Re: ICON is dead

[joko@crl.com (Joe Kohn)]

(the following is Tom Weishaar's announcement about ICOM)

In the beginning was the end
----------------------------
     We are on the bank of the river now, drying off, exhausted, but  alive.
After months of swimming upstream, this month we quit.

     When I set up ICON a year ago, I felt it would guarantee Resource
Central's publications a long future. ICON had not only the monthly  income
from renewals of our longstanding Apple II publications, it also  had new
Macintosh and Windows publications coming on stream that would  generate new
members, new subscriptions, and eventually, more renewals.

     Unfortunately, my dream has turned into a nightmare. Projections  for
1995 show ICON's expenses would have been about $210,000, while  income
would have been only $140,000, a shortfall of 50 percent. Worse,  even the
low-cost guerrilla marketing efforts we've been doing for  Macrocosm, Solid
Windows, Config.sys, and our other publications have  been costing more than
they've brought in, so there's no salvation  there.

     We also operated at a significant loss during 1994. We were able to
cover our expenses by selling off many of our assets, such as our  retail
inventory and some of our office furniture and computer  equipment. But the
bottom line is that we ran out of money in January.

     As our remaining assets sell, we will have the cash to pay what we  owe
to our editors and contributors. However, we don't have the cash to  pay
back what we owe to our members for unfulfilled subscriptions, which is by
far the biggest liability we have. Since we simply don't have the money to
pay you back, we've made arrangements for you to get an  equivalent number
of issues of similar computer publications from  another publisher.

     If you were a subscriber to the Macintosh version of Studio City,  your
subscription has been converted into a subscription to the  HyperStudio
Journal, a new publication created by Studio City's editor,  Bill Lynn. You
will receive your first issue with a week or two.

     If you were a subscriber to any of our other publications, about  March
1 you'll get a letter from The Cobb Group, a computer newsletter  company
owned by Ziff-Davis, that describes a selection of their  publications. The
letter will include a card with a label that has your  name and address, the
ICON publication you subscribed to, and how many  issues were left on your
subscription. If you subscribed to more than  one of our publications,
you'll get a separate letter for each one. All  you have to do is select
which of The Cobb Group's publications you'd  like to receive and return the
card to them.

     The selection includes a variety of Macintosh, DOS, and Windows
publications. Most of them are paper newsletters, but there are also  some
disk publications.

On a personal note...
---------------------

     While it's painful to see Resource Central and ICON disintegrate  like
this, your support and loyalty gave me and those who worked with me over the
last ten years great careers. We want to thank you for that.  Those of you
who are left are the loyalest and bestest.

     I am now editing two of The Cobb Group's publications. They are
Quick$ense, which is for Quicken users, and $imply$ecure, which is for
Kiplinger's Simply Money users. Both of these are on the list of Cobb  Group
publications you can subscribe to. Our editors and staff are all  moving on
to a variety of new adventures. Thanks for accompanying us on  this one.

Sincerely,

Tom Weishaar