News outlets and blogs are comparing Economist’s move with Intelligent Life to Tyler Brule’s content-rich book for intelligent readers, Monocle.

Ad buyers say magazines like Intelligent Life and Monocle reach an important audience: wealthy people, particularly men, who like expensive goods and dislike fashion magazines, preferring newspapers and current-affairs magazines like the Economist. - WSJ

What’s disturbing to me about developing magazine concepts to gain advertising, is that their first priority is not their readers or audiences. The magazine industry is unfortunately a balancing act but without compelling content, it’s just another glossy. Tyler Brule set the subscription and issue price for Moncole as high as $10 per issue to ensure, in a way, that the magazine wasn’t being run by their advertisers. He also believes that "Intelligent Life was relaunched to grab advertising that would have otherwise gone to Monocle. "For us to be on the newsstand alone, it could be a scary thing for [the Economist Group]," Mr. Brûlé says. Although Economist maintains that Moncole played no part in their decision.

It’s baffling to me that a magazine would launch with a real point-of-view and a clear distinction in the marketplace. I’m still rooting for Brule’s Moncole and hoping that intent will survive the moolah.

- Oprah AT HOME, Summer 2007 Issue

(Should’ve thrown in a couple more continents….)

Over 600 members strong (including me) the group is still rallying on to save the print magazine that Time Inc, it’s parent company hopes to dissolve.

I enjoy the magazine and would hate to see it bite the dust. But this effort will mark a milestone in the history of digital — a social network as a lifeline to save the fate of a print entity.

The magazine industry, like most other traditional media entities has been a flux for the past few years. While there has been much debate and talk around the magazine industry on it’s deathbed, it hasn’t stopped hundreds of intreprid entrepreneurs and enthusiasts to launch new magazines every single year. For some, it’s a brand extension, another jewel in the crown and for some… it’s passion. In both cases, it is crystal clear.

Monocle, a nascent magazine only a few issues old, created a ton of buzz when it launched primarily because of it’s illustrious founder, Tyler Brule - the visionary and brilliant editor behind Britain’s famous WallPaper* magazine. The 200 some pages of this magazine brim with sparkling wit and editorial insight - a sharp voice in a culture that is so ridden with glossy-fancy magazines with celebrity-like editors at the helm and socialites on staff. Monocle’s simple vision, "A briefing on Global affairs, business, culture and design," and craftfully designed book - gives every issue a collectible status. It’s a book you want to hold on to. The smartest attribute about Monocle is that it does not underestimate the intelligence of it’s readers. Also, that it does not employ an iota of ethnocentrism. It writes about young politicos in Azerbaijan and the ornamental fish business in Japan and puts together a list of world’s most liveable cities (that do not include New York or London) and it does so because it expects it’s readers to be (rightfully so) interested in this perspective. The internet, if anything, has only made us more intelligent and more curious to become more intelligent.

I do not know it’s circulation or it’s subscription list - and at 75Euros/ year - it is an expensive subscription and even an expensive purchase at $10/issue. It’s website - complements the book instead of cross-selling subscriptions and advertisers. The advertisors, thankfully respect the magazine’s environemnt and it’s international audience. And this strategy interests me because this magazine has no pretenses about who it’s audience is.

Most mistakes that new magazines (and existing!)  make is that they try to create a commerical product that will appeal to the masses — and thus to advertisers. (Conde Nast’s Portfolio for example) Assuming that a magazine’s audience appreciates glossy paper, expensive photo-shoots and star celebrities is perhaps the single-most insult to the readers intelligence. Ofcourse certain magazines are flourishing and will continue to do so, but perhaps if they understood that the reader is willing to pay a premium for a fresh voice not mired down in efforts to appease advertisers — we’d have more magazines like Monocle.

Magazines don’t lose advertisers - they lose their audience. And magazines don’t die - they burn out trying to bring new advertisers when they perhaps should be wooing their audiences. Moncole, I hope, will continue to keep the balance and it’s audiences I hope will recognize this and award it with their loyalty.

Dreamworks will be making a film on the child-hood favorite journalist-cum-detective TinTin. The movie is expected to hit the theaters in 2 years with plans of making more movies, depending on how well the first movie does.

I briefly was enarmored by TinTin’s technicolor-adventure filled world, but soon moved on to Enid Blyton characters. Although now  some 18 odd years later, I can’t wait to see how TinTin unfolds on the silver screen.

