All Programs
Thursday, July 15
3 pm
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3:45 pm
Opening General Session
Join Michael Hollett, editor and publisher of host
NOW Magazine, for a brief welcome to the 33rd Annual Convention,
.
4 pm
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5 pm
Business Roundtables
Moderated roundtables with topics that focus on business issues.
Design Roundtable
Moderated roundtable discussion that will focus on design issues.
Editorial Roundtables
Cultivating the Online Culture: How can editors lead their newsrooms from being once-a-week producers to reporting and writing on a more daily schedule?
Moderator: Matt Kettmann, The Santa Barbara Independent
Mister Publisher, Tear Down That Wall! As alt-weeklies continue to adapt to new models, what is keeping editorial from listening to the ad department more, and vice versa? Why doesn't the ad dept take more leads from edit? In a Web 2.0 world, has the wall become lower already? Can't we just smash through it altogether? Moderator: Jeff Lawrence, Weekly Dig
Survey Says...: Online tools allow us to create and distribute surveys to our readers, to "listen" to them on Facebook and Twitter, and to invite them participate in crowdsourcing our stories. We can collect and collate their feedback in all sorts of interesting ways. So what are we asking them? And what do we do with that information? At this roundtable we'll discuss creative and practical ways to gather and use reader feedback. Please bring ideas, success stories and cautionary tales. Moderator: Cathy Resmer, Seven Days
Matt Kettmann is the senior editor at
The Santa Barbara Independent, and oversees the paper's website,
Independent.com, which was named best weekly website by
Editor & Publisher in 2008.
Jeff Lawrence is the founder and owner of the award-winning
Weekly Dig, The Best Little Paper in Boston.

Cathy Resmer is the associate publisher and web editor for Vermont's
Seven Days.
Rock Star Advertising Roundtables
We're not talking about just any old roundtables here. We're talking Bryan Adams, Canadian-rocker, pull-out-all-the-stops style roundtables. We're going to rock your advertising world with our 15-minute round-robin discussions that allow you to sit in on all three topics and learn:
• How
Salt Lake City Weekly built a list of 20,000+ subscribers to five newsletters that sell out each week.
• How
East Bay Express leverages beer sales sponsorships to yield 50k in revenue -- and has beer companies clamoring to get on board.
• How
NOW Magazine developed an incredibly successful revenue niche in brokering pre-printed inserts.

Jody Colley
is the publisher of the East Bay Express and an at-large board member of AAN. Jody has served on the AAN marketing and classified sales committees and was an executive committee member of the Alternative Weekly Network (AWN). Over the past decade, Jody has been actively involved with local and national organizations that promote sustainable economies and independent business alliances, as well as serving on the boards of merchant associations and business groups.

Jim Rizzi is publisher of
Salt Lake City Weekly. Jim has nearly 30 years experience in the alternative weekly publishing business. The first 21 years of his career were with New Times (now Village Voice Media), and the last nine years with
Salt Lake City Weekly. Jim serves as marketing chair for AAN and has done so since 2004.
Pam Stephen joined host paper
NOW Magazine in 2008 bringing her 20 years of advertising experience from The Globe and Mail and radio. Starting as a sales rep and working through all aspects of sales to round out her knowledge and understanding of what the sales role is all about, she feels fortunate to have an outstanding team that always goes the extra mile. Her expertise is finding the nuggets of revenue that are often overlooked in the marketplace and turning them into profit; of course while building the core business at a more profitable margin.
NOW Magazine has enjoyed a 24% increase in readership over the past year which has allowed us to continue to be a strong competitor in a seven-paper city.
Blair Barna has worked in the world of alt-weeklies for 20 years and is the advertising director of the Charleston City Paper in Charleston, S. C. He founded and co-owns the paper -- now in its sixteenth year -- with his two business partners, publisher Noel Mermer and editor Stephanie Barna. One of them is also his life partner -- he'll leave it up to you to guess which. Barna has two children, three cats, two dogs, and no time to himself. Prior to blazing trails in Chucktown, he worked for Creative Loafing in Savannah and Atlanta.
4:30 pm
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5:30 pm
Town Hall Meeting: Admittance of online pubs
Admittance of online publications to AAN would require a bylaws change. Members will have a chance to weigh-in on this potential move at this moderated town hall meeting.

Tim Redmond is executive editor of the
San Francisco Bay Guardian and AAN first amendment chair.
Friday, July 16
9 am
to
10 am
Seizing Opportunity in a Time of Chaos and Change: Some Inspiration from the Front Lines of Independent Journalism
From Guatemala to Indonesia and Russia to Zimbabwe,
Media Development Loan Fund serves independent news outlets that have managed to survive and prosper in countries facing wrenching political and economic transitions, while making critical contributions to the advancement of democratic development there. Harlan Mandel,
MDLF's deputy managing director, will share the stories of some of these heroes of journalism and how they seized opportunities during times of chaos and change to build successful news businesses. Perhaps these stories can offer some hope and inspiration for all independent news publishers as they navigate this challenging time of dramatic change for the whole news industry.

