Salon Replaces its CEO; Hires Veteran Gingras

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Normally as I sift through each day’s 8-Ks, 10-Q’s Form 4’s and all the other “paperwork” media companies file routinely with the SEC, most of the stuff, to be honest, makes my eyes glaze over.

But today’s batch included a stunner: Senior management turnover at Salon.

Elizabeth Hambrecht, daughter of one of Salon’s largest and most loyal investors, Bill Hambrecht, is out, replaced by Silicon Valley veteran executive Richard Gingras, effective immediately. Gingras was until recently a senior advisor to Google, previously CEO of Goodmail, and a former exec at Apple and at Excite@Home (where he was briefly my boss.)

Note: He’s also a close friend — though not so close as to have tipped me to this news!

Gingras and Salon go back to the web magazine’s beginnings, when he ponied up the first $50,000 or so in funding from a fund he controlled at Apple. I also was working with Salon’s founders as a consultant back then (in the fall of 1995) and one of the items Gingras supplied us with was a printer that for years afterwards was referred simply by his last name.

He’s a terrific visionary and a good hands-on boss, and most importantly one of the smartest people Salon could turn to if the company is to turn its fortunes around. As I reported recently, the company has been losing money faster than a sinking ship takes on water, so a turnaround is definitely in order.

Through all of the years and management changes, Salon consistently delivers quality content, and I’m sure that will not be changing. So, here’s one blogger wishing the new team success. Long live Salon!

Tags: Salon, Team Management, Channel Management, Printers, Management, Marketing, Hardware, Peripherals, David Weir

In addition to serving as a BNET Media analyst/blogger, David Weir is a veteran journalist and the author of several books. Weir is a co-founder and vice-president of the Center for Investigative Reporting, as well as an editorial board member of The Nation.

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1

Nohohome

05/06/09 | Report as spam

RE: Salon Replaces its CEO; Hires Veteran Gingras

This is, indeed, significant. Salon has enormous potential and I feel it hasn't continued to live up to its ability to present thoughtful and varied articles on current events and social themes. It was wonderful years ago and it would be fabulous to see it become an invaluable resource again. I used to look forward to checking its home page every morning and night to see what it covered. I'll keep my fingers crossed.
2

hotweir

05/06/09 | Report as spam

RE: Salon Replaces its CEO; Hires Veteran Gingras

Agreed.

Salon's main problem has never been its content, which rocks. Its problem is with its the business model.

Creating original content is very, very expensive, yet also Salon's "secret sauce."

When I worked there, in order to help offset that cost, I struggled (and eventually succeeded) to get a free AP feed of headlines on the site.

Another battle I waged was posting links to government docs, like speeches, White House releases, etc. Free content!

Sadly, these initiatives were often met with what I can only describe as disdain. I trust Richard Gingras to treat these legacy attitudes with his own appropriate disdain.

Salon can, and should, be a strong voice in new media. But some serious house-cleaning is in order if that is to happen.
3

koenjin

05/07/09 | Report as spam

RE: Salon Replaces its CEO; Hires Veteran Gingras

I agree with Nohohome. Frankly, Salon was great in early
days. (I realize that was when you worked there.) Time has
changed, and maybe the approach you took then makes more
sense now. Hope Gingras will get its edge back.
4

jburger

05/08/09 | Report as spam

RE: Salon Replaces its CEO; Hires Veteran Gingras

Knowing Richard Gingras I am sure he took the CEO position at Salon because he has a vision how to unleash the great potential of Salon in a way that preserves and promotes high level journalism in a sound economic model. I am very hopeful and like Nohohome I am keeping my fingers crossed.
5

hotweir

05/08/09 | Report as spam

RE: Salon Replaces its CEO; Hires Veteran Gingras

Thank you, jburger and koenjin for your comments. It is great to see that Richard has a lot of support -- I too believe he is a great choice for Salon, very loyal to it all these years, respectful of the great editorial content, and determined to help find a winning business strategy. I'm forecasting good things for Salon under Richard's leadership.