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Ars Technica was created by Ken Fisher and John Stokes in 1998 to publish computer hardware and software-related news articles and guides;^[1] in their words, "the best multi-OS, PC hardware, and tech coverage possible while [..] having fun, being productive, and being as informative and as accurate as possible."^[2] Fisher created the limited liability company Ars Technica that year to control the website.^[3] The site's writers were geographically distributed in the United States at the time, most attending graduate school; Fisher lived in Boston, Stokes in Chicago, and the other writers their respective cities.^[3]^[4] Ars Technica published news—generally aggregated from other news sites by the staff—, original reviews, original guides, and other content of interest to computer enthusiasts. The articles ranged in size from one-paragraph to multiple pages; for example, a detailed 2,500-word guide on CPU architecture published in 2000 named "Understanding CPU caching and performance".^[5]

The website's title "Ars Technica" is a Latin attributive construction that translates to "Art of Technology".^[1]

primaries edit

^[4]

^[5]

^[2]

original description from early 2000:

When it comes to news, opinions, and technology reviews, prosumers want content that informs, not conforms to industry hoopla or some IT Manager’s idea of proven technology. And we’re gonna give it to you.

—Ars Technica, April 2000

http://arstechnica.com/site/press/

"Arstechnica.com is part of the Condé Nast Digital Business Group, comprised of Wired.com, Arstechnica.com, Portfolio.com, Golfdigest.com and Reddit.com."

http://arstechnica.com/site/about-ars-technica.ars

At Ars Technica—the name is Latin-derived for the "art of technology"

owned by conde-nast

has offices in san-fran, chicago, in addition to original boston

^[6]

its "Conde Nast Digital" now

http://web.archive.org/web/20001207092800/http://www.arstechnica.com/index.html

since 2000 has used the "Serving the [PC enthusianst, technologist] 2x10^-2 centuries" thing

http://arstechnica.com/site/subscriber-faq.ars

subscriptions started in July 2001.

http://arstechnica.com/subscriptions/

three models: ad-supported 5$/month 50$/year

paid versions give: no ads, exclusive articles, live-chat with industry people (get specifics), free 1-year sub to Wired magazine

^[1]

Ars started in 1998, remained a hobby with Ken and other founders for most of the first 6 years

"Ars Technica" attributive construction in Latin meaning: "art of technology"

company located in boston and chicago in 2008

subscriptions suppliment ad rev, but ads still most important

site organization edit

featured articles: more indepth commentary (get average word amount compared to regular article)

content:

news articles and featured articles grouped into categories (apple, business, gadgets, etc)
guides: howtos, buying advice
reviews: games, software, products
ETC: tweet-like links to other news sites

other:

job listings
OpenForum

http://www.blogrunner.com/

ars content is aggregated on NYT via "Blogrunner"

http://arstechnica.com/business/news/2009/01/welcome-to-ars-technica-v50.ars/2

has gone through 5 redesigns since 1998

they relocated to chicago offices by 2009(mostly)

writters edit

John Stokes edit

http://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=Q1zSIarI8xoC&oi=fnd&pg=PR15&dq=%22Ars+Technica%22&ots=qp4yIObQvm&sig=N6Jqc0GDvNY8Xo-D5PyTLFq-sZ8

published Inside The Machine

John Timmer edit

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6WSN-4NMMB5G-3&_user=10&_coverDate=05%2F04%2F2007&_rdoc=1&_fmt=high&_orig=search&_sort=d&_docanchor=&view=c&_searchStrId=1287306446&_rerunOrigin=scholar.google&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=e5909238c0f859c8436298d6a6ff32ae

research associant at University of Californua

has contributed to "Nobel Intent since 2005

http://www.capjournal.org/issues/01/35.pdf

science article by John Timmer rebuplished in journal

Timothy B. Lee edit

http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=11467

article republished by Cato Institute

he writes a column for one of their pubs

secondaries edit

http://books.google.com/books?id=GDpsUDz26QcC&pg=PA218&dq=%22Ars+Technica%22&as_brr=1&cd=5#v=onepage&q=%22Ars%20Technica%22&f=false and http://books.google.com/books?id=PjEEAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA77&dq=%22Ars+Technica%22&as_brr=1&cd=6#v=onepage&q=%22Ars%20Technica%22&f=false and http://books.google.com/books?id=idUYAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA379&dq=%22Ars+Technica%22&as_brr=1&cd=10#v=onepage&q=%22Ars%20Technica%22&f=false

"ars technica" is used in other contexts

http://books.google.com/books?id=RHwCAAAAQAAJ&pg=PT524&dq=%22Ars+Technica%22&lr=&as_brr=1&cd=15#v=onepage&q=%22Ars%20Technica%22&f=false

use of "ars technica" in english eytmology book in 1783

magazines edit

http://books.google.com/books?id=PgIAAAAAMBAJ&pg=PT46&dq=%22Ars+Technica%22&as_brr=1&cd=9#v=onepage&q=%22Ars%20Technica%22&f=false

"Best Web site" -Technical Editor Will Smith (Maximum PC) (2000)