Harlan Mandel is deputy managing director of
Media Development Loan Fund, a mission-driven investment fund providing low-cost financing to independent news media in countries with a history of media oppression. MDLF has provided over $85 million in loans and equity financing to more than 70 print, broadcast and on-line news outlets in 25 countries, helping journalists in challenging environments build sustainable businesses around professional, responsible, quality journalism. More than 32 million people on four continents get their news from MDLF's current clients. Prior to joining MDLF in 1998, Mandel served as Deputy General Counsel of the Open Society Institute, after practicing law in the New York and Los Angeles offices of Morrison & Foerster.
10:15 am
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11:15 am
Local Online and Mobile Ad Spending and Trending
You probably know how much online advertising revenue you're making with your Web site, but do you know whether you're doing better or worse than everybody else in online sales? Borrell Associates has agreed to conduct a benchmarking report for newsweeklies' online revenues and will outline the results in this session. Learn where your paper stacks up against other AAN members.

Andrew Martin is a senior associate with
Borrell Associates. Based in Toronto, Andrew has worked for more than 25 years in the media sector. He managed the B2C and B2B online operations for CanWest Global, the largest newspaper publisher in Canada. Before that he ran the Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency for seven years. His early career was with LexisNexis, where he was director of textbook publishing for the UK division, before moving to Canada in 1987 to head up their operations in Toronto. He was closely involved in developing CanWest's web strategies and the expansion of their online aggregation businesses. He also contributed to drafting the newspaper industry positions on copyright law reform in Canada. Andrew's current consulting work divides between business and strategic planning, licensing and copyright. Clients include media businesses, government departments, trade associations and libraries in Canada, the US and UK. Andrew has a law degree from the University of Cambridge, and qualified as an UK attorney.
SEO: Past, Present and Future
We all know that search engines can drive a lot of traffic, and SEO (search engine optimization) is important for any publisher to get at least your fair share of search engine traffic. However, there are a lot of changes in how search engines work, and more changes are coming as search engines incorporate more data based on location, real time information and social media and the social graph. Join Mike Volpe, VP of Marketing at
HubSpot to learn how to adapt and optimize your website in order to remain competitive in the future, including:
• Why page rank and search rankings are not relevant measures of SEO success,
• The impact of social media on search rankings in the future,
• How real time search and local search is affecting SEO, and
• What to do now to prepare for the future.

Mike Volpe is vice president of inbound marketing at
HubSpot, an Internet marketing software startup, where he leads the company's lead generation and branding strategy through inbound marketing, including blogging, search engine optimization, video marketing, and social media. Since Mike joined HubSpot, the company has grown from about a dozen beta customers to over 1,200 customers, from five employees to 75 employees, and raised $17 million of venture capital in two rounds of financing. Mike is a cutting-edge B2B inbound marketer who ranks in the top 0.1% of all users on Twitter (@mvolpe) with over 7,500 followers. He also hosts a weekly live marketing video podcast HubSpot TV and blogs frequently. Before HubSpot, Mike worked as director, marketing operations at SolidWorks where he launched a number of inbound marketing initiatives such as SEO, PPC, blogging and podcasting. He is an MBA graduate of the MIT Sloan School of Management and received his B.A. in Economics and Government, summa cum laude, from Bowdoin College.
Telling Stories Across Platforms
With the Web -- and now mobile -- there are so many different ways to tell stories. How do you choose the right platform for the story? How do you choose what parts in which ways? This session will help you sort through the story forms and learn to make good choices.

Regina McCombs is a faculty member of the
Poynter Institute, teaching multimedia, mobile news, social media and programming. Previously, she was the senior producer for multimedia at StarTribune.com in Minneapolis-St. Paul. She arrived there after 13 years as a television producer and photographer at KARE-TV, the NPPA-winning powerhouse in the Twin Cities. Winner of numerous Best of Photojournalism and Pictures of the Year International awards for multimedia storytelling, as well as an Emmy for her video work, she has been a regular speaker around the country, talking about finding new ways to tell stories on the Web, especially with video. For StarTribune.com, she coordinated the multimedia team's coverage, shot and edited video stories, created audio slide shows, produced major projects and trained staff in creating multimedia. She also taught classes in online journalism and TV news at the University of Minnesota, where she received her master's degree.
11:30 am
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12:45 pm
Selling Has Nothing to Do with Selling
Join Richard Farrell for a lively walk-through of his unique nonselling sales process and gain an understanding of:
•Why most sales organizations are very good at a game no longer being played.
•Why selling by its very nature so often produces the exact opposite effect that is intended.
•Why the salesperson with the best understanding of the customer's problem
will consistently outsell the salesperson with the best solution, the lowest price and the most innovative product.
•Why selling is simply a quest for the truth.
•How salespeople position your offering in the exact opposite manner that your customers are buying.
•How salespeople overcommunicate your sales message and how it forces customers to undercommunicate their problems.
•How to differentiate yourself, not by what you sell, but by how you sell.
•How the greatest enemy of selling is the illusion of it.
•Why, if your customers have no problems, you have nothing to sell.

