The Tip-Off The NYRM Index
TO PAy hOmAGe TO The 25Th AnniVeRSARy OF The hARPeR’S indeX, We hAVe ShAmeLeSSLy STOLen The ideA By Matthew Bachtel
Year Harper’s Magazine mourned the semicolon as “almost forgotten among proofreaders”: 1924 Earliest general use of the semicolon in English: 1591 Italian printer who first developed the semicolon: Aldus Manutius Date of the first annual National Punctuation Day: Sept. 24, 2004 Date Felix Dennis sold Blender and Maxim to Alpha Media: August 2007 Price Alpha Media paid for the two magazines: $250 million Date Blender folded: March 2009 Year Hiram Flannery Rich distributed 10 handwritten copies of a death threat against Jules Hollis of The Boston Globe, who called Rich’s saloon “a fine place to tarry, so long as you don’t mind poisonous whiskey and your brain bashed in by the vile brigand posing as a saloon keeper”: 1905 Name of the newsletter that grew out of that death threat: Genteel Drunkards Drink at Hiram Rich’s Real Irish Saloon Cost of a six-issue subscription to that newsletter’s current incarnation, Modern Drunkard Magazine: $24 Number of times Joseph Stalin was named Time’s “Man of the Year”: 2 First time a woman (Wallis Simpson, who married Britain’s King Edward VIII) was named Time’s “Man of the Year”: 1936 Year that you were named Time’s “Man of the Year”: 2006 Price Samuel I. Newhouse Sr. paid for Condé Nast Publications in 1959: $5 million Number of US magazines at Condé Nast when Newhouse bought it: 4 Number of US magazines at Condé Nast today: 23 Condé Nast magazine that most deserves to live, according to a Gawker online poll: Wired Condé Nast magazine that least deserves to live, according to same poll: Cookie Number of languages the Jehovah’s Witnesses’ Watchtower magazine is published in: 168 Number of languages The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints’ Liahona magazine is published in: 51 Number of trees needed to make one ton of coated, high-end magazine paper: 15.36 Percentage of Alaskan timber-producing forests managed by the federal government: 51 Percentage of Alaskan timber-producing forests managed by Native corporations: 24 Number of national news magazines Alaska Governor Sarah Palin reads: All of them
The Year in Magazines
...time flies when you’re having fun By Nikolaj Gammeltoft
January 2008 Out: Ingrid Sischy, after 18 years as editor-in-chief and curator of the Warhol legacy at Interview; and Gavin McKinnes,
after 14 years as founder and curator of his own legacy at Vice. February 2008 William F. Buckley Jr., founder of the National Review, Yale graduate, CIA agent, author, TV host, proponent of the
legalization of marijuana, dies at 82. March 2008 World Wrestling Entertainment announces its plan to introduce children to the joys of
spandex, fake tans, and macho antics with new bimonthly magazine WWE Kids. April 2008 New York Magazine celebrates its 40th birthday. Theme of
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Cover Boy in Chief By Mirjam Donath
Yorker jumped 80 percent in July when the cover portrayed Obama as a Muslim. Rolling Stone’s March Obama cover was far and away its topseller of early 2008. Time loved Obama the most, putting him on its cover 14 times in 2008. Check your mag brand recognition by guessing which Obama image graced which cover.
Whether you read pet magazine Animal Fair, Health and Fitness, or Marvel comics, there was no way to avoid the magazine world’s favorite cover boy of 2008. Barack Obama was on those covers—and many more. Magazines of all kinds tried to profit from his popularity, and most of them succeeded. Single-copy sales of The New
1.
2.
3.
a. The New Individualist
a. Amazing Spider-Man
a. Newsweek
b. The Atlantic
b. MAD
b. Time
c. Black Enterprise
c. Wizard
c. The Economist
d. The New Republic
d. The New Yorker
d. The Atlantic
e. Ebony
e. Vanity Fair
e. Fast Company
5.
4.
a. Bitch
a. GQ
b. Rolling Stone
b. Vanity Fair
c. Vibe
c. Men’s Vogue
d. Ms.
d. Playgirl
e. Mother Jones
e. Esquire
anniversary issue: city just as screwed today as it was 40 years ago. May 2008 Manhattan Media acquires Harvard lifestyle magazine 02138, only to fold it five months later.
Advertisers don’t care what school you went to. June 2008 Blame it on the editor. Vogue Italia releases its all-blackmodels-issue. In a New York Times interview, fashion photographer Steven Meisel blames magazine editors,
among others, for the lack of black models in fashion publications. July 2008 It’s only satire. The normally unsullied
The Obits
By Cordelia Jenkins It’s been a bloody year for magazines. The war against rising paper costs, a tanking economy, and that greatest of villains, the Internet, rages on. We’ve sifted through the carnage and selected some of the more recognizable corpses for a decent burial. Here’s a memorial to those who fought bravely, and fell.
Playgirl
1973 - 2009 Beloved sister to Playboy, taken in her 36th year by rising costs and declining sales. Resting now, in a paradise of “Sexy Après Ski” and “Nude Hotdogging.”
1. The New Republic, January 2008 / 2. MAD, February 2009 / 3.Time, March, 2009 / 4. Ms., December 2008, Special Inaugural issue / 5. Vanity Fair, March 2009.
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The Tip-Off
New Yorker causes a mass media controversy with the cover of its July 21st issue, depicting Barack and Michelle Obama, dressed as a Muslim and a terrorist, burning the American flag in the Oval Office.
Is there an afterlife? Yes, at Playgirl.com. Who’s laughing? Gay ’zines. Women made up just 23 percent of Playgirl’s readership. Who’s crying? The odd feminist. Ex-editor Colleen Kane told Radar she saw “parallels between Playgirl’s struggle to find its identity and readership, and the developing lack of cohesiveness among feminists.”
Clay Felker—founder of New York magazine, instigator of the New Journalism movement, and (according to Tom Wolfe) inventor of New York City—dies, at 82.
