Magazine World 2012

FROM THE INDUSTRY, FOR THE INDUSTRY

2012 EDITION

BREAKING NEWS OH, IS THAT PHOTOSHOPPED?

SELLING THE FRONT PAGE MAKING A MEMORABLE COVER /// P. 5

STORIES FROM JAIL

SCOOP

DISHING OUT THE

IT’S ALL ABOUT THE GOSSIP /// P .14

GOING DIGITAL

BUILDING A

BRAND INFLUENCING PERCEPTIONS FINDING NEW AUDIENCES

BY MAKING THE MOVE

TO TELEVISION /// P.22

ADVERTORIALS A COMMUNITY NEAR YOU

PUBLIC DISCUSSIONS AND HOSTING EVENTS /// P.33

LAUNCHING IN CANADA

BRINGING THE PAST TO LIFE

SCANDALOUS MARKETING

SPORTS WRITING

FREELANCE AGREEMENTS

contents 2012 EDITION

THE LOOK

THE WRITTEN

Selling the Front Page

p. 5 Creating covers that sell: how to make a memorable front page KATHERINE WARD

Dishing out the Scoop p. 14 The world of writing and high society from the view of a gossip journalist KRISTIN ANDREWS

Photo Tweaks p. 7 Experts explore the current and future standards for digital editing of images NEETU THIND

Words for Sale p. 16 It’s not just writer’s block: the struggle of contracts and copyright laws PATRICIA BROTZEL

Mad Mags p. 9 Advertisers and magazine producers searching to strike a balance KAITIE FRASER

The Sporting Blues

The Lines of Scandal p. 11 Dependance on advertisements leaves many magazines ignoring their creative HEATHER VANANDEL

Objective Perspective

p. 18 Hockey may be Canada’s sport, but freelancing is what is in demand TERRY ELKADY

THE INDUSTRY

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p. 20 Can the way a journalist tells a story influence readers’ perceptions?

LISA GILLAN

THE ALTERNATIVE

Building a Brand

p. 22 More and more magazines are branching into television to reach new audiences RUSSELL PIFFER

A Community Near You

What a Digital World

p. 25 Digital magazines are the future for Canadian publishers ANDREW RUSSELL

In Between the Bars

The News Fight p. 27 A battle of relevance pitting breaking online news against the printed word SARAH RIX

Inside History p. 38 At Legion, bringing the past to life means moving magazines into the future ELTON HOBSON

p. 33 Highfalutin’ to cheap and easy: magazine events and communities they help form HELEN SURGENOR p. 36 A publication sheds light on the seldom seen viewpoint of people behind bars CLAIRE MCCORMACK

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New Kids, Old Medium

p. 31 An inside look at the difficulty of launching a magazine in Canada ANDREW MILLICHAMP

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masthead Editor-in-Chief Lisa Gillan

Executive editor Katherine Ward

Managing Editor Words Claire McCormack

Managing Editor production Andrew Millichamp

Managing Editor Online Kaitie Fraser

Assistant ME wordS Andrew Russell

Assistant ME Production Heather VanAndel

Assistant ME & ART DIRECTOR online Neetu Thind

AssignMENT and Copy editor Elton Hobson

AssignMENT and Research Chief Patricia Brotzel

Section Editors

Kristin Andrews Andrew Russell Terry Elkady

Art Directors Sarah Rix Russell Piffer

Photo editor

Helen Surgenor

Faculty Advisers

Editorial: Terri Arnott EXT 4518 Photo: Anne Zbitnew EXT 4562 Art Design: Lara King EXT 4513

LETTER FROM THE EDITOR Success

in business is all about how you take advantage of the latest technologies. Making profits as a magazine requires a sort of evolution; not necessarily getting away from the printed page entirely (at least not yet) but certainly branching out into other areas.

It’s like anything else. If a magazine wants to keep up, be a real contender and not become obsolete, its survival toolkit must contain more than ink and paper.

In this edition of Magazine World, we take a look at a number of different ways magazines have grown into so much more than what we see on the newsstand.

Russell Piffer looks at how magazines have expanded their reach over the years, into the television industry, for example. Now, with the popularity of online videos, (and the potential for them to go viral) we see some of the major players in magazines releasing their videos to the insatiable masses of mouse-click-movie junkies.

