Chris Pirillo launches GnomeTomes. From the Q&A: "Q: Content should be free. A: Instead of charging a subscription to our various daily newsletters right now, we're giving this eBook thing a shot. Even if you're not subscribed to our newsletters, we'd like to believe that each one of these tip-topped GnomeTomes are worth paying for. [...] How much is your time worth? Waste two or more hours on the Internet trying to find help - or purchasing an eBook or two immediately. We're trying to cut down your lost opportunity cost."

This is an interesting way to fund the free part of an online content network. Instead of adding/switching to paid newsletters, Lockergnome repurposes its content in an easy-to-read format. We'll abduct Chris a few weeks from now to know how this business is doing.

Update: Morningstar and The Motley Fool are other content providers using a similar approach, with ebooks such as the Morningstar Funds 500 and The Motley Fool Money Guide. The question is, how much will these products come to represent in new revenue, a river or a rivulet? Are we talking ancillary sales (see chapter 6 here, nice to have for their high margins but they won't bring much volume), or will they come up as one of the pillars of online business models?

It might be worthwhile to look at multi-channel content providers such as Martha Stewart to see where they generate money from. Hoover's, primarily known for its online subscriptions for businesses, still has about 3% of sales coming from CD-Roms and print. Repurposing content to different formats and channels always require some amount of adaptation work. Before you start adding new formats, it's probably safer to run a cost-to-benefit analysis or test the waters with a toe before you dive in.