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Eaters’ Digest By Amber Sandoval-Griffin Pure Food and Wine
Whether it’s a question of fine cuisine, cheap eats, or best hole-in-the-wall in NYC, food magazines are constantly recommending restaurants to their readers. We decided to flip that formula by taking you into the kitchens of some of the city’s great chefs to find out what magazines they can’t live without.
Gramercy Tavern
Chef: Christopher Faulkner Restaurant: Colors Cuisine: A global blend of flavors, from South America to Asia, all on one plate Back story: The eclectic menu is a tribute to the home nations of the more than 50 employees of this NoHo restaurant, many of whom once worked at Windows on the World, atop the World Trade Center. Favorite magazine: Food Arts (“At the Restaurant and Hotel Forefront”). “I like to see what perspectives other people have on food. This magazine gives you the opportunity to see how food is looking and what the trends are—where food is heading.”
Chef: Brad Farmerie Restaurant: Public, The Monday Room, and Double Crown Cuisine: Fusion cuisine making creative use of offal Back story: The loud and August 2008 We all get smaller as we get older. Rolling Stone ditches its signature large format for a standard trim size. September 2008 A Kindle on every newsstand.
social atmosphere of Double Crown, the sexy chic aura of Public, and the intimate ambience of The Monday Room set these Nolita eateries apart in terms of scene, but all three restaurants serve eclectic “Australasian” cuisine inspired by the chef’s travels through Australia, New Zealand, and the East. Favorite magazine: Art Culinaire (“The International Magazine in Good Taste”). “It tends to have a lot of younger chefs, not all the same names you keep seeing in other magazines. It also uses unusual ingredients and gives you a nice in-depth view of them.”
Chef: Neal Harden Restaurant: Pure Food and Wine, and One Lucky Duck Cuisine: Raw food (nothing cooked over 118 degrees Fahrenheit) Back story: Union Square’s premier raw food restaurant uses all organic and seasonal fruits, vegetables, nuts, and seeds to create award-winning dishes and a high-end dining experience. Favorite magazine: Gastronomica (“The Journal of Food and Culture”).
Esquire unleashes its 75th anniversary issue with an electronic cover—a crude version 1.0 of electronic ink. Bad timing. The Wall Street Journal launches WSJ, a glossy luxury lifestyle magazine, just as Wall Street starts crumbling when venerable but heavily leveraged
Perilla
“It’s a great magazine that goes beyond recipes. It’s more about the cultural role of food. Every dish you create is an amalgamation of the different things you learn from history and travel, and this magazine does a great job of covering it.”
Chef: Michael Anthony Restaurant: Gramercy Tavern Cuisine: Refined, contemporary American Back Story: This upscale tavern was the result of the Union Square Hospitality Group’s 1994 redesign of a historic building in the Flatiron District. It has since offered American fare and earned an abundance of accolades, including a 2008 James Beard Award (known in the press as the Oscars of the food world). Favorite Magazine: The Art Of Eating (“About the Best Food and Wine”). “[Publisher] Ed Behr travels around the world, and you can live vicariously through his writing. When you’re stuck in your kitchen, it offers an unbelievable window into the world of food and wine.”
Public
Chef: Harold Dieterle Restaurant: Perilla Cuisine: Seasonal American Back Story: Named after a plant in the basil and mint family, this neighborhood eatery in Greenwich Village incorporates fresh, seasonal ingredients into every dish. Chef Dieterle, the 2006 winner of Bravo’s Top Chef, may be the initial draw for diners, but it’s Dieterle and his partner Alicia Nosenzo’s dishes and the excellent service that keep them coming back. Favorite Magazine: Food & Wine. “Food & Wine runs the Aspen Classic, which in my opinion is the best food event in the country. It’s a yearly gathering of the most influential folks in the world of food and drink, and it focuses on what’s going on all over the world.”
Photographs by Amber Sandoval-
Lehman Brothers declares bankruptcy.
Sarah Palin tells Fox News she reads The Economist.
October 2008 An Oedipal magazine moment. Men’s Vogue is canceled and folded into mother Vogue. Style-conscious American men now face the humiliation of buying a women’s magazine for fashion guidance.
November 2008 From news you can use once a week to news you can only get once a month. US News & World Report concedes defeat in the competitive field
of newsweeklies and becomes a monthly magazine. December 2008 In bad company. President-elect Barack Obama follows in the footsteps of, among many
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The Tip-Off
A Recession is a Terrible Thing to Waste By Smriti Rao
P
ropportunity: What you get when you look at a problem as a potential opportunity. (Source: “Recession Lexicon,” Recessionwire) The Internet is crawling with the progeny of pink slips. Layoffs across various industries have spawned a chatty new generation of bloggers, tweeters, and all-round whiners who have been creatively chronicling their laid-off lives as a way to fill the black hole of time that unemployment bestows. Dropped into this mix is yet another recessionrelated website: Recessionwire, the brainchild of Sara Clemence and Laura Rich, two former editors at Condé Nast’s Portfolio.com, and freelancer Lynn Parramore, who saw her gigs swallowed by the downturn. The three founders grabbed the “propportunity” to set up Recessionwire, a site that hopes to chronicle all things recession and more cheerfully claims to see “the upside of the downturn.” For former lifestyle editor Sara Clemence, the site initially served as a forum to creatively channel her frustrations after losing two jobs within three weeks, including one that “prefired” her, to borrow a word from her online “Recession Lexicon.” “Around mid-morning Wednesday, I accepted a senior editor position with Domino magazine,” writes Clemence on the site. “It was a great gig at a great book—complete with a talented, energetic, sane boss; others, Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin, Ayatollah Khomeini, and Vladimir Putin when Time names him “Person of the Year” for 2008.