]]> http://jinalshah.com/2007/03/08/hot-off-the-press/feed/ http://jinalshah.com/2007/03/05/media-consumption-meme/ http://jinalshah.com/2007/03/05/media-consumption-meme/#comments Mon, 05 Mar 2007 23:55:46 +0000 Jinal Shah http://jinalshah.com/2007/03/05/media-consumption-meme/ Anastasia of YPulse has a very interesting Meme on media consumption that was intiatiated by Marianne Richmond of Blogher. Here’s my input:

Web: I read news from WSJ, NYT and BBC. I rely on blogs like PSFK, Springwise and thecoolhunter for news that interest me the most. I also subscribe to fantastic newsletters like VSL, JCReport, TrendCentral, Marketing Daily, AdAge, and Iconowatch. Other favorites are Ypulse and WWD. I also like to stay updated about news in India and sadly, I only trust blogs like youthcurry.com and soniafalerio.blogspot.com with this information. I also maintain an active Del.icio.us feed. My favorite site on the web has to be amazon.com (for obvious reasons pertaining to spending one’s hard earned cash on items that may have no useful purpose except to make me happy for about 10 seconds)

Communication: I live on my Yahoo! mail. I know gmail offers free 2MB but I still pay the yearly $20 for more space on my Yahoo! mail. I am on Yahoo messenger, AOL (I don’t use it much) MSN and Skype. I actively communiate via facebook, orkut and sometimes linkedin. I’m on facebook because my college friends are on it, Orkut because my school and college friends from India are on it. I cannot possibly maintain any more. It’s tough as it is keeping up with two. It was a conscious decision to not buy a Blackberry or any phone that would allow me access to email. And I intend to prolong this situation until it absolutely demands for it.

Music: I’m afraid, it’s usually just what’s on my Ipod. I don’t seek out new music, but I rely on my friends to recommend new music. I’m a huge fan of soundtracks and am likely to dload music from TV shows and movies via itunes.com

TV: Does youtube count as TV or web? I actively watch LOST, Desperate Housewives, Ugly Betty and Grey’s Anatomy. I LOVE Apprentice but it clashes with DH so I had to make a choice! I’m addicted to Food Network.  Esp. Iron Chef. I also loved Top Chef on Bravo and intend to go back to the show once the new season begins. My guilty pleasure: watching Indian shows on musicnmovies.com

Movies: I watch a LOT of movies. Esp. independant cinema. The last movie I watched was Pan’s Labyrinth. I highly recommend it. My favorite theater are the Ritz in Philadelphia.

Magazines: I subscribe to Fast Company, Wired, Lucky, Zink (because I write for them) and most recent addition is the Economist. I read BusinessWeek, Entrepreneur and Inc online. But I buy one new magazine every month or so. I highly recommend Universal News and Magazines in NYC to check out hard-to-find magazines and foreign titles. When in Philly, I rely on used bookstores or Barnes and Noble.

Books: My attention span has decreased, I think because I’m so used to consuming media in short bytes. But I try to read one book a month. The last book I read was Everything is Illuminated- Jonathan Safran ( I recommend it but the epoynmous movie is very nice too)

Newspaper: WSJ. And yes, I still enjoy reading it on paper.

Ouch, now I feel silly. Feel free to join in and leave a link below if you do!

Competition is forcing once-staid publications to spice up their content. Mumbai’s Midday tabloid has introduced a bikini-clad version of Britain’s topless “page-three girls”, called the “Midday
mate”. Most broadsheets offer similar enticements in colourful
“entertainment” sections full of Bollywood stars. - The Economist, Feb
15, 2007

Mumbai’s Midday is a tabloid I grew up with. The bikini-clad version of Britain’s topless page-three girls called the Midday Mate is NOT a result of the competition nor is it a recent feature. The Midday Mate is a part of India’s pop. culture that kids in the 90’s grew up with and it continues (I think) to be a popular fixture of the tabloid.

The Economist wrongly points out that this feature was introduced to beat competition. When Midday introduced this feature, only a handful of newspapers existed in Mumbai/Bombay. It is only in the last 2-4 years has there been such an influx of new entrants in the field. When I was last in Bombay in 2005, the billboards and every available adv. space in the city was saturated with ads from DNA, The Hindustan Times and Mumbai Mirror– three newspapers that launched around the same time in 2005.
I agree with the article that competition is intense but I wish it had been more thorough in researching the article.

Also, I’m surprised that unlike Time and Business Week, The Economist does not allow for reader comments.

To read about the state of media (TV & newspapers) I strongly recommend Rashmi Bansal’s blog, Youth Curry.

I think the concept is very interesting and with the growing luxury/aspirational market, the newsletter has tremendous potential.

Check out their scandalous promotional ad in New York magazine. On Wednesday night, PocketChange NYC held a speed-dating session ONLY for extremely wealthy men and extremely hot women.

High-schoolish, but spot on.

Which brings me to my latest discovery. (Thanks to VSL) Pentagram, the iconographic design-firm that has lended it’s genious to numerous campaigns and brand identities (some you may be familiar with, some you may not), has just released a previously in-house, treasure trove of design-papers aptly titled, "The Pentagram Papers."

Published since 1975, The Pentagram Papers are a  collection of whimiscal and inspiring images that highlight a certain point of view in design. For example, check out this collection of Tin Tabernacles and other buildings for inspiration:

We watched SuperSize me and thought we knew it all. Our Daily Bread, a documentary film about cold industrial salt mines and slaughter houses reminds us just how much we (blissfully?) do not know. From it’s website,

"To the rhythm of conveyor belts and immense machines, the film looks without commenting into the places where food is produced in Europe: monumental spaces, surreal landscapes and bizarre sounds - a cool, industrial environment which leaves little space for individualism."

Watch trailers here. (via)