Similarly, Andrew Russell explores how people who prefer e-books to those with bindings can get digitally enhanced magazine content on their personal tablets or e-readers. My guess is any magazine that doesn’t take advantage of this latest trend in the next few years will probably have a hard time keeping up commercially with those that do.

But it isn’t all about technology. Just when you thought things couldn’t get any more robotic, Helen Surgenor’s story looks at how magazine companies are bringing people together for some good old-fashioned fun. Sans Internet. From drinks at the bar to fancy dinner parties, some magazines are bringing people together almost as much as they are enticing them to take time for themselves.

And, in the case of Elton Hobson’s look at Legion, a historical niche market magazine, we see how instead of pushing the latest trends, some magazines are used to preserve history, and their readers’ ties to the past. That said even Legion publishes content online.

The takeaway point from all of this is the need to remain flexible. Magazines, like any other competitive business, have to be willing to expand their horizons and try new things if they want to remain relevant. This doesn’t only refer to the technological side of things (although of course it is an important part). What’s key for magazine producers here is to challenge their ways of thinking; to reflect on traditional approaches to the trade and really figure out what can be done differently.

We’ve dug deep here, and what readers will find in the forthcoming pages is likely to surprise and inspire. It will help readers critically question many aspects of today’s magazine world.

PUBLISHER

William Hanna

Lisa Gillan Editor-in-Chief

HUMBER COLLEGE

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A: 205 HUMBER COLLEGE BLVD., TORONTO, ONT.

MAGAZINE WORLD 2012

P: 416-675-3111

PHOTO BY KATHERINE WARD

THE LOOK

The Walrus’ art director Brian Morgan.

Selling the Front Page A good cover is about the subject, the audience and above all, the brand.

BY KATHERINE WARD

I

f a picture is worth a thousand words, a cover may as well be a million dollars. It is perhaps the most talked about page for each issue. It sets tone, conveys style and is the only thing visible to consumers from the newsstand.

While they may not be the works of da Vinci or van Gogh, magazine covers have caused the same levels of controversy and generated just as much buzz. At any corner shop or bookstore, the masterpieces of countless professionals are on display. They have learned how to marry the artistry of inviting images and celebrities with text and advertisements.

Their work can draw people into an instant relationship and sometimes a lifelong readership.

The effort that goes into the front page varies from one publication to the next. While strategies change, there is no doubt that for any magazine, creating a cover that sells is challenging, rewarding and in the end, essential to a publication’s survival.

Making a front page is like any group project. Most of the time, those involved in the process have different opinions given their experience and positions. Juliette Baxter, newly appointed editor-in-chief at Glow magazine has done her fair share of these “group projects.”

“There are so many people involved and that’s how it should be,” she said. “The cover is the calling card for your magazine and you want as

many people to weigh in on it as possible.” The only difference between this and your Grade 6 science fair experience is that magazine professionals willingly do this, sometimes up to 52 times a year, and are always looking for another opportunity to showcase talent and try new things. Baxter explained the different roles of the interested parties: The art director wants to have beautiful images, the marketing director is looking at how the cover lines are placed, the publishers want to make sure it sells, and the editor-in-chief is keeping the big picture in mind. “It’s not a perfect science by any means,” Baxter said, “and that is the great part about it.”

For any magazine the most important distinction is determining the audience for the publication. “I am dealing with a sophisticated individual,” Baxter said. “Our readers are beauty involved and concerned about health and that is what guides my choices about who I would put on our front page.”

Scott Bullock, a widely sought after circulation expert in Canada and the United States, said the basic cover making principles are very simple.

His popular website and blog, www.coverssell.com, is dedicated to the topic. He has spent his 30-year career demystifying the magic of selling the front page and has created his own list of criteria to consider.

Above all, “subject matter matters,” Bullock said. “If you get this right, then you increase your chances of selling exponentially. No matter how

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It is not a science, it is a dark art - Brian Morgan

Bullock explained how great cover execution is really about getting five or six of his 30 rules working together to secure an advantage over other publications on the newsstand.

However, as many ways as there are to succeed, there are just as many avenues for failure. A common mistake is often the result of a creative team getting too carried away by an image and forgetting its audience.

“Sometimes covers can get lost when people look at the picture in isolation from the subject matter,” said Bullock. “People will say, ‘oh look at the puppy… it is such a cute puppy….’ But in the end if your magazine isn’t about puppies then it doesn’t make sense.”