nice colleagues; and even a slightly higher salary than I’d made at my last job. The editor-in-chief was brimming with ideas. I was psyched. In my head, I loosened up my budget. I could start sending out the laundry again, pay for a personal trainer, replace my totaled car. “Two hours later, Domino folded.” Just three weeks earlier, Clemence had been laid off from Portfolio.com. So far the team has met with great press. CNN gave them a thumbs up, The New York Times ran a Recessionistas of the downturn: Lynn Parramore, Laura Rich, and Sara Clemence breathless profile of the site and featured an “OhUnemploymentHaikuWeekly. Lexicon” has a unique take on we-SO-mean-business” blogspot.com, which offers articulating your thoughts. picture of the good-looking hilarious illustrations plus haikus With a minimalist website founders dressed in their little on being out of a job, such as: design and chatty posts, black dresses, and PC World “It would be better, Recessionwire makes for a fun pegged Recessionwire as a good If my ketchup sandwiches, read. But in a market already place to find moral support Had a little bread.” cluttered with blogs and news if you’re “unemployed (or Then there’s The Recess Ends, sites chronicling the downturn, preparing to be).” The site is a blog that actually seems to be Recessionwire lacks a unique a running commentary on the, making lemonade from this large point of difference. If you’re er, recession. The “Recession economic lemon. It recounts the looking for serious, in-depth Briefing” department provides adventures of two filmmakers coverage of the financial links to news on the economy, as they travel across the country meltdown, you’re already like “Recession hits babyshooting a documentary about on WSJ.com or NYTimes. making market”—a news item the recession. Recessionwire com. There’s also WSJ.com’s on how the recession helped says it has no plans to grow blog “Laid Off and Looking,” spur greater egg-and-sperm old and outlive this recession, which tracks eight out-of-work donations by people wanting promising that it will die the day MBAs in their post-meltdown to make some extra cash—and the recession ends. Meanwhile, job searches. Vault.com’s blog a piece in the Times about the with all that Web competition, “Pink Slipped” covers the demand for romance novels the site’s founders have to worry latest news and job market outstripping supply: “Recession about getting another pink slip— trends and provides you with fuels readers’ escapist urges.” from a fickle online audience. tools and advice to get back to “Screwed” provides reviews of work. And if you’re looking for the number of pink slips being Photograph by Jon Whitney mere empty calories, you’ve handed out across different got the extremely entertaining industries, and the “Recession
January 2009 The New York Times reports that at least 14 magazines, including Country Home, Arthur, Map magazine, and Teen, died in the first month of 2009. Hardcore Gamer’s publisher puts his magazine up for sale on eBay.
February 2009 Newsweek no longer wants to be a news magazine. Editor Jon Meacham tells The New York Times, “If we don’t have something original to say, we won’t.” A new design and shift in content are in the making.
fall get together due to bad economic times. You can’t ask the publishers of Mother Jones and Fortune to hang out in Boca Raton with unemployment approaching 10 percent and the Dow free-falling toward 5,000.
March 2009 Life is tough. Rodale men’s magazine Best Life folds after five years of publication.
The Magazine Publishers of America cancels its annual
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Gay or ... Details?
Which men’s mags embrace their gay readership? By Cyrus Moulton It’s no secret that gay men comprise a major audience demographic of men’s magazines. So, why are the lad mags so secretive about it? Some barely mention gays in their ongoing examination of American masculinity. Others openly joke about society’s obsession with sexual categories: metro-, homo-, hetero-, regreto-, etc. And in between are magazines with a homoerotic vibe that could be interpreted as a subtle nod to their gay audience—or as further proof of the obliviousness of the average straight male.
The perceived attitude toward gay men in ostensibly straight men’s magazines raises some interesting questions. Is appealing to gay men without alienating a straight audience just good business sense, or a subtle example of “gay for pay?” By addressing masculinity as distinct from sexuality, are lad mags presenting us with a post-gay/ straight world or just straightening out the gay world? Sometimes it’s hard to tell. To help, here is a highly subjective assessment of the gay friendliness of various men’s magazines, measured on a scale of one to four rainbow flags.
Esquire Esquire likes representative journalism: It included interviews of nearly 100 people in its first two issues of 2009, January’s “All-American” edition and February’s “Inauguration” issue. Gays, however, were the silent minority. Perhaps Esquire has adopted a “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy. After being criticized in 1997 for all but outing Kevin Spacey and for axing gaythemed fiction from its pages, the magazine has developed a preference for the strong, silent type. Its July 2006 issue on the “State of the American Man” included just a single reference to gay rights, along with the fascinating fact that 30 percent of men surveyed planned to see Brokeback Mountain. As writer Kilian Melloy, searching for gay content on Esquire’s website, noted on AfterElton. com: “Trying the keyword ‘homosexual’ yielded only the message, ‘Error: homosexual was not found.’ Not in these pages, it wasn’t.” Vote: 1/2 of a token rainbow flag.
Details Yes, Details, there’s ample reason to lampoon male insecurities, sexuality included. Sometimes you nail it: The “Homophobic Parents” article, about supposedly liberal parents who were afraid their sons were gay, should be required reading for PFLAG members. But then there are the
A-Rod: Reflecting whose fantasy? Details covers all its bases
clichés: the moral deviants (April 2009’s “The Curious Case of Gay-Porn-Star Identical Twins”), the successful gays who aren’t “too gay” (November 2008’s “A-Gays”), and the false alarms (August 2008’s “What if You Only Thought You Were Gay?”). And then there’s editor Dan Peres who, at the Columbia J-school’s Delacorte magazine lecture series this spring, said that he was proud that Details openly acknowledges its gay audience and, an hour later, that he “hate[s] Details being called a gay magazine.” Vote: 2 warily waving, possibly selfloathing rainbow flags.
beautiful models showing off their chests. The magazine also mostly avoids conspicuously spelling out that its fashion models, profile subjects, etc., are straight—something many men’s magazines accomplish with a scantily clad female cavorting in the photo shoot, or the requisite mention of the wife/girlfriend. It’s a small but appreciated gesture. Also appreciated are the shirtless models demonstrating exercises. It’s so you can see what muscles to target, right? Vote: 4 rainbow flags—about as good as it gets for a straight fitness mag.
