IN THE DAYS AND WEEKS FOLLOWING THE TERRORIST ATTACKS in New York and Washington, D.C., many of you turned to the Internet and email to make fast, two-way connections with others in the GSB community. (See the Dean’s letter at right for details.) In such crises, this magazine cannot compete effectively with the latest communication technologies, or even, for that matter, with the old telegraph and telephone. So what role does the printed quarterly Stanford Business magazine play in this age of Web pages, e-books, and email newsletters?

You told us in a recent survey—mailed to 15,000 alums and emailed to 8,000 others, which in itself suggests there is no one-size-suits-all method of getting information to you—that fast-paced communications don’t always provide the nourishment you seek and that you look forward to picking up the latest issue and having something catch your eye, your mind, your heart.

The consultants who gathered the information from 4,500 surveys and focus groups in 14 cities concluded that “the magazine is a ‘must-read’ for most alumni.” And while some alums, especially younger ones, said they are “very interested” in online access to the magazine, far more expressed interest in receiving a paper copy.

“Reading habits reflect lifestyles,” the consultants noted. The magazine is “leisure reading to some, an important professional education resource for others. The printed version was lauded by most, but considered unnecessary by some younger alumni, who prefer electronic ‘digest’ communications.”

Given these responses, it is possible the paper magazine will disappear someday, but it won’t happen tomorrow. “If it doesn’t come in the mail, there’s no way I’ll go look for it,” one alum commented about Class Notes, the most popular part of the magazine.

Another alum who reads on paper said, “If I see something I like, I go to the Web site and email articles to clients. For me the Web is value-added, but not necessarily the way I read.” Another pointed to the different strengths of these media. There are many “things I want to know that I come looking for,” he said, which is a strength of the Web. But there are also “things I didn’t know I wanted that the GSB can make me aware of.” Flipping through the pages of a magazine still offers this serendipity better than most Web sites.

Contributors to this printed and Web issue include freelance writer Karl Schoenberger, who wrote the feature story on educational reform—a subject he found to be one of the most convoluted he has had to unravel in his 20 years as a journalist. “I look to my sources for clarity, but practically everyone I talked to for this story warned me how complicated the issues were,” he says. Given the “mind-numbing” amount of research and ideological hyperbole surrounding the reform debate, Schoenberger offers a “snapshot” of some of our alums in the thick of the entrepreneurial approach to reform.

Photographer Timothy Archibald took the pictures for the education story, as well as for the article on a Richmond, Calif., firm working its way out of crisis. A Richmond resident himself, Archibald “was amazed with the things that are uncelebrated—going on in my own back yard.”

Kathy O'Toole
Editor