Another cardinal sin, according to Bullock, is using puns. “Some people are absolutely addicted to them,” he said. “But how many times have you heard one that makes you laugh instead of groan?” He said the key is to keep things clear, because according to his experience, if you have to rely on clever gimmicks and tricks the product probably isn’t that strong.

There are certain basic rules that most magazines use as a starting point for their artistic execution. John Macfarlane, co-editor and publisher of The Walrus, said black and white covers in general are not as successful as those done in colour. Using the left-hand real estate on the page is crucial as that is what is most likely to be seen from the newsstand.

But this is only the beginning.

Brian Morgan, art director for The Walrus, describes the creative process as a collaboration. “We get together months in advance in a roundtable discussion. The key is to hone in on the subject, and use that as the inspiration to figure out what we want to say about the issue.” Morgan takes the information from this initial brainstorm and uses it as inspiration to create sketches about how he artistically interprets the cover itself.

From those drawings, he writes a few sentences that embody the message of his overall creative interpretation. He then gives this written brief to the contracted photographer or illustrator and hands over the artistic reigns.

Morgan said he believes that micromanaging the artistic process only hurts the end result. “I know that forcing your will is expensive and bound to fail,” said Morgan. “You have to allow for some space for happy accidents. That’s when true ingenuity happens.”

Lisa de Nikolits, art director for Air Miles magazine, agrees that in order to be successful creatively, a magazine has to have a clear sense of branding. “If you do this well, you can’t help but see it in the publication’s circulation,” said de Nikolits. “Every detail is important, and it is the artistic director’s job to be the guardian angel of the visuals.” Her 23 years of experience have made her value a detail-oriented approach. She might spend hours searching for the illusive image that no one else has in order

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to capture her readers instantly.

Even after the cover is in its final layout stages, de Nikolits will continue to adjust the kerning, typeface and leading on the page. “Clients might want the image to be bigger and bolder, however you have to keep track of the editorial integrity while delivering their message,” she said.

Even though there are many rules that govern how covers are designed, the reality is that no one can predict a front cover’s success. When it comes to pushing the boundaries of design and composition, for the most part it is a guessing game. Macfarlane, said the ability to do this intelligently relies heavily on experience, failure, and intuition. “There are many conventions that we have,” Macfarlane said, “but at some point you have to trust yourself, the art director, and the subject.”

There are many additional factors that influence a cover’s success.

Morgan said the economic, social and cultural factors have to be taken into account when looking at a magazine’s success at the newsstand. “It is not a science, it is a dark art,” he said. “If it was a science it would be easy to motivate the masses, but the reality is that it can be fairly unpredictable.”

The modern-day magazine has much to contend with. With the introduction of tablets, smart phones, and an increasing number of online readers, industry professionals worry about the integrity of a magazine’s design. Malcolm Brown is an art director and has worked in the industry for more than 22 years. He said while photography has made a good transition to online formats, magazines have yet to do the same successfully. “The graphic design is just not coming through the same way,” said Brown. “Front covers were meant to be zoomed in and zoomed out upon, and the reader truly loses the intention of the designer when they see a magazine in that medium.” He said it seems as though for magazines to succeed they almost have to go mainstream artistically, following established trends. “You see magazines now, and they tend to flood their covers with type and the image is almost always sexy – it has become more about business and less about the art form.”

At the end of the day, there is no set formula as to what will succeed and what will flop. But circulation experts like Bullock enjoy grappling with the mysterious process. “I sleep well at night knowing that I am not selling junk bonds,” he said. “I am helping to sell quality merchandise that makes a difference in people’s lives, their hobbies, passions and their interests. That’s what turns me on.”

PHOTO BY KATHERINE WARD

great the art director is, if the subject matter is boring or depressing, or just not timely and useful, even great art direction can’t save it.” Bullock explained that even though artistic vision is important, it will not save a topic that fails to reach the intended audience.

“On the flip side, I have seen some average covers from an art director’s point of view, but the subject was so compelling that the magazine still sold well.”

A wall of past covers at Walrus Magazine.

MAGAZINE WORLD 2012

THE LOOK

PHOTO TWEAKS re

Befo

PHOTO BY NEETU THIND

After

“The way I feel about Photoshop is the way some people feel about abortion: It is appalling and a tragic reflection on the moral decay of our society ...