The Advocate Men’s Health Men’s Health’s workout posters are the gay man’s Playboy centerfolds: moodily lit,
Let’s not restrict our criticism to straight magazines. Many members of the gay community felt that The Advocate had lost its selfdeclared status as the “premier
gay magazine.” It gave out “gay icon” status as indiscriminately as people hand out condoms at Pride, and asked hard-hitting questions about celebrities’ penis sizes. Perhaps new editor Jon Barret said it best in his March 2009 editorial: “We were too quick to bestow the label ‘hero’ on any celebrity who came out ... (especially those celebrities willing to grant us an interview).” But the twin events of Election Day 2008—the election of Barack Obama and the passage of Proposition 8 to ban gay marriages in California—demonstrated the clash of optimism and harsh reality facing those who struggle for gay civil rights. They also helped The Advocate rediscover its voice. December 2008’s “Gay is the New Black” boldly compared today’s gay rights movement to the civil rights movement of the 1960s, while also addressing the “fashionability” of homosexuality and political activism. The magazine has since challenged rather than simply praised allies like Obama (“A Nod’s Not Enough”) and Rachel Maddow (“Wither Maddow?”), and it has demonstrated an ability to adroitly meld the essential tricks for selling magazines with substantive discussion. Vote: 4 made-over rainbow flags flying with new confidence.
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What are They Reading? Then and Now Edition By Laura Slot NYRM annually surveys what people in the magazine industry are reading. This year, we asked some of the nation’s top editors to name their favorite magazines, not only today but also when they were growing up. Our questions: 1) What was your favorite magazine growing up? 2) Why? 3) Which magazines do you like today? 4) Why?
Time For Kids: Claudia Wallis, Founding Editor 1) Comic books—Fantastic Four, X-Men—and Rolling Stone, when I was a little older. 2) Superheroes and fantasy were something I shared with my brother. It was a secret thing that my father didn’t know about. We weren’t supposed to read that. 3) Three very different magazines that I enjoy a lot are The New Yorker, New Scientist, and Wired. 4) All have excellent writing and a mix of stories that surprise me—and in an era of media overload, I like to be surprised.
Texas Monthly: Evan Smith, Editor in Chief 1) For me, that was Sports Illustrated. 2) It was kind of a reflexive boy’s thing. I was interested in sports as a fan, as an observer. You lose yourself in sports the way you lose yourself in movies.
3) It’s still Sports Illustrated. 4) If you’re a sports fan, there was no better magazine, then or now. Sports are recession-proof— it’s a naturally endless source of material. And I think the people running Sports Illustrated now have done a great job.
4) I’m an alum, for one thing. More to the point, smart stories and smartly conceived designs capture the eminence and vitality of its home city.
Details Magazine: Daniel Peres, Editor in Chief AARP The Magazine: Nancy Perry Graham, Editor in Chief 1) Jack and Jill magazine. 2) When it came each month, I would disappear into my room to read it. The games and the interactive stuff were great. I felt like it was written just for me. 3) I like People and Texas Monthly. 4) At Texas Monthly they really know their audience. At AARP we say, “Where is our Texas?” when we talk about our readers, because that’s what the people at Texas Monthly always ask themselves. When you read an article, you know why it’s in the magazine.
1) Esquire, when I was a teenager going into college. 2) Wonderful stories, and I knew the magazine had a rich history. It made me feel more grown up, like a better man. It showed me a connected world—real life—very different from my own. 3) Vogue and New York. 4) I try not to read too many magazines because I don’t want to be overwhelmed, but Vogue is really well done. And Adam Moss is doing a wonderful job every week with New York magazine.
Giant Robot: Eric Nakamura, Founder and Publisher 1) Growing up, I think I liked MAD. 2) It combined smart humor, cool drawing styles, and had the fold-in in the back. It combined satire with humor on so many levels and appealed to different groups of people. The people there were real artists. 3) It’s a tough call… 4) …I want to say so many titles. There’s Dwell, although really it’s not that great. I like Sunset, which is a home and gardening magazine. It’s not that great either, but I enjoy it. I like Wired for certain reasons, and even Rolling Stone when they have a great article. Interview magazine works as well—I don’t care for their fashion stuff, but their interviews are good. So in the end, just read Giant Robot.
San Francisco Magazine: Bruce Kelley, Editor in Chief
Chicago Magazine: Richard Babcock, Editor in Chief 1) Life. 2) It was newsy, vivid, dramatic, and it mixed the highs and lows of American life. Many of its notable features—an illustrated “day in the life,” for example, or massed headshots of soldiers killed in battle—are still in use today. I think almost anyone who read Life growing up developed a deep appreciation for the interplay of stories and photos. 3) New York magazine.
1) Sports Illustrated. 2) Almost every issue had one great piece of long-form literary journalism, written by Frank Deford, Curry Kirkpatrick, Ron Fimrite, Gary Smith, Dan Jenkins, George Plimpton, Robert Creamer, or Herbert Warren Wind. The lure of the intense narrative or profile is why I hang on in this business. 3) I read the New Yorker and New York every week, and they’re terrific. 4) New York is an editor’s magazine that captures its city’s zeitgeist. As for the monthlies, GQ is fun. And when a wordsmith like Andrew Corsello is doing his thing, it can be transformative.
CosmoGIRL! 1999 - 2008
Totally the coolest daughter of Cosmo and Hearst Magazines, she was, like, brutally murdered by her parents in an effort to “consolidate teen publishing activities.” WAY harsh. Is there an afterlife? Check it out at CosmoGirl.com Who’s laughing? Seventeen, which totally scored at the reading of the will, inheriting all of CosmoGIRL!’s subscribers. Who’s crying? My 14-year-old sister.
