How Doubledown Double-Dipped

Earlier this week, FOLIO: reported that Doubledown Media, the publisher of magazines aimed at the Wall Street elite, has ceased operations. This morning, as I was scanning the newsstand, I came across a couple remnants of the once-rising enterprise—and was seeing double. Literally.

Side-by-side, the November/December issue of Doubledown’s Trader Monthly and the December/January issue of Dealmaker are nearly identical. The cover subjects—Dean Smith and Wray Thorn, respectively—are posed and photographed the same way. The coverlines are near mirror images of each other.

Flipping through, I found—wait, yes—identical feature stories. Word for word. Page for page. With little in the way of design changes.

Admittedly, I was not a subscriber to Doubledown’s magazines, so I don’t know if this happened often or was an isolated incident. While I understand that Trader Monthly and Dealmaker had similar readerships (and advertisers) there is no excuse for such blatant, lazy sharing of copy.

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Doubledown Media Shuts Down

By Jason Fell --

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Double-Dipping

Submitted by Anonymous on Thu, 02/05/2009 - 17:10.

I'm sorry but this is just bush-league. They ought to be ashamed of themselves.

Blatant, lazy sharing of copy

Submitted by Anonymous on Fri, 02/06/2009 - 15:10.

Interesting detective work you did to come up with your findings. I’m curious, though - did you apologize to your co-workers before you tossed them under the bus with your article? Your last comment indicates “there is no excuse for such blatant, lazy sharing of copy.” Unfortunately, it looks like that is exactly what some of your co-workers are doing when they fill content on-line with copy from firms internal memos…”A Death Metal Memo” February 4th; ”The Doubledown Memo” on February 3rd; the Nielsen 'Reply to All' E-mail on January 27th; the “Zell Memo” on December 8th. If those aren’t examples of “blatant, lazy sharing of copy”, I don’t know what is…

Re: Anonymous2

Submitted by Jason Fell on Fri, 02/06/2009 - 16:48.

I think you missed the point of this post as well as the purpose of posting memos. Thanks for the comment.

Copy Sharing, Writer Cheating

Submitted by Anonymous on Mon, 02/09/2009 - 03:59.

Not only did DD run the same exact copy in both magazines, they also ran the same exact copy on the websites of both. Even more egregious is that they did not pay writers for the double use of the work. I was one regular contributor to TM who did not have it in any contract that they had my permision to use my work twice, in bohth print and online. Unfortunately I discovered this fact too late. They got wht they deserved.

Right as rain

Submitted by Anonymous on Thu, 02/26/2009 - 16:02.

Jason, take it from someone who knows the ins and outs of Doubledown Media, you are right on the money!! The management was a den of thieves, Randall Lane, Jim Dunning, Wilkie Bushby, Richard Skeen and the list goes on - - Double-dipping copy is just the beginning and everyone who worked with, and for, Doubledown, except management, got taken, mostly in the form of not being paid. And they stole Private Air Magazine outright, never even paid the original publisher 1 red cent. Modern day scoundrels. They are a stain on the media industry and the folks who put in some very hard work on Doubledown's behalf.

not the only ones

Submitted by Anonymous on Wed, 04/01/2009 - 09:07.

Check out Adweek and Mediaweek and Brandweek for March 23. Covers may be different but after the first few pages and the last few pages that are exactly the same magazine. Sad too.... though they are under the same publishing company they claim to have different editors. What.... did the three editoprs decide on all three magazine content over lunch one day?

Failed Wall Street publisher repurposed editorial—to an extreme.

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