Richard Farrell is president of
Tangent Knowledge Systems, a
Chicago sales training and development firm. He has been in sales for
25 years and sales training for 10 years. He has authored numerous articles
in international and national publications about his unique nonselling sales process and has had many articles written about his company. He is the author of an upcoming book, "Selling has Nothing to do with Selling."
11:30 am
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12:30 pm
Journalism and Location-Based Services: Making sense of place
In 2010 journalism is increasingly about location, location, location. News organizations and independent media producers are using location-based services such as Foursquare and Gowalla to add contextual layers to stories, break news, act as community guides, and engage readers. Learn how this smartphone-based technology is helping us reimagine the news in our communities.

Jeremy Littau has almost 10 years of experience in journalism after working at newspapers of different sizes, specializing in editing and writing both in print and online. He got his start at the
Daily Democrat in Woodland, Calif., and did the typical "move up the ladder" part of his career, landing at the
Los Angeles Daily News in 2000. He spent four years at the
Daily News before returning to school at Missouri. He earned his M.A. in journalism from Missouri in 2007 and his PhD in journalism from Missouri in 2009. Jeremy has extensive experience researching new media trends in journalism and is the author of several publications on the subject, specializing in multiplatform storytelling that makes use of audience conversation in the news process.
Launching End-of-Year Community Giveback Campaigns: How three Alt-weeklies built goodwill and raised $1.5 million as well as publicity for local non-profits.
Several local AAN papers have launched their own unique end-of-year community fundraising initiatives designed to catalyze giving by readers to worthy local non-profits. Last year,
Willamette Week's Give! Campaign raised more than $900,000 for 79 local Portland area non-profits.
Monterey County Weekly's Community Fund raised $543,000 for 73 nonprofits via its Local Economic Stimulus campaign. And the
Colorado Springs Independent initial 2009 Give! campaign raised $198,000 for 29 local nonprofits. All of these papers are planning their 2010 end-of-year community campaigns. Come learn how your paper can launch similar campaigns, as well as what these papers did right, and wrong.

Bradley Zeve founded Monterey County Weekly in 1988. He served on the board of AAN in the mid-1990s (Secretary) and rejoined as Free Speech Chair in 2012. He also served as the president of CAL-AAN. Zeve originally became a member of AAN in 1986 while working at Santa Cruz Sun newspaper. He launched the Monterey County Weekly Community Fund in 2000, which has raised and contributed over $2,850,000 from Weekly readers and local foundations, all to support local nonprofits in Monterey County.
Hal Brody was the owner/publisher of the
Pitch in Kansas City from its inception in 1980 until 1999. With some partners he purchased the
East Bay Express in 2007. Their first
Give! Guide is scheduled for publication this fall.
Richard Meeker has been publisher of Portland's Pulitzer Prize-winning Willamette Week since 1983. Along with co-owner Mark Zusman, his City of Roses Newspaper Company also owns and operates the Santa Fe Reporter and INDY Week.
John Weiss is Publisher of the Colorado Springs Independent and Co-Chair of Indy Give!
2 pm
to
3 pm
Redesigning? Don't just aspire. ATTACK.
Gone are the days when redesign meant new fonts, maybe a new logo, perhaps moving things around or jazzing up your covers. Today, any relevant redesign starts with a question of revenue. What innovations can we design to pull in new advertisers, retain those at risk, or lure back those lost? How do we create new editorial "WOW" -- probably on a shoestring -- to anchor those premium spots? How do we pull in the sales teams as early as possible, devise marketing messages with punch, and create stronger marriages with editorial? This session will include a look inside
the just-launched rethink of Atlanta's Creative Loafing, and a glimpse at the process that may be used at
Washington City Paper and other publications contemplating change.
Ron Reason Chicago-based design consultant Ron Reason is advising Creative Loafing Media on rethinking editorial and advertising strategies in its various markets. He has worked with an odd array of daily and weekly newspapers and magazines in places like Dubai, London, Chicago, New York, Dallas, Nairobi, Orlando, New Delhi, Santa Fe, Sao Paulo, Reykjavik, Lisbon (Ohio), Venice (Fla.) and Walla Walla (Wash.) He is a visiting faculty member at The Poynter Institute, where he previously served as fulltime Director of Visual Journalism for five years. His email is ron@ronreason.com, and his websites are
www.ronreason.com and
www.artwithinreason.com
Tools You Can Use For Your Reporting
Mike Webb, ProPublica's director of communications, will discuss the various ways the investigative nonprofit newsroom can help you with your reporting. He'll explain the roots and goals of the organization, their partnership process and the many tools they've made available that can help you with your own investigations. From their Reporting Matchmaking to their Stimulus Recovery Tracker to their Reporting Recipe and more, ProPublica shares data and information to help you write stories that will have impact.

