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Versha Sharma (Editor: Teen Vogue) Jun 14, 2024

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IT’S COMPLICATED

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If Teen Vogue’s editorial still surprises you, it might be time to admit that this says more about you than it does about Teen Vogue. And also, perhaps, that you haven’t been paying attention.

Teen Vogue is not the first magazine aimed at “the young” of course, and it’s not the first one to address multiple issues. But…Teen Vogue is the first, perhaps, to make a certain kind of noise.

Since well before the Trump presidency, but certainly turbocharged during it, Teen Vogue has mixed tips on fashion and beauty, profiles about the latest girl groups from Korea, and the scoop on the stars of Bridgerton, with political analysis and opinion, stories about identity and social justice, and an election primmer that is maybe one of the most thorough you’ll find anywhere.

Versha Sharma has been editor since 2021 and has not only maintained all the pillars that make up Teen Vogue but enhanced them. She came to Teen Vogue from overtly political media like Talking Points Memo, NowThis, Vocativ,and MSNBC. And she says she’s landed her dream job.

Sharma and her team are unabashed and unapologetic about what they do—and know that they are serving a large community of very active young women (65% of the readership) who follow the brand on every social channel imaginable, visit the website by the millions, and attend Teen Vogue Summits—in person!—to listen to their favorite influencers, singers, entrepreneurs, actors and activists talk shop.

Sharma feels like the luckiest editor in the industry. But one thing is missing: paper.

Teen Vogue discontinued its print edition more than seven years ago. Her new dream? Convincing her bosses at Condé Nast to bring it back.

David Remnick (Editor: The New Yorker) Jun 07, 2024

Show notes

THE FIFTH

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I want you to stop what you’re doing for just a moment and imagine we’re back in 1998. (Those of you born since then will have to use your imagination). We’re on an ASME panel exploring the future of magazines in the digital age.

The moderator, eager to get the discussion off to a lively start, turns to you and asks, “What magazine that we all cherish today is least likely to adapt and survive what’s coming?”

Without hesitation you blurt out “The New Yorker!”

The audience murmurs in agreement.

“The Atlantic!” someone shouts from the crowd.

More murmuring.

I’m not surprised. Neither is anybody else in the room. It’s almost three decades ago, and yet we’ve already headed into a new world of “nugget” media—and the total loss of our collective attention spans. Hell, magazines that feature 25,000-word polemics on topics like the squirrels of Central Park are already dinosaurs, even here in 1998.

It’s a bleak outlook for an institution—I’m talking about The New Yorker—that claims the following heritage:

It has survived two world wars and the Great Depression,
it’s been led by only five editors, ever, in its 71-year history,
it didn’t use color—or photography!—until its 67th year when a young, supremely talented, and controversial Brit took over in 1992,
and it’s now run by a former newsman who had never edited anything except his high school newspaper.

But here’s the thing: It’s 2024 and we’re looking at a decimated magazine business. Mighty brands and hot-shit startups alike are dead and gone—or running on fumes. The big publishers are divesting from print right and left.

And yet, there is a shining light.

Today The New Yorker is busy preparing for its 100th anniversary, with that same newsman at the top of the masthead who has brought video, events, podcasts, print (a magazine!)—and even some branded pajamas—together with the most legacy of legacy brands to create a 21st-century media juggernaut.

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This episode is made possible by our friends at Mountain Gazette, Commercial Type, and Lane Press.

Gail Bichler (Designer: The New York Times Magazine) May 31, 2024

Show notes

THE FINE ART OF MAGAZINE MAKING

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Imagine this: You’re a 42-year-old designer who’s only worked at one magazine. Ever. Then one day, unexpectedly, you’re tasked to lead the design of that magazine. Now imagine that the magazine is universally lauded as a design masterpiece. Add to that, your immediate predecessors have both been enshrined into every hall of fame across the design and media universe.

