Business quadruplet

In 2005 Schibsted launched E24.se business news online service (SWE). The site grew amazingly big reaching now more than 700.000 unique weekly visitors. It is very good result in a country of 9 million inhabitants.

E24.se left Bonnier’s Dagens Industri’s (daily business tabloid) site behind from the start even though DI was the brand of the business dailies in the country. Concept was just better. However, Di.se was nominated the best business site of 2007 in Sweden and it gets more than 540.000 unique weekly visitors.

Sanoma Corporation’s Taloussanomat (FIN) renewed its business news site totally in 2006. It weekly unique visitors jumped from about 50.000 to more than 300.000 and the growth continues. Just at the end of the year Taloussanomat closed the paper and focuses online service only. The paper version never reached profitability during its 10 year existence.

While ago Alma Media’s Kauppalehti (FIN) passed Taloussanomat to be the leading business site getting 380.000 unique weekly visitors. This week Kauppalehti launched new service to answer the competition. Kauppalehti is publishes as printed version too.

One thing is very interesting. All of these sites look very similar. Is it the optimal way for their customer segment or are the Finns just following the Swedish trend setters? Could there be an other kind of concept. Ok, I’d admit that Kauppalehti differs a little bit compared to the others. Check the sites yourself: E24.se, DI.se, Taloussanomat.fi, Kauppalehti Online.

Note: Until April 2008, I work for the company that publishes Taloussanomat.

Power of a full broadsheet page

Saturday Jan 19th 2008, Helsingin Sanomat used almost one broadsheet page for stories about three different cases of extreme and insane violence.

In the first case a man aged 21 murdered his two younger sisters. In the second case four young men aged 17 to 21 beat, tortured and killed two men previously unknown to them and finally tried to burn the apartment where the victims were. In the last case a 35 year old man stabbed a tourist to dead without any reason.

The stories were written in detailed format, yet without any attempts to be scandalous. The style and the wide space used had an effect. It made me think a lot. How a country that is top ranked in OECD basic education studies can have a such holes in its mental care system? All of the cases were irrational, extreme and just insane.

My friend told me that he got exactly the same effect after opening the page. By gathering all the stories to the same page the paper forced us the readers to really think about the madness behind all of the stories. At least for me it worked.

Note: I work for the company that publishes Helsingin Sanomat.

Delicious, delicious, del…

Though trying to keep up an image of a healthy and sporty habits I have to admit that delicious food is my weakness. And ice cream. Here is three food related experiences.

Delicious No 1: For a Christmas and New Year I had a pleasure to visit Spain. In Oviedo we went to a typical restaurant for enjoying few starters and some wine. There I was introduced to local Asturian specialty called callos, which is certain type of tripe. There is a difference how they make it in Asturia or Madrid or in other countries. Here is a recipe for Callos a la Asturiana (Spanish) and Callos a la Madrilena (English). Enjoy!

Delicious No 2: A week ago in Istanbul I went for a lunch to Ciya with Clara. A comment in NY Times described the restaurant as a “culinary adventure“. That is true – we loved it. For starters we had a wide selection of cold mezes including dolmas and stuffed egg plants. For the main course we shared two kinds of soups. Our language skills are still limited, so can’t really tell what it exactly was. However, the lunch was superb! It is no wander that the Hedonist Guide names Ciya as Istanbul’s best restaurant. Ciya is a good reason to visit Istanbul. Click for map here.

Delicious No 3: Time to time we tend to smoke fish in our summer place. Often it is salmon or perch but one of our favourites is smoked vendace (Coregonus albula). The food is not only experience. The smoking process itself is great fun and traditional part of my family’s summer activities. In smoked fish both happiness of cooking and tasty food are tightly connected. When next time in Finland, you should taste smoked fish.

Photos: No 1. Callos by Micheo (CC), No 2. Ciya Sofrasi by Margin (CC), and No 3. Smoking vendace by me (CC).

Facebored

If the number of average page impressions of Facebook users would be disclosed, I’d bet they were dramatically fallen among members who joined the network 5 months ago. Should not draw too direct conclusions from own behaviour, but it was probably in line with all of the Finns who joined the same time.

First there were the enthusiasm. People were looking friends’ status updates and answering quizs and uploading all potential applications. I guess that last fall Big Brother 2007 (Finland) didn’t get so much audience as it would have without the service. There were competing way for spending spare time, as you could follow who is doing what and where and with whom? At my bravest Facebook moment, I marked some of my favourite movies and books. And exciting enough, I even answered “How normal are you?” quiz…

And now? Lately I’ve been quite passive with it. Sent few messages but ignored most of the super wall, fun wall, vampire wall, water fall and whatever invitations. I don’t hang in the service in daily basis. And I’m quite sure the behaviour is similar compared to my friends joined at the same time. We’re starting to be bored or very bored. Number of users grows but what happens to their activity in the site?

I agree with the headline of Guardian’s Bobbie Johnson blog: “Facebook is so last year”. It is still running great and gaining new customers worldwide. But, worth of $15.000.000.000? No, it can’t be. After all, it is very boring.

Halosenniemi winter day

One of my favourite places in Finland is Rantatie area at Lake Tuusula. Many late 19th and early 20th century artists used to live there creating a lively community. Composer Jean Sibelius and writer Juhani Aho and poet J.H. Erkko used to live there and poet Eino Leino stayed often as a guest in Onnela Artist residence.

Most frequently I tend to visit Halosenniemi, which used to be home of painter Pekka Halonen (1865-1933) and his family. Halonen studied in Académie Julian and Académie Colarossi in Paris. Later on he was taught by Paul Gaugain.

Halosenniemi locates in the shore of Lake Tuusula quite near Sibelius’ home Ainola. The design of the huge log building have got inspiration from Karelianism, a National Romantic cultural phenomena started at late 19th century.

Today was clear, sunny and somewhat cold winter day. The lake had a (thin) ice cover and the bravest ones were already skating. Some of them seemed to enjoy a break with hot chocolate in Halosenniemi. I took few pictures from Halosenniemi itself and more about the enjoyable winter day at Lake Tuusula. Afternoon light was amazing!

Click here to see Halonen’s paintings (Finnish National Gallery).