Mike Webb Before joining
ProPublica, Mike Webb was the deputy director of communications and strategy at the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law. Prior to that, Webb served as publicity and syndication director for
The Nation magazine, and in various roles for a number of elected officials. Earlier in his career, Webb held marketing, sales and promotion jobs in the music industry. He is a graduate of the E.W. Scripps School of Communication at Ohio University.
What on Earth Do You Pull Out of Your Hat Now?
You've been focused on doing more with less, for too long…
In a competitive market that is challenging every assumption and actively reinventing itself from the bottom up, your business model is going through more contortions than you could have dreamed, even five years ago. The only thing you know for sure is your cost structure; your revenue model is completely up in the air. Traditional sources are drying up faster than new ones can be found and tapped, and the only thing you've known for certain is that you've had to cut costs to survive. You must grow your balance sheet and not by acquiring assets or committing to new expenses, but through the contribution and ROI you are receiving from your existing capital base -- primarily your human capital.
Jan van der Hoop of HiringSmart, offers organizations a proven approach to staffing that leads to better business results. He will take you through a step-by-step process that will help you and your organization:
• Understand the factors that drive performance and productivity
• Discover what characteristics separate top performers from poor performers
• Learn how to measure what matters
• Plan concrete steps to improve your top line and your bottom line

Jan van der Hoop spent more than fifteen years in senior human resources positions with a number of leading corporations, including Hilton International Hotels, PepsiCo and Office Depot. Through his work, Jan developed a clear understanding of the issues and challenges people face in the corporate trenches, along with some insights into how he could help organizations work smarter. As a result in 1998, Jan founded The People Factor -- a training and coaching organization that worked with companies to build their organizational capacity, grow their people and improve their bottom line performance. In eight years, he built an impressive client roster across North America, including Nissan Canada, Procter & Gamble, State Farm and Sleep Country Canada. In 2006, Jan partnered with Tim Brennan to launch HiringSmart in response to a demand from his clients to improve their bottom line results by changing the way they hire.
3:15 pm
to
4:15 pm
Financial Standards
Fran Zankowski will moderate discussion of this year's annual benchmarking survey. (Closed session, open only to AAN members who participated in the annual survey.)
How I Got That Story
Four months before a Toyota Lexus accelerated out of control in California and killed four people -- ultimately resulting in Toyota's recall of millions of cars -- Houston Press staff writer Paul Knight published his investigation into unintended acceleration of the Toyota Prius. Although the Prius was the darling of the environmentally conscious, Knight had started hearing accounts from owners that their cars had gotten away from them and in some cases crashed. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration had done a few brief investigations and found nothing while Toyota was claiming either driver error or loose floor mats were the culprits. As Knight's story demonstrated and now as the world knows, that was not the case. In this panel, Houston Press Editor Margaret Downing and Paul Knight will discuss the reporting methods used to produce this piece of journalism.
Margaret Downing has been editor of the
Houston Press since February 1998. A member of the AAN membership committee for several years, she was voted onto an at-large position on the AAN board in 2009. A writing editor, she has received a number of national and regional awards from organizations that include: AAN, the Education Writers of America, Missouri Lifestyle, Lincoln University in Missouri (Unity Award), National Mental Health Association, NABJ and the Fort Worth chapter of SPJ (First Amendment awards.) In 2007, her paper won the IRE award in the local circulation weeklies category; it was a finalist in 2009 and this year three of its stories (by two of its reporters) were again finalists in the IRE competition. She has four fulltime staff writers in her newsroom.
Paul Knight started at the
Houston Press in 2007 and has written stories about, among other things, a culture of violence inside the Texas A&M Corps of Cadets, the exploits of an East Texas superthief, and a high school basketball team from a crumbling Houston neighborhood. A story Knight wrote about the Toyota Prius was a finalist in the 2010 AAN competition. Before the Press, Knight worked in Alabama for the
Mobile Press-Register as a general assignment reporter, covering two small towns on the Eastern Shore of the Mobile Bay.

