Luczywo, who says that the portal will launch by the end of this year, acknowledges that Agora, like many old-media companies, was a bit slow to embrace the Internet. But she argues that Agora's plans are so big and so creative that the company will quickly make up for lost time. "We're going to turn a brick-and-mortar company into a new-media company," she declares. "We're going to be as big on the Internet as we've been in print."

Still, Rapaczynski admits that the outside criticism has created friction. "We have a million disagreements every day," she says. "I get anxieties. I say to Helena, 'When are you going to launch?' I know she would just like to go into skunk works and emerge when it's done. But you can't do that as a public company. I spend a lot of time forcing people to document their progress, the milestones that they've reached. Unless investors and analysts can see and touch what you've done, they're turned off."

Meanwhile, Agora's CFO, Jerzy Thieme, resigned abruptly in June after only six months on the job. In a press statement, he said that he was resigning for "personal" reasons, but some people saw his departure as a sign of Agora's cultural resistance to outsiders. Rapaczynski denies that, but admits that the company -- which has always insisted on control and independence, and has been very choosy about its partners -- is wrestling with the reality that alliances are a necessary fact of life on the Internet.

Many, though, are betting on Agora, noting that the company has become such a respected brand that it has the power to create the kinds of deals that it wants to do. "Everyone wants to do business with Agora," says Joe Senfft, a Warsaw-based advertising consultant. "Its value proposition is quality." Indeed, Gazeta Wyborcza 's 3-year-old Web site recently became Poland's third most popular site, despite the little attention that the company has paid to it.

Sitting in her office one afternoon, Luczywo looks tired as she rattles off the Internet issues that she is trying to sort out. "It's all terribly boring but important," she says. Has she ever considered retiring, doing something else, now that she is very wealthy? "Why would I do that?" she asks. "There is too much that we need to do here." Later, when asked the same question, Rapaczynski offers much the same answer: "Now we have to make Agora a global company."

Pamela Kruger (pkruger@fastcompany.com), a Fast Company contributing editor, is based in Millburn, New Jersey. Contact Wanda Rapaczynski (w.rapaczynski@gazeta.pl) by email, or visit Agora SA on the Web (www.agora.pl).

Sidebar: What's Fast

The leaders of Agora, Helena Luczywo and Wanda Rapaczynski, have learned a lot about building a company under extreme conditions and against long odds. In just 11 years, they have transformed a small underground newspaper in Poland into what is widely considered the best-run and most profitable media company in post-communist Europe. Here are their strategies.

If you want to live by your values, create value.

From the outset, Luczywo and Rapaczynski were determined that Agora would remain an independent agent of democracy. And the way to guarantee that course, they concluded, was to become extremely profitable, so that the company would never be vulnerable to outside economic pressure. "If you want to be independent, then you must be financially independent," says Luczywo.

Don't do everything on your own.

One factor behind Agora's success has been its partnership with Cox Enterprises Inc., a family-owned media company based in Atlanta. Cox has provided Agora not only with cash but also with management training, consultants, and strategic advice. "The investment was not a strictly monetary one for Cox," says Luczywo. "They just liked us -- what we stood for and what we were trying to do. And they became very helpful friends to us."

Treat investors with respect.

Rapaczynski is the first to criticize the investment community as being fickle, even irrational. "If you went by what the analysts say, you could have serious bipolar disorder," she says. "They change their minds minute by minute. You can't live by what they say."

But, she also cautions, "You ignore them at your own peril." As a result, Rapaczynski has made sure to provide the investment community with lots of clear, detailed reports on Agora's strategies and progress, going far beyond what companies are legally required to disclose in Poland.

Finish second -- and smarter.

It sounds counterintuitive in the age of Internet time, when everyone's mantra is speed over accuracy. But Agora has always operated on the strategic principle that it's better to take the time to study the market, the competition, and their mistakes before committing big resources to new initiatives. This go-slow approach has attracted some criticism from analysts who believe in first-mover advantages, but Rapaczynski says that caution is one of Agora's strengths: "If you go in too early, you may go in when the market is still asleep, burn a lot of cash, and never see revenues. If you go in later, you have more competitors -- but we've never been afraid of competition."