Hearst Magazines Digital Media Delivers Premium Branded Content Across the Internet through the Interactive CelebSpleak Platform

Premium content from Hearst's Teen Brands is now widely available to audiences via Spleak's interactive instant messaging, social networking, and SMS based celebrity media network

New York, NY & San Francisco, CA (PRWEB) April 15, 2008 -- Hearst Magazines, publisher of CosmoGIRL!, Seventeen, TEEN and the social site eSPIN.com, today announced a strategic partnership to infuse Hearst's content across CelebSpleak, a highly interactive celebrity-focused communication and publishing network with over 100,000 active daily users. Spleak's platform combines user-generated content (UGC) with mainstream media content across the most popular online social platforms including AIM, Facebook, MySpace, MSN / Windows Live Messenger, and to mobile phones via SMS. Hearst editors and producers are now able to designate content for distribution into the CelebSpleak network, which in turn appears alongside user-generated "Tattles" in a highly interactive, engaging, and fun experience.

Mainstream media publishers are seeking new avenues and platforms for delivering content to widespread and increasingly disparate audiences. Instant messaging, for example, is an interactive and engaging medium seemingly ideal for content delivery, but without Spleak it is unreachable for most publishers.

"In the rapidly changing content distribution industry, it's important to reach audiences whenever and wherever they are interested in engaging with our content," says Chuck Cordray, GM/VP, Hearst Magazines Digital Media. "Hearst sees the partnership with Spleak as an opportunity to extend the reach of its premium content at scale and be one of the first to leverage a new and exciting distribution platform."

"Spleak's opinionated, gossip-with-attitude 'Tattles' are a great fit for our media-savvy core teen audience. Teens consume content on their terms and Spleak's omnipresence online helps meet those needs," said Amy Gibby, president of Hearst-owned social site eSPIN.com.

Spleak's hybrid publishing platform enables content creators to reach their target audiences and embrace UGC without departing from their existing business models or infrastructure. CelebSpleak is the first network launched by the company, and has a very active and passionate user base less than a year into its existence.

"There's great value in both UGC and professional, editorial content. Most of the time the two end up in conflict with one another, but Spleak has found the right way to combine the best of both worlds," says Morrie Eisenberg, CEO of Spleak Media Network. "It's a great win-win for both the consumers and the publishers, and we're very pleased to enable hybrid publishing for such an established brand as Hearst."

Key to the success of Spleak's UGC approach is the structure around the content, which makes it both entertaining to readers and agreeable to large publishers. Hearst's content is distributed in the same format and appearance as all other user contributions, though it also contains Hearst branding and links back to Hearst web properties. Consumers are able to pick the content they like and read it via web widgets, on social networks, through interactive IM conversations, and even via text alerts on their cell phone. Spleak users can easily vote on their favorites and share content with their friends. Some examples of the Hearst and Spleak partnership currently live on the web can be found at: www.teenmag.com/spleak/, www.cosmogirl.com/spleak, at www.seventeen.com/spleak/ and www.espinthebottle.com/celeb-spleak/.

About Hearst Digital Media: Launched in March 2006, Hearst Magazines Digital Media, a unit of Hearst Magazines, is dedicated to creating and implementing the digital online and mobile strategy for Hearst's magazine brands and other sites which serve the company's consumers and audience. The unit has launched or re-launched 18 web sites and nine mobile sites for brands such as Cosmopolitan, Esquire, Good Housekeeping, Marie Claire and Seventeen, as well as non-magazine brand sites such as TheDailyGreen.com, MisQuinceMag.com and MyPromStyle.com. During this time, Hearst Digital has also acquired the eCrush Network (eCRUSH.com, eSPIN.com), Kaboodle.com and RealAge.com to round out its growing portfolio of interests for teens and women. With more than three million monthly unique visitors, the Hearst Teen Network, which includes Cosmogirl.com, Seventeen.com, Teenmag.com, MyPromStyle and others, is one of the top 10 ranked entertainment news web sites, according to ComScore Media Metrix.

About Spleak Media Network: Spleak Media Network is a hybrid publishing platform that combines the strengths and merits of mainstream media along with user-generated content. Spleak enables highly interactive and engaging communication between users and publishers across instant messaging, social networking, SMS and web-based widgets. Spleak's first platform is CelebSpleak, a celebrity gossip content network with over 100,000 active daily users, and the company will launch numerous other content networks in 2008. Based in San Francisco, Spleak Media Network is venture-backed by Draper Fisher Jurvetson (DFJ) and Sunstone Capital and is privately-held.

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