Julia Goldberg is the editor of the award-winning
Santa Fe Reporter, heralded by a blogger in 2009 as one of the country's most "fabulous" papers, notably for its coverage of domestic violence and wild animals (as separate topics). Julia also serves as the editorial chair for AAN's board of directors.
SMO -- Social Media Optimization
Simon Owens, social media consultant, online journalist and founder of Bloggasm, will provide demonstrations on how he pitches bloggers, social media users, and online journalists to secure hits for articles and stories. In addition to showing the different measures for gauging reader engagement and how to retain more long-term readers, he will discuss the impact of online social news communities like Digg and Reddit and how to solicit help from those communities to drive traffic. Most importantly, Simon will stress the importance of journalists maintaining their own personal online "brands" that exist outside the publications for which they work. He will also present the results of a social media survey sent out to AAN member papers.

Simon Owens is a 26-year-old social media consultant and online journalist. Over the years, Simon has secured hundreds of placements on top blogs and social news sites for clients. He has conducted digital PR for both major and small brands and has driven millions of page views for clients, getting them on the front pages of Technorati Top 100 blogs and major social news sites like Digg and Reddit. Simon has been interviewed by reporters from numerous newspapers, television and radio programs about his expertise in new media. His blog,
Bloggasm, was launched in late 2005 and focuses on the intersection of new and old media. It often includes in-depth feature articles on a variety of media subjects. The site was named in 2008 as one of
PC Magazine's favorite blogs. In that same year it was also nominated for a Weblog Award in the "best large blogs" category. Simon was named the second best Twitter user in DC in 2009 in
Washington City Paper's "Best of" issue.
The Localization Movement
The Localization Movement, popularized with "Shop Local" programs in cities throughout the U. S. and Canada, is a perfect match for altweeklies. Moderator Jody Colley, East Bay Express, will find out what altweeklies are doing in their communities, showcase the success stories and present the challenges. Participants will have time to talk about the opportunities that have yet to be explored.

Jody Colley
is the publisher of the East Bay Express and an at-large board member of AAN. Jody has served on the AAN marketing and classified sales committees and was an executive committee member of the Alternative Weekly Network (AWN). Over the past decade, Jody has been actively involved with local and national organizations that promote sustainable economies and independent business alliances, as well as serving on the boards of merchant associations and business groups.
4:30 pm
to
5:30 pm
Renaissance or Ruin? Finding Your Way to Opportunity After the Fall
Patricia Martin, expert on commerce and culture, and author of the book, "RenGen: Renaissance Generation," reveals what to expect from the coming cycle of re-birth. Known for using culture as a medium to reach communities of consumers, Martin takes you on a journey to the heart of the social movements forming the next wave of prosperity. Having worked with some of world's most respected brands including Dannon, Discovery Channel, Microsoft and Target, Martin delivers:
• Competitive insight -- Discover how independent news and information fit into the next cycle of cultural change.
• Innovative ideas -- Get insight from the rarely revealed social experiments of Google, Red Bull, Ford Motor and others to engage your audience in new ways.
• Strategic thinking -- Create emotional bonds with your community that translate back to your advertisers.

Patricia Martin is an author and noted expert on commerce and culture. She is CEO and founder of
LitLamp Communications, an award-winning marketing boutique acclaimed for using culture as a medium to connect brands with communities of consumers. Author of the book "Renaissance Generation: The Rise of the Cultural Consumer and What it Means to Your Business," she pioneered the point of view that the convergence of art, technology and entertainment is remaking the American consumer. A keynote speaker in demand, Patricia brings C-level executives to their feet when she casts the American consumer in a new light and sets the stage for marketing in the 21st Century. Before founding her firm in 1995, Patricia created the first-of-its-kind sponsorship marketing division for the American Library Association. While there, she partnered with some of the world's most recognized brands, including Microsoft, where she built the blueprint for what is now the Gates Library Foundation. Patricia has been featured in the
Chicago Tribune, the
New York Times, NPR, the
Wall Street Reporter, Market Watch,
Harvard Business Review, and
Advertising Age. She is a frequent contributor to
Advertising Age and Huffington Post and lives near Chicago with her daughter, Grace.
Saturday, July 17
9 am
to
10 am
iPad: New Opportunities for Content Creators
iPad: It ain't gonna save us...but our papers look great on it, and we can make some money off it! With the launch of the iPad, Apple is creating a third category of mobile devices positioned between smartphones and laptop computers. The bad news is, it's not going to save newspapers by itself. The good news is, our content--and our ads--look fantastic on it. There is money to be made and there's an opportunity for AAN papers to create digital versions of their products with innovative features, such as gps targeted ads and listings, to make the digital paper reading experience profitable and enjoyable to the reader. Hear from both outside experts and AAN papers that are investigating iPad development and business opportunities.

