Sticking your neck in the sand?

Making sense of the world around us can mean pausing to reflect on recent events and how they fit into the reality of business. It happened to me yesterday. A business owner protested, "I just can't deal with computers," when I offered to email information to them. That's an enviable position on days when technology glitches make life challenging. It's not real, however.

Online mediums continue to gain in importance when compared with traditional media including publishing. BusinessWeek moved top editor John Byrne from print to online media recently. Byrne's responsibilities include oversight of BusinessWeek.com, one of the leading news sites. BusinessWeek.com users increased by 22% in the past year. Unique users per month now average more than 6.7 million.

Given that kind of growth, can a small business owner really ignore the internet?

At the May Editor/Publisher Interactive Conference in Miami the focus was on using video to beef up online viewers. Byrne spoke to participants, discussing the potential new venture of a BusinessWeek YouTube. While he was referring to a service that would link business ideas with venture capital, the implications are clear: cross-platforms for publishers.

Given the convergence of media, does sticking your neck in the sand make any sense at all?