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Greg Satell Digital Tonto: What is a business model? Yesterday at 11:04 | Greg SatellHow do you expect to make money?There is probably no more important question in business.

If you cant answer that, youre not likely to get very far or, in fact, anywhere at all.

Of course, conditions can change and very quickly, so the question is a fluid one. A highly competitive approach ten years ago might not be viable today and companies that are barley five years old are commanding valuations in the billions.

Thats why theres so much talk about business models. Somebody claims to have new one, while another says that an old one is defunct. But what is a business model really? As innovation researcher Tim Kastelle points out, there a multitude of definitions representing different points of view. That can be confusing. Its time to clear things up.

For instance, Henry Ford realized that by using an assembly line to manufacture cars, he could take a very niche product, a curiosity really, and make it into a product for the masses. Lou Gerstner transformed IBMs diverse product line into a powerful consulting model. More recently, the Google guys realized that the same logic that conveys authority is an academic setting could create a better search engine.

Sometimes, the innovation isnt about the product itself, but merely the way its sold. Tim Kastelle gives a great example in the story of Xerox, where they failed when they tried to sell copiers but then when on to great success when they began leasing them.

In other words, a business model is a lot more than just a key insight (Jon Kleinberg of Cornell had an idea for a search engine that was very similar and, some believe, superior to Googles concept, but it never really gained traction). You need to also figure out the mundane stuff, like how much your product will cost to make, who youll sell it to and so on.

However, even after you have all that figured out, you still need to get some idea if your business will be steady for years, grow very quickly or whether its likely to decline over time. For that, youll need more than just clever ideas, youll need to plug in some numbers.

Thats fairly obvious with a start-up, but its also true of an established business. As Ive pointed out before, prediction is a tricky business, even if you have a wealth of data at your disposal. The past cant be automatically extrapolated into the future.

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Digital Tonto: What is a business model?

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By Adam Dachis, Lifehacker

You share music, rip DVDs, make Hitler whine about your first world problems, and much more in the course of your regular online activities and more often than not, you do these things without giving a thought to the fact that you're actually breaking the law. Here's a look at how you're inevitably circumventing copyright law and what you can do to protect yourself.

Why it's almost impossible to avoid breaking copyright law Copyright law is extremely complex. It's so complex that lawyers, lawmakers, and experts heavily argue over how it's interpreted and applied. Nonetheless, if you commit a crime, you can't use ignorance as an excuse. The law doesn't (officially) offer leniency for misunderstanding or lack of knowledge. So how can you comply with convoluted copyright laws when you can't realistically understand them all? You can't, and so you may end up breaking these laws on a regular basis without ever knowing it.

To make matters worse, a spectrum of illegality makes it acceptable to break the rules in some circumstances yet not others. Experience tells us that uploading a home video to a video sharing website (e.g. YouTube) that features a copyrighted song is sometimes okay, but downloading a television episode is not.

Both of these actions are similarly illegal, but the first example is regularly tolerated while the second can lead to a loss of Internet connectivity, a fine, or even jail time (depending on the number of offenses and how often copyright holders decide to "catch" you).

Just as it's easier for us to circumvent copyright law online, it's easier for copyright holders to come after us. I spoke with Derek Bambauer, assistant professor of law at Brooklyn Law School, who explained this is particularly problematic because infringement is often only a byproduct of the way we communicate and bears no intention of doing anything illegal:

The tricky thing is, if you and I want to share a recipe then I photocopy it and then come over to your office and give it to you so it's just you and me. If I want to do it online, the odds are pretty good that we're going to do it on a social network or a blog or something like that. That means that the blog is all of the sudden a choke point something that people who want to keep us from doing this can exert control over. The way the law deals with this is with the notice of takedown under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), but that's just on the copyright owner's say-so. The copyright owner says "That's infringing!" and the site should take it down. You can get it back up, but you have to file a counter notice and it takes somewhere between 10 and 14 days. It's a lot of hassle. Copyright owners, through the DMCA, have a good deal of control over the way we communicate.

But because rights holders are often fickle about what they choose to have removed and what to leave alone, it's difficult to rely on the law for guidance. The result is that we the average users and consumers of the Internet are unsure of how to proceed when dealing with copyrighted works and either have to assume we have no rights or make our best guess and hope it doesn't lead to legal consequences.

It all comes down to this reality: you will often have to circumvent or ignore copyright law to go on with your regular activities. Fortunately, there are ways to handle these circumstances better and keep yourself out of trouble. In this post, we're going to look at specific situations you encounter on a regular basis and what you can do to protect yourself.