Raven Zachary is president of
Small Society, working with big brands, established companies, investors, and startups on iPhone strategy and product development. Raven directed the Obama '08 for iPhone application for the Obama Campaign, and has worked with companies such as Whole Foods Market®, Zipcar℠, CLIF BAR®, and Air New Zealand℠ on iPhone application initiatives. He is the founder of iPhoneDevCamp, a not-for-profit iPhone developer conference. Raven is also a Contributing Analyst with The 451 Group, an IT industry analyst firm and works closely with O'Reilly® Media on iPhone and mobile technology related events and coverage. He is regularly quoted by the press about the iPhone market and is a frequent conference speaker on the topic.
10:15 am
to
11:15 am
Everybody is a Correspondent: So Now What?
Those people formerly known as the audience are consuming plenty of media, but a lot of it is generated by their pals, crowd-created on Twitter and Facebook, or by some guy in Lawrence, Kansas, whose cat plays a pretty mean piano. How can professionally generated content -- give or take, this is AAN we're talking about -- compete and rise above the clutter? We'll talk about friending social media in a new informational ecosystem.

David Carr writes the Media Equation column for the Monday
Business section of The New York Times that focuses on media issues including print, digital, film, radio and television. He also works as a general assignment reporter in the Culture section of
The Times covering all aspects of popular culture. For the past 25 years, David has been writing about media as it intersects with business, culture and government.He began working at
The Times in 2002 covering the magazine publishing industry for the Business section. Prior to joining
The Times, David was a contributing writer for
The Atlantic Monthly and
New York Magazine. In 2000, he was the media writer for Inside.com, a web news site focusing on the business of entertainment and publishing. Before coming to New York, David served as editor of the
Washington City Paper for five years. From 1993 to 1995, he was editor of the
Twin Cities Reader and wrote a media column there as well. On August 5, 2008, David's book, "The Night of the Gun," came out on Simon and Schuster. The book is a memoir of addiction and recovery that used reporting to fact check the past. He lives in Montclair, New Jersey with Jill Rooney Carr and has three children. By the way, David will talk about anything, except the hardy AAN perennial, 'What is alternative?' He has no idea.
Mobile Application Development -- Bringing Home the Bacon!
There is a sea-change occurring in the way people are interacting with the internet. More and more, consumers are using mobile devices as their connection to content. The choices facing content providers are as important as they are confusing. What platforms are out there? What devices? Where should I spend my development dollars? And most importantly, How do we make money with this?! This session will explain the current state of mobile use and explore the choices that are out there for AAN papers to move content onto these remarkable devices. We will talk about some of the models for income generation in the mobile world. There is a tremendous opportunity to reach an incredibly large and diverse audience with both content and advertisements. From iDevices to Androids, we will cover what you need to know to make the right choices for mobile development.

Brian Gentry has been working in the fields of software architecture and application development for 15 years. He has led development efforts to push computing to mobile handsets for clients in the transportation, insurance, financial, and medical industries, integrating legacy systems with modern mobile hardware. He currently is the president of
Trestle Development Inc, a software consulting firm, and a founding partner of
Chilly Primitive, LLC, a company developing innovative applications for the iPhone, iPad, and other mobile devices.
11:30 am
to
12:30 pm
Classifieds: Have you abandoned ship or built yourself a lifeboat?
In this session, we'll review the results of an AAN questionnaire to learn how various AAN papers have dealt with the issue of traditional classifieds over the past year. Find out which papers are still having success in sustaining a traditional print classifieds, what special issues or categories are being sold right now, how classified staff resources are being deployed and how some members have taken a different approach all together.
Carol Flagg is a managing partner in
HITECH Answers and founder of
Pivotal Solution Group. Before going out on her own in 2008, Carol was the advertising director for many years for
The Austin Chronicle. She resides outside of Phoenix, Ariz.
Cassidy Frazier has been the classified director of
The Austin Chronicle for the last seven years. Having started in the industry as an account executive during the classifieds boom and seen the rise of Craigslist and various other online competitors, she has since developed a chin as solid as legendary Toronto boxer George "The judges voted for Ali, but he had to be taken to the hospital afterwards while I went dancing with my wife." Chuvalo.
Going Deep for a Baker's Dozen: 12 Quick Investigative Story Ideas
Let's face it: most AAN editors' rely on a small team of reporters to deliver (nonstop) front and back section stories -- hopefully high quality, hopefully on deadline. But in this recessionary era with smaller papers and staffs, the hard-hitting investigative pieces, long the staple of our newspapers, seem more daunting to produce, even with technology on our side. In this session, we'll hear from three experienced editors and reporters before opening it up to the floor, with the goal of generating up to 12 ideas -- hopefully 13 -- to take home and get to work starting Monday. We're looking for easy to produce, highly relevant, bureaucratic busting stories that you and your readers will find satisfying, begging for more. Who are the public employees in your city or county that make over $100,000 per year, and what would their salaries be if in the same job in the private sector? Who's the local attorney who reaps more from city hall assigned cases? How many pounds of Round-Up® were sprayed in your favorite city park? Which arts organization spent the most on administrative expenses versus programming? We're looking for some easy how-tos on FOI requests, and some clever new ideas to take home so that you and your editorial team are ready and willing. Plus, we'll brainstorm for a bonus 13th quick investigative story idea, one that a bunch of us might undertake in the same month in the next 12 months and publish in our local markets the same week, a collective AAN project. Sharpen your pencils, charge up your iPads, we're going deep, fast. Moderated by the winner of AAN's Best Story Panel Competition, Bradley Zeve.

