Burgeoning digital content leads to new ASME ad:edit guidelines

Eight U.S. National Magazine Award categories will be open to stories published online, it has been announced by the American Society of Magazine Editors. Concurrently, ASME is revising its guidelines on digital publishing in light of a doubling of digital magazine initiatives so far in 2007.

Last year the Canadian Society of Magazine Editors (CSME) in collaboration with Magazines Canada, produced a revised set of advertising:editorial guidelines, based on a considerable amount of consultation with Canadian magazines. The one area that it didn't get into directly was what might be called "digital publishing". As more and more magazines have versions and extensions that play a larger and larger part in their business models, this will become a more important issue, particularly since the divide between advertising, promotion and editorial is fuzzier in the online world.

From a story posted on Folio: magazine's website:

The American Society of Magazine Editors is in the process of changing its guidelines for 2008 to include new rules that address the industry’s increasingly vivid shift to digital content.

At the American Magazine Conference in Boca Raton, Florida last week, ASME president and Glamour editor Cindi Leive said the digital environment presents magazine editors with an even blurrier line between advertising and editorial than they are used to.

“The church-state wall isn’t as clear or defined as it is in print,” Leive said. Leive's announcement came on the heels of a Magazine Publishers of America report that digital magazine initiatives have doubled thus far in 2007.