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Teen Mags, U R Sooo Over! By Ashton R. Lattimore
S
pinoffs are the gifts that keep on giving. TV’s Law & Order brought us Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (among countless others). Nintendo’s Donkey Kong gave us the beloved Super Mario Brothers. And in the late Nineties, with teen spending power at $141 billion in 1998 and rising, women’s magazines got into the act as well. In those five years, little sister publications brought to you by People, Elle, Cosmo, and Vogue burst onto the scene. But the teen spinoff boom was quick to bust: 10 years later, only Teen Vogue is left standing. At first, the idea seemed (in teen spinoff speak) “totally hot.” Teen People was first out of the gate in 1998, providing celebrity news on the Teen Hollywood set. Hearst followed the next year with CosmoGIRL!, a more mature teen ’zine for girls who were so over trying to decode their crush’s eye signals but still too innocent for grown-up Cosmo’s 400 tips on how to blow your man’s mind in bed (with helpful diagrams!). Lifestyle and fashion magazines Elle Girl (for the average girl) and Teen Vogue (for the high-class princess) rounded out the pack in 2001 and 2003. But the senior teen magazine queens weren’t about to relinquish their seats at the popular table without a fight. The new spinoffs had to go head to head with established juggernauts like Seventeen, Teen, and YM, which each boasted more than two million readers in 2000. “It was extremely competitive,” recalls Christina Kelly, former Elle Girl and YM editor-in-chief. And not just for readers. “A big part of the game was getting celebrities for the cover so the magazines would sell well on newsstands. But there were so many teen magazines at the time that the publicists had all the power.”
While the teen fashion magazines had only one another to contend with, Teen People was duking it out with adult titles. As Wendy Wilson, a staff writer from 2001 to 2005, explains,
were actually up 18 percent at Elle Girl when they shut their doors. “Whenever a company starts a magazine,” explains Kelly, “they have to lose a lot of money, and I think [Elle Girl
read magazines anymore,” says Kelly. “There’s not that same passion for magazines among this generation.” As a result, the defunct teen spinoffs have sought refuge online. Elle Girl has shifted its focus to the Web, having struck a deal with a teen marketing firm, Alloy, and expanded its online and wireless offerings. Similarly, CosmoGIRL! still updates its website, and Teen People lives on at People.com. With the flameout of the teen spinoff genre, publishers learned the hard way that appealing to teens doesn’t mean placing a junior version of big sister’s old standby on the newsstands. Instead, it’s a mandate for publishers to meet teens on their own terms—online.
Illustration by Katie Stengleim
“All of a sudden the Us Weekly’s and the Life & Style’s started to have covers and commentary on Jessica Simpson and the Backstreet Boys, and it was like, when did they discover that these people exist?” And although teens had an ever-widening field of options on the newsstand, they were increasingly heading online for content. What was intended to be a symbiotic relationship between print editions and their websites quickly became a competition, as well. So in 2006, both Teen People and Elle Girl hung up their strawberry lip gloss for good, followed by CosmoGIRL! in 2008. Teen People and CosmoGIRL! were victims of declining revenue, but ad pages
publisher Hachette Filipacchi] reached their limit on how much they wanted to lose before the magazine established itself.” As for Teen Vogue, the last spinoff magazine standing, Wilson believes that its affluent audience guaranteed its survival. “She’s the Park Avenue girl, the Gossip Girl,” says Wilson. “She can still pick up the magazine for $5, so they’ve had the resources to keep producing.” But for how long? The spinoffs haven’t been the only casualty of the cultural shift away from print. In the last several years, non spinoff teen titles like YM and Teen have folded too, leaving Seventeen and Teen Vogue the only major players in the once overpopulated field. “I don’t think teenagers really
Domino 2005 - 2009
Rest in Peace, Domino, trendiest of home shopping magazines. You are only good for wallpaper now�really stylish wallpaper. Is there an afterlife? No. Condé Nast is discontinuing the Domino brand. Who’s laughing? Stella Artois, which Gawker named the “official beverage of magazine closings” after the staff of Radar and Domino were seen drinking it at their fold parties. Who’s crying? The “domino dogs.” Domino was known for featuring dogs frequently in their cover and photo shoots. So it’s back to the agencies for Fifi and Fido.
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Bucking the Trend By Kathryn McGarr In its December 2007 issue, Folio asked 107 industry experts— including consultants, editors, and CEOs—to predict what the next year would bring for magazine publishing. Many of them anticipated a rough year ahead. Then, when the country’s largest corporations began tanking in mid-September 2008, it became even clearer that print ad revenue would suffer. (General Motors, for example, had been among the top three magazine ad buyers for the previous 10 years.) Although industry insiders were braced for bad news from the Publishers Information Bureau, which tracks consumer magazine trends, few expected their January report to be quite so bleak.
According to the PIB, the decrease in print magazine ad pages for last year was a staggering 11.7 percent, with a decline of 17.2 percent for the fourth quarter alone. To put that number in perspective: Over the previous two years, the total number of ad pages sold had fluctuated by less than 1 percent. With so many publications ailing or dying (see page 3 for “The Obits”), we magazine lovers have all the more reason to call upon our inner Pollyanna and play “the Glad Game.” Let’s look at some magazines that not only finished first in their categories but also saw an increase in ad pages. What were they doing right? (Hint: Good, or at least improved, content actually helped.)
+12.2%
+4.4%* A prestigious brand worldwide, The Economist’s cachet in the United States has climbed as we look for hard business news with a global twist. Advertisers know their money is well spent, with their ads reaching an affluent readership whose average household net worth in North America is over $1.6 million. Also, the weekly magazine currently lacks a direct competitor, as traditional newsweeklies like Time and Newsweek lose relevance, and financial magazines like BusinessWeek and Fortune lack the serious, international journalism of The Economist.