Heard enough? Well now throw into this mix that your job is only an interim post.

Why? Because just as your boss was leaving, his boss was out the door, too. That’s right, now you’ve got to navigate all of … this … while the company is searching for your new boss. And whatever you did that got you a shot at this opportunity the first time? You’re gonna have to do it all again. And likely for an editor who’s been tasked with coming in and shaking things up a bit.

“I’m fucked,” you might think. But you’re not Gail Bichler.

As you already know, Bichler survived the turmoil that started her tenure at The New York Times Magazine. And the astonishing thing—well, astonishing until you know more—is that Bichler has not only maintained the exalted design standards, she has pushed even further.

“Her magazine looks different from Rem [Duplessis]’s, as Rem’s did from mine. She’s pushed the envelope in dramatically new directions,” says her legendary predecessor—and the woman who discovered Bichler—Janet Froelich. Why? Because Bichler is an artist. And, as Froelich states, “she chooses to work with people who work the way artists work. She’s firmly committed to ideas and, most importantly, to journalism.”

“What elevates her as a leader is the discipline, structure, and consistency she brings,” says Arem Duplessis, whose departure for Apple created the opportunity for Bichler to move up. “Gail has always been so reverential to the Times’ legacy—and she fiercely protects that.”

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This episode is made possible by our friends at Mountain Gazette, Commercial Type, and Lane Press.

Kerry Diamond (Founder & Editor: Cherry Bombe) May 30, 2024

Show notes

THE CHERRY ON TOP

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Cherry Bombe is a full-course meal. Its founder, Kerry Diamond, created the magazine after working in titles like Women’s Wear Daily and Harper’s Bazaar, and after working for brands like Lancôme. And in the restaurant industry. She worked in restaurants at a time when everything culinary was in the ascendance in the zeitgeist.

That’s also when Diamond realized a key ingredient was missing. None of the brash rising stars at the table were women. She had also been hearing from women who found the going in that world challenging. This in an industry that is difficult for everyone to begin with. Out of this came Cherry Bombe.

Today, Cherry Bombe is a full-fledged and rising media empire. It’s a magazine, sure, but their menu also includes multiple podcasts and a series of wildly-successful events. Their community, called the “Bombe Squad,” meet each other on Zoom, at the events, and form a tightly-connected sisterhood of fans and evangelists for the brand.

Diamond makes it sound like she built all of this without a blueprint, and maybe she did. But just like the best recipes, sometimes the tastiest things are the result of the happiest accidents.

Willa Bennett (Editor: Highsnobiety, GQ, Seventeen, more) May 24, 2024

Show notes

THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER

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In early April, what’s left of the magazine industry gathered at Terminal 5 to see who would win this year’s National Magazine Awards—the ASMEs. Throughout the evening, the usual suspects stepped up to accept their Alexander Calder brass elephants—the ‘Ellies’—on behalf of their teams at The Atlantic, New York, and The New York Times Magazine.

Then came the award for General Excellence, Service and Lifestyle—a category that covers every food, fashion, and fitness magazine in the business.

And the Ellie went to… content juggernaut Highsnobiety—a sneaker blog-turned-cool kid media amalgam that encompasses a twice-annual $20-per-issue print magazine, plus a flood of social media, a website that is also an e-commerce platform, and a creative agency that does 360-degree marketing and storytelling for brands.

Before the crowd could start scratching their graying heads, a Billie Eilish lookalike in a gray Thom Brown skirt-and-pant suit took to the dais. There were plenty of people in that room who had never given Highsnobiety much, if any, thought.

But in that moment, this woman, Willa Bennett, Highsnobiety’s 30-year-old editor-in-chief, had officially become a force to be reckoned with. Not only that, but Highsnobiety’s business model, which bends rules that had long been sacrosanct in magazine journalism, suddenly appeared to have won the seal of approval from the oldest of the old guard.

