Four Canadians make magazines' "hot 100" list of public individuals

Not that I'd want to encourage one more ranking or list, of which there are plenty, but isn't it interesting that Foreign Policy magazine (Washington) and Prospect (a kind of British Walrus) jointly created a list of leading intellectuals?

According to a story carried by CanWest News Services, four Canadians or expatriates found their way onto the list of the top 100 public thinkers, including deputy opposition leader Michael Ignatieff. The others were philosopher Charles Taylor and pop psychologist Steven Pinker, both of Montreal, and writer Malcolm Gladwell, who was born in the United Kingdom, raised in Elmira, Ontario, and who now lives and works in New York City as a staff writer for the New Yorker. (Pinker and Gladwell are listed as sort of hybrid Canada-U.S. nominees.)

The list, which not surprisingly is top heavy with U.S. and UK neames, includes Pope Benedict XVI, former U.S. vice-president Al Gore, Czech statesman and playwright Vaclav Havel, British novelist Salman Rushdie, American linguist Noam Chomsky and Russian democracy activist and Chess grandmaster Garry Kasparov.

"We have compiled our list of the men and women who shape the tenor of our time with the power of their thoughts, words and discoveries," Foreign Policy explained in its May-June edition.

"It's a diverse group drawn from across the globe whose ranks include activists, political scientists, journalists, economists, playwrights, scientists, and many more."

Candidates were required to be active publicly and to "have shown both distinction in their particular field and an ability to influence wider debate, often far from the places they call home.

New science and nature title to bringing BBC-ness to the New World,

BBC Worldwide and its magazine division is about to launch its first magazine aimed at the U.S. market, called BBC Knowledge. According to a story in the Guardian, the new magazine -- six times annually with a projected circulation of 85,000 starting in August -- will essentially be competing with the likes of National Geographic and other natural history and science titles.

BBC Knowledge is already an established brand, having launched as a television channel in Poland, Singapore, Hong Kong and Indonesia last year as part of BBC Worldwide's new Global Channels business.

The magazine, which is to be edited from the UK Sally Palmer, former deputy editor of the BBC science publication Focus, with help from US consultant editor and science editor John Horgan, will have 100-plus pages and will use content from other UK titles such as Focus, BBC History Magazine and BBC Wildlife Magazine .

BBC Worldwide already sells about 35,000 copies of various titles in the US, including Gardens Illustrated and Homes & Antiques. The new magazine's launch will be preceded by a direct mail promotion of 1.5 million copies.

BBC Knowlege will sell for $5.99 on the newsstand and $29.95 for an annual subscription, (and presumably will be sold in Canada as well. In its usual way, the BBC tends to consider Canada simply part of the "American" market.)

"This was always envisaged to be an international project," said Andy Benham, the publishing director of BBC Worldwide's specialist division, BBC Magazines Bristol. "While we are initially launching in America, where the concept researched very favourably, the magazine undoubtedly has global appeal. We are already looking at a number of exciting international licensing prospects."

Benham said the magazine is not intended to compete head-to-head with U.S. titles. He said a few features would be "National Geographic-y" but that the magazine would be very broad, covering everything from the Falklands war to the country of Colombia.

“While the content will feed American interests, the Britishness and BBC-ness of the magazine are seen as being key assets, offering consumers a fresh alternative to what is currently on the market," Benham said.

It's not nice to surprise us, say ad agency media directors

Magazines who pay for their own circulation audits shouldn't change suppliers or procedures without the approval of the advertisers to whom they supply the resulting data. That would seem to encapsulate the extraordinary message delivered today by the Canadian Media Directors Council (CMDC).

There was a blizzard of "shocked and appalled" commentary from several quarters recently when, first, Star Media Group, Sun Media and Transcontinental Media were switching from the Audit Bureau of Circulations to the Canadian Circulation Audit Board - and, later, that Rogers Media announced it was switching the auditing of all 52 26 of its titles to ABC; together with the 26 already ABC-audited, this totalled 52. (The fact that the commentators often had a vested interest in or sat on the boards of one or the other of the two main auditing organizations was generally ignored.)

