Andy Bourland, Super Genius, Launches Up2Speed, the Best Site Ever About I-Marketing

ANDOVER, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--July 1, 2003--(This press release is dedicated to the rock stars at Slashdot.org. Why? Let's face it: press releases are kind of bogus, so we may as well be shameless about it: If we get a link from Slashdot, we'll get tons of traffic. Best of all, we actually have a legitimate Slashdot angle to the story. Read on ...)

This is a press release about an entrepreneur named Andy Bourland. He's a guy who can spot a trend. In the 1970s, he sold Earth Shoes and waterbeds. In the 1990s, he sold web media. In 1996, he started Andover.net, which ultimately included several leading technology sites, including Slashdot (see!). It later IPOed and went platinum.

“But publishing a web site is hard”

He thought, "That was cool." So in 1997 he started another company called ClickZ. It was also a big hit, becoming among the most popular web media companies about Internet marketing. In 2000, he sold it to Internet.com for millions. He laughed all the way to the bank, like this: "Mwaa-haa-haa!" until he met the taxman, who gave him a spanking. Ouch.

Meanwhile, another smart guy named John Audette started Aventive.com in 1995, featuring email discussion lists about Internet marketing, including I-Sales, I-Search, I-PR -- 10 in all, read by thousands daily. But after eight years, John was tired and wanted to sell.

Meanwhile again (paragraph transitions are hard), five more smart e-marketing consultants -- Rick Bruner, John Engler, Steve Hall, Robert Loch and Olivier Travers -- spotted opportunity: despite lots of good Internet marketing web sites, none aggregated industry news well. "But publishing a web site is hard," they moaned. "Wait, publishing a weblog is easy!" they cheered. Thus was born MarketingFix.com.

Yet, great as MarketingFix was, one thing could make it better: money. "I know a guy named Andy," said Rick. So Andy returned from his mansion in Tahiti (not really) and bought MarketingFix, plus Adventive.

Hence, we proudly present Up2Speed.com, the best damn online media company ever for Internet marketing news, advice and consulting -- period. So much more to tell, but we've hit our word limit, so just go see for yourself: http://www.up2speed.com.