The post at Highsnobiety was a major leap for Bennett. Just two years ago, she was the social media manager at GQ. Our friends who worked with her there tell us they thought of her as “the industry’s little sister”—hungry, passionate, and looking to translate the magic of magazines to a new generation. They said that even though she’s disrupting the magazine as we once knew it, at heart Bennett is a “a magazine junkie who really venerates the old ways.”

And now the surprise win has put her in the spotlight of the establishment media, with The New York Times Styles running a portrait of Bennett in her signature suit-and-tie look on its cover. The win inspired a segment on the SlateCulture Gabfest in which the hosts pondered, “What Is a Magazine Now?”

Over in Spreadlandia, we thought, Why not turn that question directly to Willa Bennett herself? In the end, this conversation left us feeling more optimistic than usual about the future of media. It also made us feel old as shit. We hope you enjoy it as much as we did.

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This episode is a special collboration with our friends at The Spreadand is made possible by our friends at Mountain Gazette, Commercial Type, and Lane Press.

Mike Rogge (Editor & Owner: Mountain Gazette) May 17, 2024

Show notes

WELCOME TO THE GREAT OUTDOORS

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Mountain Gazette is one of those media … things … that only long-time fans really know about, with a long and colorful history. A kind of Village Voice of the outdoors, the first incarnation (1966) of the magazine was about mountains and for “mountain people”—a lifestyle magazine for those who weren’t interested in either coast, let alone cities, let alone New York.

Like many magazines, the Gazette succumbed to economic forces and shuttered. Twice. Until Mike Rogge, a journalist and film producer, and more important than that, an avid skier and outdoorsman, purchased the archives and the rights at a bar in Denver. The deal was drawn up on a napkin and consummated with a beer.

Mostly he bought it because it was there.

Rogge felt the media, specifically what he calls the outdoor media, was broken. Especially the advertising model. And he had grown tired of the arcane and opaque revenue streams of the digital world. So he decided to do his own thing. He rejected those models, and plowed into print.

And he went big. Literally. The result is a magazine that is a success in every sense of the word: aesthetically, editorially, and financially. It’s a black diamond in a magazine world that often feels like a series of bunny slopes.

But Mike Rogge and Mountain Gazette have proven something: you can have your mountain and ski it too.

Janice Min (Editor: The Hollywood Reporter, Us Weekly, Ankler Media, more)) May 10, 2024

Show notes

THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER

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A good editor can, theoretically, edit any magazine, regardless of genre. But in some cases, you need an outsider to make things right. To see the forest for the trees.

To that end, Janice Min has planted acres of forests—one tree at a time—on both coasts, where the Colorado-born editor considers herself an outsider.

“I cared about almost none of this. I don’t care about celebrities or reality stars. It was my job to just think about how to interpret what they were saying and turn that passion into stories. I don’t think that the editors always have to be their audience, but I also think, as an editor I was able to be removed from it and glean like, ‘That pops. That’s the most important story.’”

From Us Weekly, where her instincts led to a massive increase in readership that saved the floundering publication—and likely all of Wenner Media—to The Hollywood Reporter, which was in a death spiral but is now, once again, a widely-respected and well-read industry bible, Min has played a major role in creating what we now call the celebrity-industrial complex, as well as the rise of what became social media and the influencer economy. That’s all.

Now, as cofounder of Ankler Media, Min is once again rethinking publishing—and celebrity. The company is centered around its newsletter, The Ankler, which bills itself as “the newsletter Hollywood loves to hate—and hates to love” and is currently one of the top three business publications on Substack.

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This episode is made possible by our friends at Mountain Gazette, Commercial Type, and Lane Press.

Emma Rosenblum (Chief Content Officer, Bustle) May 03, 2024

Show notes

EVERYTHING OLD IS NEW AGAIN

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Emma Rosenblum is a best selling author and is about to release a new novel. But that’s not why she’s here.