The CMDC issued its "Communiqué on Media Measurement, Accountability and Auditing"

The overriding purpose of the statement, CMDC (and ABC) board member Sunni Boot, president/CEO of ZenithOptimedia, told Media in Canada, is that "future changes in auditing and measurements practices, policies, reporting will not take place without consultation with, and ideally agreement by, the buying community.

"With accountability a headline subject in the industry," CMDC's statement continues, "the question arises as to what obligations and responsibilities sellers have to the buying community, and what expectations buyers have in the currencies that govern our business transactions."

It said that sellers (i.e. magazines and newspapers) in "similar media categories" should use the same measurements and accountablity standards. What's curious about this is that, despite the kerfuffle, nobody has specified how the standards employed by ABC and CCAB differ in any substantive way. Many magazines use CCAB and a few use ABC; many newspapers use ABC and a few use CCAB.
Nevertheless, the "compatibility" portion of the CMDC statement says:

"It has taken many years of evolution in Canadian media to move to a system that - certainly for the major media - is now directly comparable for all players," the comparability section of the statement continues, adding that "disrupting this system is not seen to be in the interest of objective and efficient media comparison, nor supportive of fair investment decision-making."

Boot said advertisers must be part of setting the standards for measurements and audits.

"Why? Because the results of these audits reflect the currency by which we trade," she adds. "The advertiser/buyer's voice must take precedence. We have selected and are paying for a medium with the expectation that we will deliver a certain audience. To provide confidence in those audience numbers, we must be fully receptive to the manner in which the data is captured and reported."

So, in fact, media directors are saying they should be allowed to dictate not only acceptable methodology but also whether a publisher can switch from one perfectly legitimate auditing supplier to another without asking permission first.

Toronto's City Bites magazine up for sale

Toronto's City Bites magazine is for sale. The bi-monthly foodie title, which just published its 3rd anniversary issue, distributes 30,000 copies (25,000 through the Globe and Mail, and 5,000 to subscribers ($20 a year) and in various retail outlets). Co-founder Dick Snyder told the blog MyHogtown:

"It's just time to move on and do some new projects. Basically, we got the mag to break even in year two, and have been profitable for the last year. But to really grow it and expand -- which is what our readers cry for -- it needs a lot of serious attention. It needs to be monthly, possibly bigger format, maybe even glossy."

Snyder, who is executive editor at Redwood Custom Communications and has been doing City Bites on his own time, says he's open to staying involved if a buyer wants him to, or just letting it go completely -- either way, he just wants see it grow.

Jim and Linda Gourlay to jointly receive Volunteer of the Year Award

Magazines Canada has issued a revised press release concerning its Volunteer of the Year award, adding Jim Gourlay as co-winner with his wife Linda. The couple are co-owners and co-publishers of Saltscapes magazine. based in Halifax. An earlier release on Monday named Linda Gourlay as the recipient of the prestigious award. In its revised release, the organization cited the couple's "outstanding volunteer contributions [that] have had a national impact on the Canadian consumer magazine industry" and said:

Jim and Linda Gourlay are a team who own and publish Saltscapes. Both are staunch magazine advocates and generous volunteers, nationally and regionally. Jim was a driving force behind the evolution of the Atlantic Magazines Association and served as Chair in its first year, and Linda has been a valuable member of the Magazines Canada board of directors for the last 6 years. Linda also chaired the Magazines Canada Consumer Marketing Committee for the last 4 years and she and Jim are co-chairing the International Regional Magazine Association conference being held in Nova Scotia in the fall of 2008. In addition to these acts of volunteerism, Jim and Linda have made time throughout their busy careers to sit on industry task forces, speak at conferences and share their expertise and passion with colleagues and students, for the betterment of the industry.

Canadian graphic designer Leanne Shapton named to Time magazine's Design 100

Canadian graphic designer Leanne Shapton, the former art director of the late Saturday Night, has been named to the Design 100 published by Time magazine. The supplement honours "the

people and ideas behind today’s most influential design".

