10 Years Ago...

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... I wrote this, which Brad Berens and Josh Messinger helped me track down. Back then, I had my own site called OLAF - The On Line Advertising Forum, and I wrote a semi-regular column there called "The Rant."  I say "semi-regular" because the individual columns had to be hard-coded and it was a big pain to write something and then get it live without the aid of a CMS.  By the time I got a CMS going, I was already writing for other folks.

Back then, I was getting my jollies and keeping my writing chops up by writing "The Rant" and posting long diatribes to mail lists like the O-A Discussion List, I-Advertising and the WWWAC Ad SIG.  Then this guy named Charlie Sayers calls me up and asks me to write for this site called Who's Marketing Online?  I was happy to oblige.

Almost immediately, WMO was scooped up by Andy Bourland and ClickZ.  So I wrote the media buying column for those guys for several years.  After Alan Meckler bought ClickZ, I worked with Nick Friese and Ken Fadner at Mediapost to conceptualize and kick off the Online Spin.  I wrote there for years until I decided to move on and work with the folks at iMediaConnection.

So it's been 10 years since that first column appeared on WMO.com, and it's been a wild ride.  Quite a few people have invested time and effort in me and my column over the years, and I'd like to acknowledge them here.  (Please forgive me if I accidentally leave someone out...)

  • Doug Jaeger spent many late nights with me at the offices at K2, designing pages for OLAF, so that I could keep the information resources and The Rant going.
  • Rich Birnbaum did a lot of the same, but on the CMS side.  Rich essentially wrote an entire content management system for OLAF from scratch, using PHP.
  • Andy Bourland invested in me early on, keeping me aboard at ClickZ when it acquired WMO.
  • Ann Handley was really my first editor, keeping me on track at ClickZ and taking care of my development as a writer early on.
  • Claudia Bruemmer was also a great editor at ClickZ and helped me out immensely with my columns.  She's also a fantastic writer herself and has written things that have literally moved me to tears.
  • Nick Friese has been a friend, occasional bandmate and Mediapost co-conspirator.  We came up with a lot of ideas together for content and community features at Mediapost.
  • Ken Fadner always listened to our ideas and gave them a fair hearing.
  • Masha Geller has been a great friend and the only person to work with me in two places (Mediapost and iMedia).
  • Brad Berens is a fantastic editor who really took a lot of time to tease more interesting pieces out of me.
  • Gretchen Hyman is my current editor at iMedia, helping me develop as the "utility infielder" for iMedia.

I feel really lucky that there are enough people in this industry who like my writing enough to subscribe to my various newsletters and feeds , and occasionally pass one of my pieces around to their buddies in the office.  It really helps me and my main business, which is all about strategy and execution behind the things I discuss every week in my columns.  Clients really dig seeing me, my partners and my staff published regularly.  It's very cool and I thank you all.