Forgive The VAR Guy for being a little slow, but he just noticed Spencer F. Katt is missing from the redesigned print edition of eWeek (formerly PC Week). Hmmm. Where did everyone’s favorite IT feline go? And wasn’t Spencer F. Katt the purrrfect personality to pen a blog?
Here kitty, kitty, kitty. The VAR Guy misses you so. During the early and mid-1990s, Spencer F. Katt was a must-read for our resident blogger. When the latest, hefty edition of PC Week (now eWeek) hit The VAR Guy’s desk, our anonymous blogger immediately flipped to the back page for Spencer’s gossip.
- What city ordinances did Larry Ellison’s super-loud jet violate that week?
- When — if ever — would Microsoft ship Windows Chicago (a.k.a. Windows 95)?
- Did OS/2 die … again?
Spencer F. Katt always seemed to have the best industry gossip.But unfortunately, eWeek’s editorial pages now close with a weekly top 10 list. Ummm. Shouldn’t we leave that to Letterman?
As the world moved online, Spencer did launch his own blog. But apparently it didn’t gain critical mass. Perhaps the print veteran’s tiny paws couldn’t type fast enough to keep up with the blogosphere.
Whatever the case, The VAR Guy sure misses Spencer F. Katt — and the anonymous sources who supplied his personality. If Spencer is alive and well in print or online, somebody please alert The VAR Guy.
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This was always my favorite part of the magazine — in fact, I usually read each issue from back to front because Katt’s column always appeared on the last page or else on the inside back cover.
The Litter Box has been cleaned for the final time!
Zac: Glad you share The VAR Guy’s concern for Spencer’s well-being. Just to be clear: The feline could be alive and well living in some magazine or on a Web site. But The VAR Guy hasn’t been able to find him.
I guess, like with Schrodinger’s cat, you have not been able to peek into the box yet. Until you do, this cat is both dead or alive…
Guess the VAR Guy has forgotten how to Google.
http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Features/Kattoon/
Ryzzen: Cute. The VAR Guy saw that site archive, too. But look closely: The last update is December 2007, where Spencer offers a dream mashup for 2008. Um, it’s now 2009 and no sign of Spencer anywhere.
I’ll miss him too.
This one goes up to November 2008:
http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Features/The-Adventures-of-Spencer-F-Katt/
And this one’s a “tribute” to Bill Gates from June 2008:
http://www.eweek.com/c/a/IT-Infrastructure/A-Comical-Look-Back-at-Bill-Gates/
So nothing since November 2008. Maybe he took a break for the holidays? He still seems to be employed by eWeek. (His real name is Paul Connolly)
I know the answer to this one…
Q: Who Killed Spencer F. Katt?
A: The fake Steve Jobs, with a Zune, in the wii lounge!
(Have I been playing too much Clue?)
We’ll miss you Spencer.
A few issues back, he announced his retirement -whether forced or voluntary wasn’t really, truly, apparent from his column- but he is gone from the pages of eWeek -which over the last decade, has become thinner and thinner, so that now, it contains little of interest and it takes only a minute to read.
Seanlynch: That’s classic. You should blog (but please don’t compete with The VAR Guy).
Actionbastard: Early retirement seems to be the norm in this economy. Here’s an interesting twist: Nine Lives Media Inc. (The VAR Guy’s owner) is looking to hire. Sounds like the purrrfect company for a Katt trying to claw his way back into the IT media industry, don’t you think?
Ryzzen: The VAR Guy respectfully disagrees with your assertion that Paul is key person behind Spencer. The fictional eWeek character was written by multiple real-life characters. And one of those real-world sources sent The VAR Guy an email claiming Spence signed off for the last time in December…
Ryzzen: I haven’t read PCWeek/eWeek for many years, but back when I did, I always thought the Kat was really sci-fi author Jerry Pournelle.
