FOLIO: Personalities -- The Blog People Page

Last week, the American Spectator sent a letter asking some 60,000 e-mail subscribers to cough up donations to help offset increased paper costs. “Please help us fill the $26,000 shortfall created by the perverse incentives of the liberal agenda,” the right-wing conservative magazine’s publisher wrote. “Our paper costs are rising for NEXT MONTH'S ISSUE.”

Partisan politics aside, the cost of paper is in fact creeping out of the darkness. For a couple of years, magazine publishers have enjoyed flat or even declining paper prices as the supply had largely outstripped demand. That t More...

UPDATE: Hollywood Reporter Becomes Glossy Weekly

What exactly is going on at e5 Global Media? That’s the question that’s been at the top of certain people’s minds since the private equity-backed media startup acquired Nielsen Business Media’s eight media/entertainment industry brands late last year.

The new group—formed by Pluribus Capital Management and financial services firm Guggenheim Partners— More...

Consumer magazine publishing’s elite, and a handful of nosey media news types like me, are gathering tonight at the Alice Tully Hall in New York City for what arguably is the industry’s biggest gala: the American Society of Magazine Editors’ National Magazine Awards.

Besides the usual cocktail-infused musings and spottings of sunglasses-clad Vogue editor Anna Wintour, there are some interesting stories among the nominees. This year, we have Aperture pitted against Architect and The Paris Review for a general excellence “Ellie” award in the under More...

While consumer magazine publishers are still struggling against the dramatic pullback in traditional print advertising revenues, there were some signs of hope during the first quarter. Although their overall ad pages were down for the period, consumer powerhouses Hearst and Condé Nast—which publish a combined 32 print titles—were down significantly less than the industry average of 9.4 percent, according to the Publishers Information Bureau.

Across Hearst’s 14 titles (not including Food Network Magazine, which wasn’t publishing during the first quarter 2009), the company reported More...

Sometimes even the fastest-growing media companies hit a financial wall. Arizona-based magazine publisher 944 Media, which just last year said it was the largest and fastest growing lifestyle media conglomerate in the industry, has filed for protection under Chapter 11 bankruptcy code.

In the statement announcing the bankruptcy, 944 said the filing was precipitated by “several potentially burdensome lawsuits,” but didn’t offer any specifics. I spoke with a 944 spokesperson who told me the lawsuits involve the buyout of a former 94 More...

After releasing some preliminary results in February, the American Society of Business Publication Editors Monday made available the complete results from “Survey on Digital Skills & Strategies,” a project it conducted late last year with the Medill School/Media Management Center at Northwestern University.

So, what did the survey turn up? B-to-b editors say they want more digital and business journalism help. “Even as their titles plunge into the digital space, B2B editors have been left largely to their own devices to gain the More...

Here we go again.

Nikki Finke, the tenacious and abrasive Hollywood industry editor who heads up Deadline.com, wrote in a blog post this week that she had in January been offered the top editor job at The Hollywood Reporter, the former Nielsen trade title that was bought in December along with seven other entertainment brands by newly-formed e5 Global Media. According to Finke, she was offered $450,000 in annual salary, a $1 mil More...

“Y-a-w-n!” That’s how Wooden Horse Magazine opened its e-newsletter this weekend.

What could have had editor Meg Weaver and her crew in dire need of a caffeine jolt? Simple. The American Society of Magazine Editors unveiled the finalists for its annual National Magazine Awards—otherwise known in most industry circles as the Ellies. And, for yet another year, The New Yorker, New York and National Geographic lead in nominations (27 combined).

I must say, I had a similar reaction when I saw the news last week. Scrolling through More...