LaunchPAD: Witness

Witness, a magazine targeted at India's large legal fraternity (advocates, educators, attorneys, judges, and government officials), became available on select newsstands from July 16.
Priced at Rs 50, Witness is by the newly formed Srigro Interactive and is distributed through Central News Agency.

The magazine will be formally launched on August 1, 2009 by AR Lakshmanan, Chairman, Law Commission of India.

LaunchPAD: OPEN Magazine

This week saw the launch of OPEN, a weekly news and features magazine from RPG Enterprises. The magazine is modelled on the lines of 'Time' and 'New Yorker', and will initially have about 60 pages of editorial content and 10-15 pages of ads.

The launch issue featured an opinion poll in Pakistan as the cover story.

To get a taste of OPEN, read the first issue online at http://www.openthemagazine.com/

LaunchPAD: Harper's Bazaar India Edition

This week, 'Harper's BAZAAR' launches its 29th international edition in India, with India's first ever 'crystallised' cover (on limited editions only). With a tagline ‘Where Fashion Gets Personal,’ Harper's BAZAAR will be published every month.

The inaugural issue, with more than 200 pages, is an encyclopedia of fashion and targets the sophisticated and stylish Indian woman. The masthead on 18,000 limited edition covers is studded with sparkling 'XILION CRYSTALLIZED - Swarovski Elements' in order create the ultimate inspirational experience that marries fashion and luxury.
The limited edition magazine also has a ‘Made with CRYSTALLIZED - Swarovski Elements tag verifying its authenticity and exclusivity.

Ediorial: Esquire Feb 2009 cover-Innovation or a Threat to Editorial Integrity?

The February issue of Esquire blurs the boundary between advertising and editorial in new ways: right in the middle (see on Obama's shoulder) of the cover is a window, or peel-back flap with an invitation to “Open here”.

Opening the window reveals quotations from articles inside the issue and an advertisement for “One Way Out,” a new series on the Discovery Channel cable network. Those who leave the window unopened do not see the ad or the quotations.

New York Times reports that the concept was the brainchild of the editor-in-chief of Esquire, David Granger. “Everybody keeps talking about how print is an old medium. It is an old medium, but it doesn’t mean it’s a wrung-out medium or a tired medium,” Mr. Granger said to NYT.

However, the 'flap' cover issue has sparked much debate and is being viewed as being in contravention of guidelines put forth by the American Society of Magazine Editors (ASME). ASME has invited David Granger to justify himself before his peers at a member's lunch (Feb 24) where the proposed topics of discussion is: "Is the cover window on the Obama issue of Esquire an exciting print innovation -- or a threat to editorial integrity"

LaunchPAD: Femina Hindi

Femina, one of the earliest Indian magazine for women (all the smart aunties read that as opposed to Sarita, Women’s Era, etc when I was growing up), celebrates its golden jubilee this year and has announced a Hindi edition to mark the occasion.
Priced at Rs 40, Femina Hindi is a monthly and will offer pretty much the same content--health, career, beauty, fashion and relationships—though modified for the Hindi readers. The initial print run is 1,00,000 copies and the magazine will be on the newsstand this week.
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Did you notice the Femina October cover with an oval mirror (ad of Tanishq)? I bought the issue and google search got me to this link. Below is an extract from this newsstory that apparently highlights the 'thought' behind this 'interesting media innovation':

“A mirror is not a mere looking glass for women, but a reflection of what they perceive themselves to be. One would remember the evil stepmother of Snow White who would admire her reflection in her mirror for hours, asking often ‘Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the fairest of them all?’
Tanishq’s media innovation doesn’t have any sinister connotation of that magic mirror of the fairy tale of yore. But it does seek to bring out women’s intimate association with her mirror, especially when decked in all her finery.”

Disgusting!!!

Awards: Third Annual ASME Best Cover Competition

American Society of Magazine Editors announced the best magazine covers of the year (US editions) on October 6 in the following Categories: Cover of the Year, Best Celebrity Cover, Best Concept Cover, Best Fashion Cover, Best News Cover, Best Leisure Interest Cover and Best Personal Service Cover, with special recognition of the year’s best coverline.

AND THE WINNERS ARE…

• Cover of the Year – New York, March 24, 2008:
The cover treated the scandal concerning the fall of Governor Eliot Spitzer, after the stunning revelation that he had patronized a prostitution ring, in a bold yet disarming way that managed to make news itself—telling the story of the governor’s fall with a wry and unflinching point of view. The word “BRAIN” in a bright-red box with an arrow pointing to the area of Spitzer’s anatomy that seemed to have been thinking for him cover required no headlines. The image succeeded powerfully all by itself.