+5.0%
Since its inception in 2005, Women’s Health has benefited from its family connections. It had the advantage of being born into the privately held Rodale Inc. clan, which could invest heavily in its new title without having to answer to shareholders. Thanks to its popular 22-year-old brother publication, Men’s Health, the magazine had immediate brand recognition. In 2008, Women’s Health saw its rate base surpass one million, and advertisers have taken notice.
+7.1%
Like The Economist, Elle is an international brand that has made inroads into the US over the past few years. Elle’s participation in Project Runway helped make the title hot in 2004, but the initial Runway boost had probably worn off by 2008. More likely reasons for Elle’s impressive numbers include smart editing and the fact that its parent company, Hachette Filipacchi, has a reputation for deeply discounting ads. Condé Nast, which owns Vogue, does not discount, which could be one reason that the fashion bible saw a nearly 10 percent decline in ad pages in 2008. However, Vogue continued to enjoy the number one position in market share last year, with Elle overtaking Time Inc.’s In Style as number two.
Shelter magazines were especially vulnerable to the financial crisis, as few people were building, buying, or redecorating their homes. O at Home (Hearst), Domino (Condé Nast), and Cottage Living (Time Inc.) all folded in late 2008 or early 2009. So why was Hearst’s House Beautiful miraculously up in ad pages? Well, after a 15 percent decline in 2006, the magazine’s ad numbers had nowhere to go but up. Following a few years of turmoil, it appears that the 113-year-old House Beautiful is reestablishing itself as a desirable magazine for advertisers. Nevertheless, it’s still 20 pages short of where it was in 2005.
*These numbers represent the changes in total number of ad pages in 2008, compared to 2007.
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The Thrift Detective
Bang for your Buck (BfYB) = # pages x square inches / cover price
By Tim Loh Rolling Stone’s BfYB drop significantly, when pages fell to 90. Still, to With budgets tight, many magazines have been downsizing over date, Rolling Stone’s BfYB has decreased just 11 percent. the past year—in width, height, or number of pages. Meanwhile, Fortune proved to be the most brazen downsizer. Though cover prices have been steady or climbing, leaving Joe the Shopper consistently the most generous in terms of BfYB, the magazine’s first with less bang for his buck at the neighborhood newsstand. quarter page cuts dropped its score from 23 to 16—a 30 percent dive. How much less? We’ve tracked four prominent magazines from The New Yorker, in different categories turn, raised its standard (The New Yorker, Sports Bang for your Buck cover price from $4.50 to Illustrated, Rolling Stone, $4.99 (the price formerly and Fortune) over the reserved for its double past year to find out. issues). When it didn’t We calculated the total raise page numbers, as square inches of pages well, its BfYB suffered, in each issue and divided with a year-to-date drop of that number by the cover 22 percent. price, to give you the first Last, and least, was annual NYRM “Bang-forSports Illustrated, whose Your-Buck Index.” BfYB hardly changed at For example, the Oct. all year-to-date. Although 16 issue of Rolling Stone its BfYB ended the year included 94 pages at 11no lower than it started, 5/8” x 10,” with a cover at a score of just 13 the price of $4.50, giving a magazine held steady at BfYB of 24: the bottom of the pack.
(94 pages x 116.25 sq. inches/page) / 450 cents = 24.28 That was the magazine’s final issue in its signature oversized format. For its Oct. 30 issue, Rolling Stone slimmed down to a standard trim size, but raised its page count to 146, so its BfYB grew to 28. Only in late January did
(Note: There are some limitations to the BfYB Index. We have included advertising pages in our tallies, and we haven’t judged the quality of product. We have also chain-weighted our calculations to smooth out—though not deemphasize—spikes brought about by special issues like Fortune’s early May “Fortune 500” issue.)
Staying Power By Anne-Ryan Heatwole With the magazine industry suffering a downturn, it seems like the time to look back at three magazines that have proved their staying power in this often fickle industry.
Esquire 1933: Editor Arnold Gingrich founds Esquire as a magazine for men. It gains fame during the World War II era for its use of pinup girl illustrations, most notably the Varga Girls and Petty Girls, drawn by Alberto Vargas and George Petty. The magazine evolves to include journalism, men’s
fashion, and fiction works throughout the Thirties and Forties. 1960: Esquire publishes Norman Mailer’s “Superman Comes to the Supermarket,” beginning the magazine’s involvement in popularizing New Journalism. It publishes innovative and unconventional pieces throughout the Sixties and Seventies, including Tom Wolfe’s “The Last American Hero is Junior Johnson. Yes!” in 1965 and Gay Talese’s “Frank Sinatra Has a Cold” in 1966. NOW: Esquire still honors its pinup roots by featuring
beautiful women but has serious literary chops to back up its sexy spreads. The magazine celebrates its 75th anniversary by producing a limited edition of its October 2008 issue, featuring a battery-powered cover made with electronic ink that flashes the words: “The 21st century begins now!”
Vogue 1892: Vogue is founded as a bimonthly New York society magazine with a limited circulation. Articles include features on country clubs and golfing fashions. 1909: Vogue becomes one of the first publications bought by Condé Montrose Nast, founder of the Condé Nast magazine empire. Nast builds the Vogue brand into a national
magazine focused on high fashion. 1963: Diana Vreeland becomes editorin-chief. She begins to introduce more youth-centric coverage and helps make models and society girls like Twiggy and Edie Sedgwick household names. NOW: Current editor-in-chief Anna Wintour enters her 21st year at
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The Tip-Off
Chattering Class or Huddled Mass? By Cara Parks
gone too far with their penny-pinching, tightfisted ways, recession be damned. (Full disclosure: I am a contributor to one of these, Publishers During tough economic times, we all make sacrifices, and there’s something to be said for taking one for the team. But enough is enough. Weekly.) Writers, fact checkers, and editors, unite! Cast off the cruel yoke For your consideration, listed below are some magazines that may have of your oppressors, and join your revolutionary, freelancing brethren!