I too used to read eWeek in reverse, starting with Spencer Katt. I think that was a big mistake to “retire” his column. The value of eWeek just dropped 50% in my book. RIP Spencer Katt
nhsgary: The wonderful thing about Katts, um cats, is that they have nine lives. Perhaps eWeek will bring Spence back at some point… no predictions here, but … …
I came up through the ranks reading MacWeek when I was an Apple VAR (remember Mac The Knife? I never was able to forward a good rumor for the free coffee mug), and when MacWeek merged with PCWeek, I was happy to make the transition since I had migrated from Mac’s to PC’s. I eagerly awaited Spencer’s column every week, right up until my layoff from American Family Insurance this past October. It was the first things I went looking for online, and is one of the things I will truly miss.
Rumor Central and Spencer F. Katt was the very best thing about Eweek. I missed him several weeks ago but just today decided to Google and find out why the Katt wasn’t there anymore. Without the Katt, Eweek is just another piece of junk mail and goes into the trash with out being read.
Benny: Whether you loved or hated Spencer, there’s no doubt the Katt was a “personality.” Somehow, IT publications (and many of their web sites) have forgotten they need personality to engage readers.
News wires and rehashed news are easy. Delivering content with personality — like Spencer F. Katt did — is a real challenge.
Well this is sad Spencer F. Katt is gone. I used to enjoy this publication back when PC Week has things that interested me. While I still find interesting things in it, I just don’t have the time anymore to care about everything going on in the IT industry anymore. This publication will never be the same with out the Katt. I had stopped a few publications that get sent to me, and if I would have known, eweek would have been on the list. I would have had it in digital format instead.
Without the Katt, this magazine has been bumped down to bathroom magazine, rather then what I read on the way to work. XD
Have you noticed how dry this magazine has become with out a personality like spencer katt? I noticed the first magazine of this year with the director in charge of it talking about how things have changed for the magazine. It seemed only fair to at least mention spencers dissapearance. I have lost most of my interest in this magazine, especially now being a bi-monthly one.
“there’s no doubt the Katt was a “personality.” Somehow, IT publications (and many of their web sites) have forgotten they need personality to engage readers.”
I couldn’t have said it better myself, it is quite true. Many of the articals I have read lately just seem so drab. Sadly, maybe this is the way they want the magazine, turning it into an entirely professionalized magazine with no personality. I am still deciding if reading this publication or saving trees is more important right now..
Justin: The VAR Guy doesn’t want to turn this into a personal attack on the hard-working folks who put out the magazine. But in terms of understanding brand equity and brand loyalty, the folks who run the magazine made a mistake when they put Spence to sleep.
Bring back Spencer! I’m a little back-logged in my magazine reading (as might guess from this posting) and I’m just Googling around trying to see if Rumor Central is still alive online (nope). In addition to the above comments I’d add that some of the cartoons were laugh-out-loud hilarious; I’ve got one clipped out laying around the office about privacy/identity theft (which I think featured some cops remarking about the porn Katt was surfing). It’s a big loss for that trade mag. Worst thing to happen since Network Computing folded; now there was a magazine that had personality back-to-front with great technical value!
BostonITGuy: The VAR Guy agrees with you on all points. And yes, Network Computing was a great read. In fact, The VAR Guy once work with Network Computing’s former Editor in Chief and some of the founding team members. Talented team, indeed.
Just happened upon this thread. I was the voice and cyber-puppeteer for Spencer’s incarnation as a virtual character on ZDTV circa 1999/2000. Of course, ZDTV has morphed into Tech TV and is now known as G4. It was a great gig while it lasted, giving me a regional Emmy. Tech Bubble… good times.
NeoGeezer: Glad you visited The VAR Guy. Our resident blogger doesn’t have a spoken voice (yet). But if he ever needs one, he now knows where to turn…
I think Spencer’s demise is a sign of the times. Back in the late ’80s and early ’90s, the PC tech world was relatively small and intimate. It was a time when there were LOTS of new, quirky products (many of them hardware-intensive) with no clear 800 pound gorillas. Even Microsoft wasn’t THAT huge – I recall seeing Bill Gates at a COMDEX party in an Adidas running suit.