• Best Celebrity Cover – Texas Monthly, May 2008: Willie Nelson and guitar

• Best Concept Cover – The New Yorker, February 11 & 18, 2008: “Eustace Tillarobama”
This anniversary issue cover of The New Yorker reinterprets Rea Irvin’s classic Eustace Tilley image to produce “Eustace Tillarobama,” a two-headed playing card image that featured the leading Democratic presidential candidates dressed as the New Yorker icon, sharing his famous monocle. Half of the run featured Obama on top and Clinton on the bottom; in the other half, Clinton had the upper hand.

• Best Fashion Cover (Tie) – New YorkLook, Spring 2008: Catwalk; Vanity Fair, September 2007: Gisele Bündchen

• Best News Cover – New York, March 24, 2008: Eliot Spitzer’s “Brain”

• Best Personal Service Cover – TexasMonthly, June 2008: “The Top 50 BBQ Joints in Texas”

• Best Leisure Interest Cover – New York, June 30, 2008: “The Summer Issue” (John McCain and Barack Obama at the Beach)

To view the cover image gallery, visit www.magazine.org/bestcover.

LaunchPAD: GQ India Edition

Last weekend Mumbai saw the launch of Indian version of GQ magazine celebrating India's hottest celebrities from the worlds of Bollywood, Cricket and Fashion. The inaugural issue celebrates "The Good Life" with Saif Ali Khan, Yuvraj Singh and Arjun Rampal as cover (and over 120 pages of luxury brand advertising). The launch issue also features an interview with Aditya Mittal of the famous steel family.

GQ India is the 15th international edition of GQ. The magazine is priced at Rs 100 and has a print run of 35,000. Condé Nast has tied up with Living Media Group, to make GQ available in 40 locations across the country, where it will be on sale at 5,500 different outlets.
Catch the BQ (Bollywood Quotient) of the GQ launch here. No magazine pics here, only celebrities! :)

Article: Journalist seeking paycheck? Try India

The Salon.com article "Journalist seeking paycheck? Try India" by Arun Venugoplan talks about Foreign journalists finding India's media explosion impossible to resist.

Some Extracts:
In June five graduates and enrolled students from Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism headed to New Delhi, where they're starting reporting internships at the Hindustan Times, one of the largest-selling English language newspapers in the world. I've been in touch with three of the interns, and to my surprise they all said the miserable job market in the U.S. didn't affect their decision to go abroad. But they also agreed that India's media explosion is impossible to resist.
The managing editor of the Hindustan Times is Pankaj Paul, and when he dropped by Columbia's graduate school earlier this year he said he had a lot of jobs available and promised students the sort of assignments and exposure they'd never get at a smaller American newspaper.
"I have met foreigners working at the Hindu, Mint, GQ, the Hindustan Times and Times of India," wrote Scott Carney, a Chennai-based journalist who freelances for NPR, Wired and National Geographic TV. "They all work on Indian salaries, don't speak the language, and all seem to be having a ball. Since there are so many new publications opening up in India, there is a lot of demand for native English speakers and people who can bring higher reporting standards to local papers."

Read the complete article here

Free Stuff: Read all you can at Mygazine.com

Mygazines.com is a new website that allows users to read, archive and upload content from the latest magazines for everyone to read and share within the online mygazine community. The magazines are available as digital editions where you can flip pages and use the zoom function.
According to a press release issued by the company, mygazine.com was created for a myriad of reasons, including but not limited to:
§ Low Carbon Footprint: With 70% of newsstand magazines going unsold, the goal is to eliminate the waste.
§ No unnecessary content: Allows users to access only the information that is of interest to them.
§ Efficiency: Reduces the need to physically carry and archive content.
§ Universal: Allows foreign content to be available from anywhere to anyone (I like this one, I can actually read magazines I find difficult/impossible to find in Goa)
§ Monopoly: Eliminates the effects of conglomerates merging and controlling consumers’ choice and distribution, within almost every region worldwide.

However, the industry does not seem too happy about this development, as is clear from this quote extracted from a news item on the ppa website:

Magazine publishers need to be aware of Mygazines.com, which is infringing a number of UK based magazines' intellectual property rights.
Dubbed 'Magster', Mygazines.com encourages users to upload scanned copies of magazines - without the permission of a large proportion, if not all of the
magazine publishers - and then makes them freely available to view online.
A number of PPA member titles have already been spotted on the site - and members are encouraged to check that their content has not been uploaded without authorisation. Should members find that their content appears on Mygazines.com - and they wish to have it removed - the most prudent course of action is to issue a cease and desist letter (also known as notice and takedown)”

LaunchPAD: People (India Edition)

The India Edition of PEOPLE magazine was launched last week in a licensing agreement between Outlook Group and Time Inc.

Priced at Rs 30, the India edition of PEOPLE, is the first edition of the magazine launched outside of the USA. The tagline for the Indian edition is "Extraordinary People. Extraordinary Stories."