Penton Media, producer of the Internet World trade shows and Internet World magazine, has sold off its Streaming Media conferences and publications to Medford, N.J.-based Information Today (ITI), the companies said Monday.

Terms of the all-stock deal were not released.

The sale helps Penton shore up its cash flow after a particularly rough year for Internet-focused trade shows in which attendance and company participation were off sharply amid a sluggish economy.

ITI, meanwhile, picks up assets that help it fill out coverage of online delivery systems for audio and video content. The company's titles include Information Today, Searcher, ONLINE, Computers in Libraries, Econtent and CRM. It produces the InfoToday, KMWorld & Intranets, and Internet Librarian conferences.

"As broadband and wireless technologies continue to evolve in terms of quality and capacity, we believe streaming media will play an increasingly important role in the delivery of rich content," said Tom Hogan, president and CEO of Information Today.

"We feel fortunate to be able to add the leading events and Web site in the streaming media field to our growing family of products and services."

The Cleveland-based Penton purchased Streaming Media, which produces trade shows and hosts the StreamingMedia.com Web site, in 2000, just as the tech bubble was bursting.

Since the first Streaming Media conference and exhibition that was held in San Francisco in 1998, the company has staged over 10 such similar trade shows, including Streaming Media Europe this month in London. But apart from a handful of major companies surviving the bursting of the Internet/tech bubble, such as RealNetworks, Envivio, Network Appliance and Groovy Gecko, many smaller players have exited the scene.

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For example, in past years Streaming Media East has been big enough to fill a small conference hall in the Jacob Javits convention center in New York as part of the weeklong Internet World trade show. But at this fall's show, Streaming Media East had shrunk to barely one row of exhibitors on the main floor.

As to whether ITI might continue staging Screaming Media trade shows in conjunction with Penton's Internet World, an ITI spokesman said it was too soon to say.

"The Screaming Media shows will continue," added Tom Hogan, Jr., director of marketing for ITI. "For the moment we do not have definite plans on whether to work with Penton" on future shows, he said.

ITI said Adam Pemberton, publisher of Information Today publications, would take over direction of StreamingMedia.com's Web site, e-mail newsletter and related content. In addition, Dick Kaser, Information Today's vice president of content, is expected to head up future Streaming Media conferences.

Just last week, Penton Media announced it had sold off its Boardwatch and ISPWorld Web sites and magazines to Light Reading, a Website devoted to news and analysis of telecommunications and Internet technologies.