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How you break digital law daily (and what to do)

STEVE LADURANTAYE MEDIA REPORTER Published Monday, Mar. 05, 2012 9:59AM EST Last updated Monday, Mar. 05, 2012 10:58AM EST

Newspapers desperate to shift their businesses online are earning $1 in digital advertising revenue for every $7 they are losing in their print products.

The Pew Research Centers Project for Excellence in Journalism studied 38 newspapers in the United States, and cited cultural inertia for the papers inability to seize new revenue opportunities.

The industry is caught in a trap, the report states, where declining print revenues provide most of the money but digital revenue is the only category seeing growth.

Its reflected in their sales forces where print ad reps outnumber digital ad reps 3-to-1.

The shift to replace losses in print ad revenue with new digital revenue is taking longer and proving more difficult than executives want and at the current rate most newspapers continue to contract with alarming speed, the report stated, adding that the executives they interviewed considered replacing print revenue an existential issue.

The biggest challenge, the report stated, is that managers are convinced the old way of doing things will salvage whats left of their ad bases.

Newspaper executives described an industry still caught between the gravitational pull of the legacy tradition and the need to chart a faster digital course, the report stated. A number of them worried that their companies simply had too many people whether it be in the newsroom, the boardroom or on the sales staff who were too attached to the old way of doing things.

The study focused on smaller papers, since most U.S. papers fit in that category 22 have circulations under 25,000, seven have circulations between 25,000 and 50,000, and nine have circulations of 50,000 or more (including three with circulations more than 100,000).

While the study focused on American papers, Canadian newspaper owners face the same challenge.

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U.S. newspapers slow to grow digital ad revenue: survey

STEVE LADURANTAYE MEDIA REPORTER Published Monday, Mar. 05, 2012 9:59AM EST Last updated Monday, Mar. 05, 2012 10:58AM EST

Newspapers desperate to shift their businesses online are earning $1 in digital advertising revenue for every $7 they are losing in their print products.

The Pew Research Centers Project for Excellence in Journalism studied 38 newspapers in the United States, and cited cultural inertia for the papers inability to seize new revenue opportunities.

The industry is caught in a trap, the report states, where declining print revenues provide most of the money but digital revenue is the only category seeing growth.

Its reflected in their sales forces where print ad reps outnumber digital ad reps 3-to-1.

The shift to replace losses in print ad revenue with new digital revenue is taking longer and proving more difficult than executives want and at the current rate most newspapers continue to contract with alarming speed, the report stated, adding that the executives they interviewed considered replacing print revenue an existential issue.

The biggest challenge, the report stated, is that managers are convinced the old way of doing things will salvage whats left of their ad bases.

Newspaper executives described an industry still caught between the gravitational pull of the legacy tradition and the need to chart a faster digital course, the report stated. A number of them worried that their companies simply had too many people whether it be in the newsroom, the boardroom or on the sales staff who were too attached to the old way of doing things.

The study focused on smaller papers, since most U.S. papers fit in that category 22 have circulations under 25,000, seven have circulations between 25,000 and 50,000, and nine have circulations of 50,000 or more (including three with circulations more than 100,000).

While the study focused on American papers, Canadian newspaper owners face the same challenge.

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Newspapers slow to grow digital ad revenues: survey

Let the fight begin ... Mark Bouris and Jeff Fenech. Illustration: John Shakespeare

Pretty-faced celebrity entrepreneur Mark Bouris might not look so photogenic in June. The Yellow Brick Road founder has agreed to take on the Marrickville Mauler and three-weight former world champion Jeff Fenech in the boxing ring.

''It may be a way to make some money. Mark Bouris may pay me not to hurt him,'' Fenech told CBD about the bout, which will raise money for the Nick Moore-chaired Police Boys' Club of NSW (aka PCYC).

The Punchbowl-raised Bouris better start practising his ducking skills. The 47-year-old Fenech has not trained this hard for years.

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''I have lost 13 kilograms in four weeks,'' said Fenech, who has dropped down to 76.5 kilograms. ''I feel good, ya know.

''Mark Bouris better be a wizard or he'll be in trouble.''

But Fenech's intense training program is not just about fitness.

''If I want to take my shirt off in the ring I want to look good. I still have a bit of an ego, so I don't want to look like an old fat thing.''

Bouris agreed to enter the event only after being pestered by the Inner Metro PCYC Sergeant Jim Duignan, who he met at the Woolloomooloo PCYC club where he sometimes trains.

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Mouth versus maul in Punchup at PCYC