Perpetrator
Vibe
harper’s bazaar
Publishers Weekly
ebony and Jet
Corporate Overlord
Vibe Media Group
Hearst Magazines
Reed Business International
Johnson Publishing Company
Employees are cut back to a four-day workweek and take a 10-to-15 percent pay cut.
Parent company outlined costcutting strategies, including using ineligible staff for overtime and canceling all employee subscriptions, in an internal memo leaked to Gawker.
Two floors of its Gramercy space are closing. Offices are being combined, and conference rooms converted to makeshift workstations.
The corporation asked employees to re-apply for their jobs under its “reorganization.”
Shallow Justification
An almost 18 percent drop in ad revenue creates financial problems. Vibe also plans to cut back to 10 issues a year and reduce its guaranteed rate base by 25 percent.
While Hearst has been pulling through the recession fairly well, bazaar is trying to trim a million dollars from its budget (according to Women’s Wear daily).
RBI recently enacted a 7 percent company-wide layoff to compensate for lack of advertising. (See page 18.)
ebony lost 14.7 percent of its ad pages last year, and fellow JPC magazine Jet lost 22.3 percent.
Humiliation Quotient
When everyone else is getting laid off, a four-day workweek actually looks pretty sweet.
Some suggestions, like taking taxis instead of the company car service, seem reasonable. But when even magazines think magazine subscriptions aren’t worth it, we have a serious problem on our hands.
Working next to 15 other people in a conference room? Not exactly a valentine from management.
Begging for a job from the company that already hired you? Sometimes even when you win, you lose.
The Insult
Bitch-Slap Factor
the helm of the magazine. She is well-known for predicting and influencing fashion trends and for her support of young designers. Vogue is the number one fashion magazine in America, with a monthly circulation of more than 1.2 million.
Consumer Reports 1933: Arthur Kallet and Frederick Schlink of Consumers’ Research, a nonprofit organization that tested products’ advertising claims, publish 10,000 Guinea Pigs: Dangers in Everyday Foods, Drugs, and Cosmetics. The book is one of the
first efforts to independently evaluate companies on the safety of their products. 1935: After three workers are fired for joining a union, 40 members of Consumers’ Research strike in protest. The following year, they form the Consumers’ Union, and the first issue of Consumers’ Union Reports appears in May. The new organization is similar to Consumers’ Research, in that it independently tests products for the public good, but it
has a more liberal stance. Too liberal for some: Consumers’ Research publisher Frederick Schlink accuses them of being communists. 1942: Consumers’ Union Reports changes its name to Consumer Reports to appeal to a broader readership. Subscriptions rise over the next decade, reaching 400,000 by 1950, and the magazine moves closer to the political center. 1954: The magazine is removed from the House Un-American Activities Committee’s list of subversive organizations. 1972: Consumer Reports opens an office in
Washington, D.C., where it can work more closely with the government as an advocate for consumer rights. The magazine wins its first National Magazine Award in 1974 for a three-part series on the pollution and contamination of America’s community water systems. NOW: The magazine has a subscription base of more than four million readers, as well as a strong Web presence. Its website claims to have the largest membership of any paid-subscription site, and in January 2009, it took over the former Gawker blog Consumerist.com, as well.
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My Top Ten Mag Moments of the Decade By China Okasi The Print Launch of Madame Oprah (2000) When billionaire Oprah decided to expand from TV to print, readers were thrilled to own a piece of that iconic goodness. Today, her hit magazine boasts a circulation of over 2.4 million. O herself is featured alone on every cover (save for the cover of the April 2009 issue, on which she was joined by first lady Michelle Obama).
Time to Reflect: the special Sept. 11 issue of Time (2001) Time magazine released this special edition just three days after the 9/11 attacks. The cover depicted the World Trade Center engulfed in flames. Time even changed its signature red borders to a somber black for the first time ever, as a way of honoring the 9/11 victims.
The Plus-Size Fight of Mode (2002) Mode, the first high-fashion magazine to target plus-sized fashionistas, was launched in 1997 and reached a circulation of over 600,000. When the magazine folded in 2001, its executive editor, Ceslie Armstrong, continued the fight for plus-size fashion by launching a similar magazine, Grace, that same year. Although Grace folded after just seven issues, we still remember—and applaud—Armstrong’s struggle.
New Scientist’s “RabbitHuman” Report (2003) Science buffs can’t forget New Scientist’s August 2003 article on Chinese stem cell researcher Hui Zhen Sheng. She and her team
at Shanghai Second Medical University created human embryonic stem cells from nonhuman material by fusing adult human cells with rabbit eggs. Unlike science journals that just stated the facts of the experiment, New Scientist reported the drama and doubt behind this brand new bunny science.
Sports Illustrated’s Split Personality (2004) When the University of Southern California and Louisiana State University shared the National Football Championship in 2004, Sports Illustrated created three separate covers for its January issue: one for the West Coast featuring USC as champions, another for the state of Louisiana with LSU as champions, and a third featuring Pete Rose for the rest of the nation. (And Rose wasn’t even discussing football—he was confessing to a baseball gambling addiction.)
Vanity Fair’s Unfair Bleaching (2005) Vanity Fair hadn’t put a black woman on its cover since 1993. Finally, 12 years later, the magazine put the singer/ actress Beyoncé on its cover and was promptly accused by various bloggers and media outlets of “whitening” Beyoncé’s skin. Irony much?
Time Names “You” Person of the Year (2006) Face it: From Facebook poking to Twittering, we each play a role in defining this 21st-
century world of coolness and technology, which was exactly Time’s point when it named us (“You”) the “Person of the Year” for 2006. That’s right. Without us, there would be no—us.
Sumo Wrestling Exposed! (2007) Shukan Gendai, a weekly Japanese tabloid, rocked the sumo world with its March 2007 exposé on the fixedness (i.e., fakeness) of sumo wrestling. Why, World Wrestling Entertainment could never operate that way!