Papers edit

http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/779305322-52095564/content~content=a747999209&db=all

popular with programmers by atleast 2003

http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.87.6581&rep=rep1&type=pdf (find more)

site is referenced as a reliable source of information in journal articles and other papers since at least 2008

http://dmm.biologists.org/content/1/2-3/87.full.pdf

mention as useful website in bilogy journal, providing new science news

reliable newspapers/sites edit

^[7]

wired was bought by nast in 98, the lost 2/3 of its ad sales in bubble bust

"Condé Nast bought Ars Technica, a small but very influential Web tech site;" in may 2008

was a combo purchase (ars, webmonkey, and Hot Wired) for 25 million total

"[Ken Fisher] he said that he had been approached by a number of parties interested in buying the site. After talking to people at Wired.com and Reddit, he and his partners decided that the Condé Nast way left them the best chance of developing what had been a hobby on steroids into a business.

“We didn’t have to take them on faith,” he said. “They have a track record of understanding what they acquire, which was alarmingly not the case with the other parties we talked to.”"

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/08/technology/08online.html?scp=10&sq=%22ars%20technica%22&st=cse

site used as a reference in NYT

(site also used as a reference in NYT and WSJ blogs) multiple times

http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2010/03/08/to-block-or-not-to-block-online-ads/?KEYWORDS=%22ars+technica%22

site blocked users using "AdBlock" for one day in march 2010, then published the "“Why Ad-Blocking Is Devastating to the Sites You Love.” article.

"As Mr. Fisher pointed out, he and others at his site had assumed that people who were blocking ads were “doing so with malice.” It turns out that, after being told of the problem, many readers “whitelisted” Ars Technica — or set their software to allow ads from the site."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009/dec/02/websites-charge-content-paywall-murdoch

ars has a "premium" version (give feature list of that)

websites edit

http://kara.allthingsd.com/20080417/ars-technicas-ken-fisher-speaks/

although Ars is not perfect. For example, it did get into a little trouble in 2006, when a writer did not properly attribute text from IPDemocracy blogger Cynthia Brumfield, but it apologized and then properly linked.

ken is editor-in-cheif

http://news.cnet.com/8301-10784_3-9946327-7.html

when conde bought it, was added to theier "Wired Digital" group including Wired.com and Reddit

http://www.niemanlab.org/2010/03/how-ars-technica-made-the-ask-of-ad-blocking-readers/

"ad-block" thing was march 5, 2010.

they published the related story in the 6th

by saturday 25,000 vistors to the site had whitelisted it in adblock, 200 subscribed

average visits to the site each month by a single user: 89

"Fisher said he’s also had good experiences using a sponsorship model to support specialized content, including in-depth coverage that attracts a highly engaged, technical audience, but not huge pageviews. For instance, IBM sponsored a recent series on the future of collaboration. The writers didn’t know IBM was the backer, and IBM was told only the broad topic for the stories. Topic-specific sponsorship “delivers more value than display advertising, in my opinion,” he said. “It’s much more targeted. It takes the best of contextual advertising.”

But Ars’ bottom line still relies heavily on traditional display advertising. Its particular audience likely has a worse ad-block problem than other sites. But the benefits Fisher found from communicating directly with readers — making the ask along with a gentle but clear nudge — can apply to any site."

http://adblockplus.org/blog/the-unnecesary-ars-technica-rant

adblock response from Wladimir Palant, the program's developer

http://techcrunch.com/2008/05/16/breaking-conde-nastwired-acquires-ars-technica/ (michael arrington notable blogger)

nast's "Wired Digital" in under CondeNet.

ars founded in 1998 by Kin Fisher(boston) and Jon Stokes (chicago).

after the buyout, they and 8 other employees remained.

Nast took over ad sales, handled by Federated Media Publishing before the buyout

http://www.webbyawards.com/webbys/current_honorees.php?category_id=35

"Webby Awards Honoree" 2009 (International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences)

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2192058,00.asp

"Top-100 Favotite blogs" #3 in 2007 PC Mag

http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/blog/2009/aug/29/snow-leopard-apple-reviews-roundup

guardian blogger notes Ars has in-depth mac reviews

http://mediamemo.allthingsd.com/20081111/conde-nast-web-arm-condenets-turn-for-across-the-board-cuts/

rs about condenet layoffs

^[3]

Ars Technia company (created by Fisher) (in Malden, MA) co-founder Stokes (chicago)

Stats edit

http://www.quantcast.com/arstechnica.com

estimated monthly traffic (visits per month per person): 740k (huge peak to 1.5m in July 2008)

quancast US rank: 3,2000

demos: 63% male 68% 18-49 74% white, higher than average asian viewership income roughly even , but skewed to %100k+ reletively high number of college graduates and post graduate readers readers into "technology, science, politics"

http://siteanalytics.compete.com/arstechnica.com/?metric=uv

Complete(c) rank: 1,497

site's monthly visits: 2.2m in Jan 2010, up 22% from Dec 2009

http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/arstechnica.com

site came online December 30, 1998

alexia rank: 1,957 traffic rank: 795