Bradley Zeve founded Monterey County Weekly in 1988. He served on the board of AAN in the mid-1990s (Secretary) and rejoined as Free Speech Chair in 2012. He also served as the president of CAL-AAN. Zeve originally became a member of AAN in 1986 while working at Santa Cruz Sun newspaper. He launched the Monterey County Weekly Community Fund in 2000, which has raised and contributed over $2,850,000 from Weekly readers and local foundations, all to support local nonprofits in Monterey County.
Chris Potter is editor of Pittsburgh City Paper.
Lisa Rab is a staff writer with New Times Broward-Palm Beach.
Christopher Twarowski is senior reporter/editor and investigative reporter at the Long Island Press. In 2004, the Press Club of Long Island granted awarded him two first place prizes, for environmental reporting and for political coverage, based on his exposes into illegal dumping and suspicious land-lease agreements in local parks. Christopher's investigations also earned him five FOLIO Awards from the New York Fair Media Council last year. He was hired by the Press's precursor, the New Island Ear, in March 2002 and worked his way up to his current position. He edits the newspaper's electronics columnist and pens "The Fox Hunt," a column on local folklore, as well as a food column. He also writes short stories and poetry. He has a B.S. in English from Sacred Heart University and lives in Brooklyn.
Looking for Your Audience
Who is the audience of the alt-weekly these days? What audience should an alt-weekly be seeking? Is there a way to embrace the traditional alt-weekly audience and a new audience? And how does an alt-weekly physically find their target audience and ensure that their newspaper gets to that audience? Keying in on both research and business strategies, Henry Scott, VP and Chief Marketing Officer for Creative Loafing Inc., will address these questions and more in this insightful session.

Henry Scott is an experienced journalist and media business executive who currently is vice president/chief marketing officer for Creative Loafing Inc. Before joining CL Media in January 2010, he was managing director of Gansevoort Media, a strategic planning and product development firm focused on the internet, magazines, and the newspaper industry; managing director of Metro New York and group publisher for Metro US; president of Out Publishing; and was with The New York Times Company in a number of positions. Henry, who lives in Atlanta, is a member of the International Newspaper Marketing Association, among other organizations. He is the founder of the North American Free Daily Newspaper Association.
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Change your Promotions from Added Value to Revenue Generating
With the right mindset and department participation, you can turn your "added value" promotions into significant revenue generators.
Learn how some papers have embraced:
• Converting grandfathered clients used to getting "free" promotions to paying for them.
• Re-structuring promotional contests and movie screening efforts.
• Establishing a process for getting paid promotional opportunity leads from editorial.
• Creating big, exciting promotions that bring in big, exciting revenues.

Jay Stinson After 33 years in television and radio promotions, Jay joined host paper
NOW Magazine in February 2010 as promotions manager, bringing with her a wealth of knowledge on how to make money through promotions -- something she's been doing since 1992. Taking promotions from a cost centre to a revenue generating department at various media outlets in Canada, Jay knows the challenges one faces along the way: grandfathered clients who have always received "added value" promotions or sales departments who have never sold promotions; but, it is her knowledge, professionalism and boundless creativity and energy that get people excited about the possibilities of having a standalone promotion front and centre in print! Since joining
NOW, she has worked with various departments, including editorial, distribution and the publisher's office to ensure that the transition from added value to revenue generating has been a smooth process. In that time, she and the sales department have established a policy where all sponsorships and promotions have a dollar amount attached to them. Jay's vision is very simple: the pages of our publications are our business. Most other companies offer their valued customers discounts, better pricing, even rewards cards but, they do not give their services away so, why do we? Why indeed!

