4media moves ahead with plans; Lem joins Radio Zet
4Media took another step toward its ambitious two-year goal of rivaling media powerhouse Agora last week. It announced that Dom Wydawniczy Wolne Slowo (publisher of daily Zycie), which 4Media bought in mid-January, would go public this year.
"There is no better way of pricing a company than taking it public," said Dariusz Kaszubski, vice president of 4Media's managing board. 4Media's plan is for Zycie to become one of the leading so-called "opinion-making" publications in Poland. Zycie was launched in 1996 and has an average daily circulation of 90,000.
According to its strategy presented last week, Wolne Slowo will become a 4Media subsidiary responsible for national publications. This is one of six main segments of the group that the firm believes vital to their plans, which include free local press, regional press, printing, Internet and regional radio stations.
While taking Wolne Slowo public is in-
-line with 4Media's goal of becoming the second publicly traded media group in Poland after Agora, gaining a foothold in the regional press market is also crucial.
Last week, 4Media announced that it would take over publicly traded Murawski Holding, a construction and pipeline company. As part of the 4Media group, Murawski would become responsible for coordinating local publications.
"We managed to talk PBK (Powszechny Bank Kredytowy) into this project," said Wojciech Krefft, president of 4Media's managing board. PBK and PBK Inwestycje are the main shareholders in Murawski Holding. 4Media, together with PBK, plan to restructure the holding. "In the future we might consider a merger with Polska Prasa Lokalna (4Media's local press subsidiary)," Kaszubski said.
Stanislaw Lem, the renowned science-fiction writer, is participating in a futuristic radio program launched last week by commercial broadcaster Radio Zet.
Only recently, the station was shaken by a conflict between their news team and Robert Kozyra, the director and editor-in-chief. Kozyra was charged with allowing the station to become overly commercialized. Meanwhile, according to Radio Zet's PR Manager Krzysztof Kouyoumdjian, no other station has tried to create a radio program on modern science. "Lem agreed to participate in 'Wrota czasu' (The Gates of Time), the station's new futuristic program, because he was impressed with the fact that the broadcaster would discuss modern science in such a way," Kouyoumdjian said. According to Kouyoumdjian, Radio Zet's new program is less "hermetic" than programs about science run on public media. "We are trying to find a way of presenting knowledge in a popular form," he said. But while the station's ambition is to present five different scientific projects per week, the program's daily segments are short, lasting no more than three minutes each.
Lem writes short introductory notes for three daily program segments. The notes are intended to motivate listeners to reflect on modern scientific problems such as genetic therapy or the future of cloning human organs for transplantation. Although "Wrota czasu" might be considered an intellectual program, above all it would appear to be a game. Listeners can participate by voting on scientific projects introduced by Lem, which are, according to them, most likely to be completed first.
"It's a game in which one can win a prize," Kouyoumdjian said. "Not necessarily now, though, because one of those projects might be finished in a few years' time." Once scientists announce that a particular project mentioned in the program is accomplished, Radio Zet will grant a prize to one of the listeners who voted for the project. "Wrota czasu" will be aired for the next seven weeks from Monday to Friday between 9:30 a.m. and 1 p.m.
Videowall Polska (VP), a digital-video wall company that broadcasts ad spots in shopping malls and hypermarkets around the country, announced that it would expand its operations this year.
The company said it planned to add 22 new "shallow screens" by the end of December. So far, VP's Philips shallow screens have been in eight shopping malls and hypermarkets across the country. In addition, the company has one 35 square-meter video wall, the so-called Philips Alfresco, outside Warsaw's Forum Hotel. In a few weeks, a 20 square-meter version of that screen will appear on the facade of the Bagatela Theater in Krakow. VP also plans to place up to 10 Alfresco screens in other places. Founded in June 1999, VP began by installing screens in areas where Pope John Paul II held services during his last visit to Poland.
According to Piotr Kalinowski, VP's public relations director, such a modern form of outdoor advertising is a kind of medium that combines outdoor advertising with TV advertising. "Video walls are attractive for viewers as they broadcast ads with the highest digital quality," he said. Ads are transmitted via satellite from Bielsko-Biala in southern Poland, near the company's headquarters in Pszczyna.
Beata Fertak of Cityboard Media, an outdoor advertising company, said that digital-video walls cannot really be considered competition for classical outdoor advertising like billboards. "It's incomparably more expensive to install such a screen," Fertak said. The screen located at Warsaw's Forum Hotel cost $1.5 million.
Justyna Wrobel
contributed to this column.