With so much opportunity and with good number of small players jockeying for the leadership of the entire industry, Spencer’s snippets were truly relevant, interesting, and fun.
Fast-forward 20 years: The industry is mature, Microsoft and Google are bigger and more influental than anyone can can really grasp, and even the perhaps-looming Windows vs Chrome thing is mundane (they’re just mildly differentiated versions of the same thing – nothing revolutionary there).
Jobs and Ellison are still around, still doing their guru/lunatic fringe thing, but they’re decidedly middle-aged and uninteresting. No one makes novel hardware gadgets anymore – the ramp is too steep, and in any case it’s all been done.
In such a sadly hum-drum world, there’s no place for the Katt.
Dave: The VAR Guy respectfully disagrees with you. IT gossip remains more popular than ever. Grape vines continue to grow.
Spencer died because his master forgot how to feed and nurture the Katt.
Like other folks, I would always read eWeek back-to-front just to get to Katt’s page first, but now with a lame top-10 list, it’s just eWeak.
Of course SFK was completely fictional (you’ll see the moniker in the copyright notice on the eWeek web site now,) but that’s what made the page so enjoyable. With the column’s demise I’ve been forced to now get my industry humor from Britts in the various silicon.com e-news publications. Still though, nothing quite compares to the ‘ole Kattoon and Rumor Central. Bring that Katt back!
Spencer F. Katt was a must read for me at the dawn of my I.T. career way back in 1988. I would read the Katt every month. ‘Tis a sad day indeed that the Katt is no longer here to inform and entertain. Brink back the Katt!
JesseV: You’ve stumbled across a blog entry that won’t seem to die, even though Le Katt appears dead and buried…
I remember in the 80′s when PC Week was a weekly tabloid type of publication. The word heafty came to mind. A good hour of reading about all of the latest hardware, when the universality of the PC platform was still not a given, and Microsoft was just one of numerous software companies.
How times have changed.
Spencer F Katt was my favorite page of the entire publication. I have been receiving it for almost 23 years, and now it is but a ghost of its former past. I can’t even seem to get them to quit sending it to me… when it comes every other month, I simply put it in the recycle bin at work.
It went from being a major weekly periodical devoted to all things computer and innovation to being an IT industry brochure about the mega-IT companies. The geeks here where I work don’t even read it anymore.
I guess George Harrison said it best… All things must pass. RIP Spence. E-Week probably will not be around much longer either.
Amourdutigre
Amourdutigre: It’s rather amazing how Spencer chatter keeps popping up on TheVARguy.com. You just can’t keep a good cat down… … Or can you?
eWeek print is thin, but eWeek.com is pretty darn big these days. The VAR Guy just wishes major IT media sites had a bit more peeeersonality.
-TVG
I just saw the reply to my post from last January!
I know that webzines are all the rage, but I never read them. You cannot read a web page in the jacuzzi. If a publisher wants my readership of an advertisement driven ‘zine in a periodic format, they will have to provide me with two things: First, they need to have a paper copy that I can read at my leasure and is not dependant on a computer or internet access, and second, they have to have content that I am interested in. Unfortunately, the only thing that held my interest in e-week these last four years has been Rumor Central with SFK. Now the Katt is gone, and print e-week is as I said, essentially on large advert. It is a shame actually, as I said previoiusly, I remember when PC week was a HUGE weekly tabloid that had solid content on a wide variety of topics, both hardware (my interest) and software.
They could do it again if there was a will to do so.
I do sorely miss PC week and Spence.
Best,
Amourdutigre
Amourdutigre: Ziff isn’t to blame for print eWeek (formerly PCWeek) getting thin… that’s just a sign of the times. But Spence is a great brand. Too bad he died a quiet death.
-TVG
He’s back…at eWeek and on the last page as before as of the 16 May 2011 (vol 28 no 9) issue.