According to a story in Design Edge Canada magazine, Shapton is now designing and illustrating books, magazines and textiles in New York City – she illustrated the cover of the Time Style & Design issue. In 2006, she wrote and illustrated her first book, Was She Pretty? She is also co-founder of J&L Books, which publishes art and photography books.

Bonnie Fuller out as the queen of the tabloids

[This post has been updated] The trajectory of Bonnie Fuller's career has taken a major dip with word that she's out as the Executive Vice-President and Chief Editorial Director of American Media Inc.. A release from AMI says that she is leaving both position effective today.

"I am proud of the significant achievements of American Media's celebrity and fitness brands over the past five years, and I am now ready for a new adventure," said Ms. Fuller. "The transformation of Star from a tabloid into a glossy magazine was unprecedented and has proven to be a great success. I am also proud of the redesigns of several other titles over the past few years. I have been fortunate to work with an exceptional group of talented editors and publishers, and am thrilled to continue my involvement with AMI through my role as editor-at-large at Star and consultant to David Pecker."

Usually, being given a consulting job and an honorific title like editor-at-large is simply part of a severance package and that seems to be the case here, with AMI likely paying her out for the balance of the 3-year contract renewal she signed in June 2006.

AMI publishes Star, Shape, Men's Fitness, Fit Pregnancy, Natural Health, and The National Enquirer.

As can be seen from past posts here, Fuller has come a long way since her days as a fashion reporter at the Toronto Star and the editor of Flare magazine then shot to prominence in New York heading up Women's Wear Daily, Glamour and then US Weekly.

[UPDATE] Dylan Stableford, in his blog on Folio: ventures some tart commentary about Fuller's departure:

Now, I'm no financial whiz. But a magazine that's spending $2,500,000—not including her hair and makeup!—on an editor who appears, at this point, to be relegated to blogging for the Huffington Post, is not spending its money wisely...

I think, too, that paying an editor some 50 times, say, what another editorial staffer was making is a poisonous recipe for any magazine.

Unless your name is Martha or Rachael Ray (or A-Rod), it's a good time for publishers to rein it in those exorbitant edit contracts.

What we used to call editorial...

“All of our content-providers—what we used to call editorial people—will become medium-agnostic.”

-- Brian Segal, CEO Rogers Publishing Ltd.

Mastheadonline has a report on Segal's speech yesterday to the Canadian Marketing Association' national convention and trade show

Reader-generated magazines; not easy, not cheap

Having your readers write a whole issue of your magazine is a nifty, but daunting idea. For all the lip service that's paid to "engagement" and "reader involvement", most editors would think the thing too outlandish to contemplate. Much is being made of the decision by Budget Travel (properly known as Arthur Frommer's Budget Travel) in the U.S. to turn over its entire 10th anniversary issue to reader-generated content. Not to take anything away from the idea, but it's not unique.

There are, in fact, good examples -- like Our Canada -- where people submit stories and are given a subscription in return (the magazine is published by Reader's Digest Canada). And a company called 8020 Publishing created a travel magazine called Everwhere and a photography magazine called JPG that were entirely reader-driven. There are doubtless other examples, too.

Erik Torkells, the editor-in-chief of Budget Travel, recounts in a blog post he wrote for Folio: how he and his staff took the plunge for the magazine's 10th anniversary issue. Solicitations in the magazine and online for a variety of forms and story types got an overwhelming response -- it received almost 2,800 in-depth pitches for the “Want to be a travel writer?” story alone.

Occasionally someone would ask if we were doing a reader-generated issue because it was cheaper or easier. Let’s be perfectly clear: Making this issue was neither cheap nor easy. First, we paid our regular fees; second, we traveled more writers than we normally would (we tend to find people who live someplace); finally, we also paid for companions’ expenses (something we don’t do for professional writers). And without an extraordinary amount of deft editing—both in terms of generating ideas, sifting through submissions, working with non-professional writers and photographers, and actual text-editing—the issue would’ve been a mess. Editing non-professional writers’ words is never easy.