As the chief content officer at Bustle Digital Group, overseeing content and strategy for titles like Bustle, Elite Daily, and Nylon, she has witnessed some if not all of the massive shifts and changes in the media business. The ups and downs and highs and lows, as it were.

Emma’s media past includes stints at New York magazine, where she began her career, Glamour, Bloomberg Businessweek, Bloomberg Pursuits, where she served as editorial director, and Elle, where she was executive editor.

Meaning she’s a good person to talk to about the state of media today, a world where the change never stops. And she also has an insider’s opinion about the legacy big publishers and the advantages that BDG, as a digital-first operation, might have over them.

And did we mention she’s an author? Her first novel, Bad Summer People, was a national bestseller and her second novel, Very Bad Company, will be released in the coming weeks.

Scott Dadich (Designer & Editor: Wired, Texas Monthly, more) Apr 26, 2024

Show notes

DESIGN, BUILD, AND MODIFY

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In his mid-20s, Scott Dadich told his editor at Texas Monthly, Evan Smith, that he wanted his job.

A move like that is a combination of arrogance, youth, and frankly, balls. But you should also know that Dadich is an engineer. And what do engineers do? Well, according to one definition in Merriam-Webster, they “skillfully or artfully arrange for an event or situation to occur.”

Of course, you probably know Dadich as an art director and editor, but beyond the titles, he’s the kind of guy who builds things, re-engineers them, re-configures them or, more importantly, thinks differently about them.

To date, his life’s work has been building magazines—marrying words and pictures and combining his love of math and engineering with an eye towards new, unforeseen outcomes in a long career that includes stints at the aforementioned Texas Monthly, and also Wired, Condé Nast Digital—yes, we’ll talk iPads—Wired (again) and then on to his own agency, Godfrey Dadich Partners, where he is trying to engineer a new approach to advertising.

As a rare creative who has helmed a magazine as an editor-in-chief and art director, Dadich has ideas about how to better create everything, from where digital and print sit in the ecosystem, to the makeup of an actual magazine, and even how teams should fit on the masthead. He has put these ideas to practice on the page, on the web, and also on the streams, in his award-winning Netflix series about the creative process Abstract: The Art of Design, which premiered in 2017.

Our conversation with Scott, a rather long one for us, starts right now.

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This episode is made possible by our friends at Mountain Gazette, Commercial Type, and Lane Press.

Kirsten Algera & Ernst van der Hoeven (Cofounders, MacGuffin) Apr 19, 2024

Show notes

THE EXTRAORDINARY LIFE OF THINGS

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The Bed. The Window. The Rope. The Sink. The Cabinet. The Ball. The Trousers. The Desk. The Rug. The Bottle. The Chain. The Log. The Letter.

These aren’t random words thrown together, nor am I reading a list of things I need to buy—though stop for a moment and admire the poetry and cadence of the list. No, those words are the themes of every issue of MacGuffin.

MacGuffin bills itself as a design and crafts magazine about the life of ordinary things. And in that simple descriptor, you can discover an entire world.

Founded in 2015 by Kirsten Algera and Ernst van der Hoeven, two Dutch art historians and designers, each biannual issue of MacGuffin is based around a single object, or word, and then explores that object in its entirety in quite surprising, and inspiring, ways.

MacGuffin doesn’t ask much of its global audience but reading it and experiencing it, might change the way you look at the world. MacGuffin came about because Ernst and Kirsten both felt that the discourse around design had become disconnected from the concerns of most of the world’s people.

In some ways, they have created a magazine that rejects the modern to appreciate what already exists. But don’t mistake the magazine or their ambition for nostalgia: MacGuffin is a thoroughly modern project and an ambitious one: oversized, heavy and thick.

Both Ernst and Kirsten acknowledge they are creating an object about objects, a collectible. A collection. They do this with an openness to the world and a thoughtfulness that is admirable. Because the world of MacGuffin is the world all of us live in.

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