyors of archiving solutions are doing about the Intranet. Inside, you'll find his discovery that virtually all the players have developed Intranet capability, thereby negating the need for client software.
Which means that you won't have to buy (or maintain) special software for Mac users to look at the picture archive and more special software for the Windows users to do the same thing.
Another revolution of sorts is going on at newspapers throughout North America: the movement from traditionally organized newsrooms (managing editor, business editor, sports editor) to a team-based and worker-participation organization.
Correspondent L. Carol Christopher has been watching the reorganization at the Star Tribune of Minneapolis for almost two years and reports that things have changed dramatically around the paper. If nothing else, the new team-based approach to news coverage has required more technology.
Though short of the term "revolutionary," there certainly was a significant industry announcement last month. System Integrators Inc. of Sacramento, Calif., and Cybergraphic Systems Pty. Ltd. of suburban Melbourne, Australia, have entered into a long-term agreement for SII to market Cyber’s next-generation classified and editorial front-end systems in areas where SII has strength, while Cybergraphic will continue to market in its Asia-Pacific stronghold as well as in the Americas and Europe.
The SII/Cyber announcement came on the second day of SII’s users group meeting. Michael D. Kinerk, technology editor of the Miami Herald, gives us a glimpse at the rest of the issues addressed by the supplier and those raised by customers.
Lastly, industry supplier Sysdeco has had some interesting times lately with its business, and we report on its status.
So, don't blink, because you might miss the Next Big Thing.
-- David M. Cole
From THE COLE PAPERS, May 1996, Copyright © 1996, All Rights Reserved.
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