The New Yorker’s Obama Cover (2008) In its July 21, 2008 issue, during the presidential campaign, The New Yorker ran a cover depicting Barack and Michelle Obama in terrorist garb. Some turned a blind eye to charges of racism, arguing that the cover was merely satirical. The Obama campaign, however, called the cartoon “tasteless and offensive.” Ouch!
Plenty
2005 - 2009 Farewell, Plenty, saintly friend to all God’s creatures! You were too good for this world—and you reminded us of that on a monthly basis. Is there an afterlife? No, this green ’zine is going the way of the rainforest trees it wasn’t made out of. Who’s laughing? Alaska Governor Sarah Palin and former Secretary of the Interior Dirk Kempthorne, who, according to Plenty, “hate polar bears,” and probably environmental magazines, too. Who’s crying? Ecorazzi.com, the green gossip website: “We hope everyone involved with what was a kick-ass publication finds new work on the environmental scene soon.” Super. Are they hiring?
Kanye’s Complex (2009) On the seventhanniversary cover of Complex, Complex rapper Kanye West appeared as a computer generated image. Director Chris Milk used a 3-D computer program to manipulate West’s likeness. In a video interview on Complex.com, West said that he had pitched the idea for the image because he wanted to create something iconic. “It’s not ego-driven, it’s product driven. I just want the best things to come out in the world,” he said. West added that he gets frustrated with magazines that don’t allow him to help with concepts, because he feels that he could have worked at a magazine. And there you have it, ladies and gentlemen.
Radar
2003 - 2003 2005 - 2005 2007 - 2008 Troubled hipster child of anxious parents. We all wanted a piece of him. Repeatedly bludgeoned to death by a cruel, cruel media landscape, which then robbed his grave for the leftovers. Is there an afterlife? Again? Actually, yes. Radar’s name survives online (RadarMagazine.com), although it’s now in the hands of a tabloid publisher. Who’s laughing? American Media Inc., the proud new owners of the Radar celebrity news site. Oh, the pity of it. Who’s crying? Founder Maer Roshan, who launched—and folded— Radar three times in five years.
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Climbing the Masthead...in Heels By Elizabeth Henderson My editorial experience began at the tender age of six. On my parents’ clunky, secondhand Mac, I put together community “announcements” ranging from fictitious births and deaths to short articles about house fires and the importance of smoke detectors. While I flirted with other careers along the way—pediatrician, actress, fiction writer—becoming an editor was never far from my mind. Fast-forward 17 years. Now, as a journalism school graduate facing the doom and gloom of a crippled industry, I can’t help but worry about the depressing statistics that suggest that women, after more than 30 years of entering j-schools at a higher rate than men, have made little progress when it comes to infiltrating the upper echelons of media power. Women hold only 3 percent of “clout” positions in the industry (such as owners, top editors, and board members), according to a study released by the Annenberg Public Policy Center. What, exactly, is standing between me and the corner office? The first challenge is getting hired, says Jennifer Pozner, founder and executive director of Women in Media and News, an organization working to increase the presence of women in the media. Pozner claims that the lack of women in positions of power is a result of magazines not hiring enough women, and then failing to promote those they do. “The way media is produced today, gender and race aren’t considered a priority,” says Pozner. “They’re sidelined to the larger goal of profits.” Pozner maintains that if publications want to solve the problem of gender inequality, they need to help women every step of the way. They need to invest more time and money in recruiting, training, and retaining female staffers.
Having more women in leadership positions could lead to more diverse editorial content and provide young women with invaluable mentors. “It’s good to have role models, and to see that women can hold these kinds of
will be especially difficult for young women just starting out. Women are also more likely to be in low-level positions and thus the first employees cut when times are tough, says Macdonald.
be more confident, particularly when it comes to pitching articles. “Women seem to have more of a tendency than men to assume that they need to know a lot about something before they have the authority to write about it,” she says. And Michele Kort, a senior editor at Ms., emphasizes that women need to share information about discrimination, be willing to organize when inequality occurs, and even leave publications if problems persist. “If people don’t speak up, the problem goes underground,” says Kort. Kort also encourages young women not to settle for a job or internship that compromises their values, and to be aware of inequality in the workplace once they do land the job they want. “Don’t forget your fellow women,” she says. “You’re part of the sisterhood, so represent it well.”
Illustration by Shaina Koval
positions,” says Kiera Butler, an associate editor at Mother Jones, which for the first time in the magazine’s history has two female editors-in-chief. But in the current economic climate, funding for improving diversity is especially vulnerable. “Diversity programs are often first on the chopping block. The financial crisis is going to roll back a lot of the progress that has been made,” says Isabel Macdonald, a communications director at FAIR, a media watchdog group. With layoffs hitting younger employees particularly hard—2.2 million of the more than 5 million people currently unemployed are between the ages of 16 and 29—finding a job
While structural changes are important, Carol Jenkins, president of the Women’s Media Center, an advocacy group, says that women can’t place all of the blame on the way the business is run. “Women have to become more savvy about demanding their due,” she says. So, what’s a young woman to do? To remain competitive, Jenkins urges women to learn the business and consider management positions. “For women who just want to write,” she says, “it’s not going to happen.” Andi Zeisler, the editorial and creative director of the feminist pop culture magazine Bitch, says that women need to
Quick & Simple 2005 - 2008
Cherished mother figure done to death by rising paper costs. You taught us “fun new ways to walk off weight.” And some other things we can’t remember. Is there an afterlife? Yes. The budget women’s weekly lives on at QuickandSimple.com Who’s laughing? Bauer Publishing, which puts out rival mag Women’s World. Who’s crying? Overweight pedestrians. Twelve out of the 15 covers surveyed tout new ways to “walk off weight,” the most ambitious being March 2008’s “Walk Off 50, 150, 250 lbs.” Phew!
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