Marty Griswold in a career spanning some 18+ years in the publishing world, has worked at
The Rocket magazine,
SF Weekly and currently serves as the sales & marketing director for Seattle's
The Stranger and as regional sales director for Index Publishing. Marty's contributions to the business have been marked by great strides in increased revenue, high profile event planning, and the launch of innovative ideas that have garnered both fiscal and creative success within the industry. In recent years, his efforts have contributed to the unparalleled online achievements of
The Stranger and sister publication,
The Portland Mercury, that have set new standards within the alternative weekly digital world. Marty is also known to be somewhat of a whore when it comes to generating untapped revenues through non-traditional means, which means he is quite at home at
The Stranger.
Colby Roberts , a native Vermonter, has been with Seven Days since 1999. He enjoys skiing with his wife and two daughters.
Editorial Standards
Newsroom staffing levels, freelance pay rates, page counts--this session is about the nitty gritty. In advance of this editors-only session, AAN editors will have the opportunity to fill out a survey that addresses various benchmarks, as well as queries about how they deploy their resources. The survey will ultimately be collated and available in the AAN resource library as an editorial standards document. The session will consist of a lively free-wheeling discussion about how editors are using their budgets and staffs with the goal of generating new ideas and inspiration.

Jimmy Boegle is the founding editor and publisher of the
Coachella Valley Independent in Palm Springs, Calif. He's a former AAN diversity chair and currently serves on the editorial and membership committees. He is a veteran of the
Tucson Weekly,
Las Vegas CityLife, the
Reno News & Review and The Associated Press. He decided to make the move to Palm Springs because the weather in Tucson and Las Vegas simply was not warm enough for him.
Hank Sims is a graduate of the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism, and has worked at the
North Coast Journal for the last seven years, five as editor. He has written for more than 30 publications as a staff writer and freelancer, including the
LA Times, the
California Journal, the
Anderson Valley Advertiser and the
Arcata Eye.
What Does Going Green Really Mean? The process, the price, the pay-off.
With 650 publishers and printers signed on,
Canopy is one of the smartest eco-orgs working to save the forests today. Transformation among newsprint consumers (that's us) and commercial printers across the continent has been their key focus since 2006. The results have been astounding. Find out what's actually happened in the Boreal Forest based on their work. Hint, the caribou are smiling. How does Canopy define green? And hear how some of our own have defined it for themselves.
Alice Klein is co-founder and editor/CEO of Toronto's fiercely independent weekly,
NOW Magazine and its daily multimedia website
nowtoronto.com. Klein's passion for environmental transformation has helped shape NOW's editorial and business leadership in this important area. She also writes regularly about the Canadian and global economy and politics, often from an ecological perspective. She is also a documentary filmmaker (Call of the Hummingbird), on the board of the Centre for Social Innovation (CSI), one of the co-creators of
VoteforEnvironment.ca, a founding member of Green Enterprise Ontario (GEO), and on the boards of the Toronto Arts Council (TAC) and Canadian Journalists for Free Expression (CJFE).

Nicole Rycroft is the founder and executive director of
Canopy, a North American non-profit that safeguards forests, species and the climate by harnessing the power of the marketplace and changing business practices. Best known for the greening of Harry Potter, Canopy brokers innovative solutions and works closely with the North American newspaper, print, book and magazine industries. Canopy was one of the lead organizations responsible for securing the world's largest conservation agreement alongide eight other environmental organizations and 21 forestry companies. Covering a massive 70 million hectares, the Canadian Boreal Forest Agreement was largely driven by green shifts in the marketplace created by the work of Canopy and its market allies with large corporate paper consumers. Nicole leads the strategic direction of Canopy. A firm believer that we could be doing things in a better way, Nicole is committed to ensuring that the power and influence the North American market leverages tangible eco-solutions and on the ground conservation gains for the world's forests, species and climate. Nicole is the recipient of an Ashoka Fellowship, a Canadian Environment Award Gold Medal and numerous print and publishing industry awards. Named one of Canada's 50 Most Influential People in Graphic Communication for the past four years, Nicole sits on numerous boards.
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AAN Convention Fishbowl
Convention what? No, there's no water or goldfish or tiny castles involved, just the unleashed creativity and knowledge of convention attendees. Various forms of "unconference" sessions have become de rigueur at conferences of late, and for good reason: attendees have a lot to offer and interaction enhances learning. Although AAN has a tradition of offering "unconference-type" programming, we'll take it a step further with the fishbowl. Or fishbowls. Attendees will have a chance to submit discussion topics on Thursday and Friday. A facilitator will review the ideas in advance and assist attendees in forming groups and determining the exact style of the fishbowl. There may be one, there may be several. There may be flipcharts, there may not. It may run longer than 4:45 pm. It's up to you! What better way to wrap up the 2010 Convention

Susan Percy is the founder of Toronto-based
MacGrercy Consultants, providing business-skills training and meeting facilitation. Susan helps teams and individuals to become more productive, creative and effective at work. When facilitating group sessions, Susan helps to create a fun atmosphere that encourages collaboration to quickly generate ideas and make plans.
Please note: Programming and schedule subject to change.