Smart Bart steals Littleton, Thompson, steels Variety's online future

By Tom Tapp

Wow.

I guess we all knew it was coming, but wow.

The Hollywood Reporter's Cynthia Littleton and Anne Thompson have jumped ship to Variety, according to that paper's Peter Bart -- as well as Nikki Finke.

With The Reporter laying off staff and cutting costs, it was only a matter of time before Variety prevailed in the Trade Wars (and make no mistake, that's what's happened here). But it may not really matter.

Even before I left Variety in early 2006, it was clear the competition wasn't The Reporter. That race hadn't mattered for years. But increasing Hollywood coverage from The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times and The Los Angeles Times was important.

Now you can throw a fourth, much larger force into the equation: The internet.

The proliferation of niche sites online is proving a challenge for Variety and other old-line publications that cover the industry. (See today's Ad Age story that Premiere is folding its print product but preserving its website.)

That's why the Littleton-Thompson story is so interesting: Both of them bring valuable internet savvy.

From Variety:

Littleton assumes the title of deputy editor for news development and Thompson, deputy editor, Variety.com. They will contribute both as editors and columnists, with their work appearing online and in print across the spectrum of Variety media products.

"Variety.com is developing a voice that is separate and distinctive from those of Daily Variety Gotham, Daily Variety or Weekly Variety," Bart said. "Littleton and Thompson will play a pivotal role in nurturing this distinctive content."

While Finke calls her "soft," Thompson's RiskyBiz blog was a smart, informed must-read for me each day. She gets the online space and what people in the industry need from it. (According to FishBowLA, "Thompson's blog won't travel with her, but RiskyBusinessBlog.com will be launched.")

Littleton, according to Finke, "is taking a marquee role as a Variety columnist who will also have a strong online presence."

It's a move that indicates what the smartest print brands should be doing at the moment; instead of retrenching and cutting budgets across the board, they should be picking off key personnel from suffering rivals and building smart online offerings around them.

After all, strong personalities work well on the internet. Maybe that's why Peter Bart gets it.