With the much anticipated launch of
Inside.com, the Web-based media and business news service, fast approaching, the
company’s parent, Powerful Media Inc., announced that it has acquired
PrePub.com, a Web site launched by agent Noah Lukeman last year to track
title acquisitions and rights deals.
Powerful Media was formed by Kurt
Andersen, former editor-in-chief at New York magazine; Deanna Brown, former
president of Brill’s Content; and Michael Hirschorn, former editor-in-chief of
Spin magazine. Powerful Media expects to launch Inside.com this spring. The site
will specialize in covering the business side of the books, TV and film, music
and technology industries.
Hirschorn told PW that Inside.com
will provide a mix of free and subscription services and that the firm also
plans to eventually launch a print magazine. He said that PrePub.com will serve
as the initial basis for Book Tracker, a subscription service database to be
offered through the site that will track book properties from the initial rights
sale until the book’s publciation. Book Tracker is supervised by P.J. Mark, a
former scout with Mary Anne Thompson Associates. The editor of Inside.com’s
Books section is Sara Nelson, formerly with Oxygen.com and a managing editor of
the AOL and Web-based book information site Book Report.
The Book Tracker databse will be
searchable in a variety of ways and will track 15 categories of data, including
agent, editor and book synopsis as well as film, TV and other rights. Hirschorn
said the database will be a "tool for people in the business and a source
for stories for us."