Although we've produced almost five years of Notes, Domino, and cc:Mail related journals in association with Ziff-Davis, Component Enterprises, Inc., the company that publishes DominoPower and PalmPower only began independently producing journals in January. And now, almost a year has passed. We just posted our eleventh issue of PalmPower and we're seeing substantial access and readership growth. From an average of 625,000 impressions a month at the beginning of the summer, in October we exceeded over 1.6 million. That's more than 100% growth in just four short months.

This issue, dated November 1998, will be our fourth month of DominoPower. Again, we've been thrilled with the response. Our readership has grown considerably. Our weekly tip mailings are now read by nearly 50,000 people and we estimate that something on the order of 150,000 people from all walks of life and all corners of the globe have stopped in to read the magazine itself.

For a technical publication as tightly aimed as DominoPower, that's pretty amazing.

And so now we're thinking about adding PowerBoards. PowerBoards are our discussion boards. They've been astoundingly successful for PalmPower. We've had over 1,700 messages posted and over 100,000 people have read them. And the quality of the messages contributed and mutual support has been truly heartwarming.

We're thinking about introducing the PowerBoards to DominoPower. But there are some challenges to overcome. And so, rather than just up and doing it, we're asking your opinion. There are actually three issues that makes this less clean-cut than it was with PalmPower: critical mass, hosts, and WebCrossing.

Critical mass
First, of course, is the fact that DominoPower, by the nature of the publication, has a smaller audience. While there are quite a few Domino and Notes sites, and thereby administrators, there are still substantially less Domino and Notes administrators than there are Palm device users. And that means there's a question of critical mass.

Discussion boards and virtual communities are almost living things. You've got to feed them just right to make them thrive. In the case of PowerBoards, you need enough active hosts and lots and lots of active posters and readers. Just enough and you've got a win, not quite enough and you've got a ghost town.