The best and the bankrupt

Allow me to offer my congratulations to the finalists in ASBPE's Magazine of the Year and Website of the Year competitions.
ASBPE announced the final cut earlier this week. There are 20 magazines (in two circulation categories) left in the running. While 10 Web sites still have a shot at the grand prize.
The full list of finalists is available on ASBPE's Web site.

It's worth noting that one of the Web finalists is eWeek, the same publication that outraged me when I found it was a finalist earlier this year in ABM's Neal Award. ABM later showed the good sense not to give the award to someone who violated the ethics rules of our profession.
eWeek also later came to its senses .
But I would still hate to see a publication that demonstrated such disregard for our standards be named the best B2B publication on the Web. So I'm hoping that ASBPE opts to snub eWeek as well.

Note: in the Jan. 29, 2007, post in which I first complained about eWeek's unethical practices, I also made note of the parent company's dismal financial situation and predicted that "regardless of how things turn out, it’s unlikely that Ziff Davis’ owners, private equity firm Willis Stein & Partners, will get back anything close to the $780 million they paid for the company in 1999."
Well today Ziff Davis announced it was selling its Enterprise Group, which includes eWeek, for $150 million.  The company remains riddled with debt. So it now seems likely that bankruptcy court will be the next stop for Ziff Davis.

Click here to read min's coverage of the sale.
Click here to read Folio's coverage of the sale.

tags: journalism, b2b, media, trade press, magazines, newsletters, business media, journalism ethics, advertising