Unless I need it, in which case, everybody be cool.” – Tina Fey, Bossypants

BY NEETU THIND

A

n unlikely publication recently shook up the magazine industry by making the decision to step away from striving for perfection. Cynthia Leive, editor-in-chief of U.S. Glamour, decided to change the publications photo editing policy in February. The change came after a survey of 1,000 Glamour readers revealed three out of four women did not agree with altering unique characteristics of models.

“You told us you don’t want little things like freckles and scars removed, and we agree; those are the kinds of details that make each woman on the planet unique and beautiful … we’ll also be asking photographers we hire not to manipulate body size in the photos we commission, even if a celebrity or model requests a digital diet (alas, it happens),” Leive said in an online statement.

Does that mean the end of Photoshop in magazines?

No way.

With over one million instructional YouTube videos on how to use Photoshop, anyone can see the magical effects of the photo-editing program. With a few clicks of a mouse, users can cinch in their waists, clear blemishes, and even put themselves in the mouth of a shark. It has been adapted by magazines looking to improve and enhance their images. In November 2011, Hany Farid, chief technology officer at Fourandsix Technologies Inc. - a company that looks at the use of manipulation in photos - and professor at Dartmouth College, and doctoral student Eric Kee published a way to test the amount of digital retouching in an image.

The real issue is how much modification is acceptable. The standards

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and practices for alteration of images in magazines is where the ethics of photo editing are exposed.

Generally, magazines hold all the controls in how drastically an image is altered. “I am the one catering to the client’s needs so I can make suggestions but typically I have to go with what they want to see,” said Glenn Honiball, a professional digital re-toucher who has been in the industry for more than 30 years. Without concrete guidelines on digital alterations of images in magazines, the changes solely depend on what a magazine decides to be fair.

He said in most cases, magazines don’t want to do anything too crazy.

“They usually want to ‘keep it real’.” However, there are certain types of magazines that use more digital editing. “Fashion and beauty magazines usually go bananas,” said Honiball. Since they are trying to achieve perfection more editing is usually needed. “I just finished work for a bride’s magazine and they wanted everything done to make the people look perfect – with perfect looking skin, eyes, hair and teeth.”

Kevin Connor, president at Fourandsix Technologies Inc., has worked with Photoshop and photo manipulation for more than 15 years. He agrees that fashion and beauty magazines enter a controversial area with editing.

“They will always be in that grey area where they may not claim it to be real but people looking at it think it’s real,” said Connor. He said this happens because the photo manipulation in these particular magazines isn’t outlandish, but it’s not real either.

The National Press Photographers Association, which promotes the highest standards in visual journalism, has a code of ethics for photographers in the United States. It states: “Editing should maintain the integrity of the photographic images’ content and context. Do not manipulate images or add or alter sound in any way that can mislead viewers or misrepresent subjects.” This is necessary to promote the rule to “respect the integrity of the photographic moment.”

Digital re-touching can be used in positive and subtle ways that do not challenge the integrity of the publication. “The best re-touching is when it doesn’t look re-touched,” said Honiball. Typically, he aims to edit photos without taking away their essence. He said re-touching is just like any other artistic form. “It’s something that comes naturally to me, allows me to get creative and I really enjoy it.”

Magazines have a lot to lose if they edit too much. “At Glow we didn’t use a heavy hand with re-touching,” said Jackie Shipley, former art director of the magazine. “It can’t look like it is so Photoshopped that the skin looks plastic and fake. We liked our models to look real and show skin texture because they needed to look attainable. The re-touching was just for some major stuff that needs cleaning up.”

Even in a business where perfection is wanted, too much editing can do more harm than good. With beauty magazines in particular, editing colours can be especially tricky. “With makeup we make sure that the colour of products reflects as accurately as possible to what the product looks like in real life,” Shipley said.

During her time at Glow, she said there were no printed guidelines on digital re-touching. Instead, art directors, editors and photographers used their eye to determine what needed to be done to an image. The magazine uses re-touching on cover and beauty shots and avoids any alterations to supplied images like stock photos, Shipley said.

When magazines employ a photographer, unless stated in the contract, the magazine can do what it wants with the images, said Brent Edwardson, ethics chair of Professional Photographers of Canada. In some cases, photographers hand over their copyrights by handing over their images to be re-touched by someone else. “A lot of photographers no longer re-touch

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their own images,” Edwardson said.

Keeping images as real as possible seems to be the only consistent standard necessary. It is difficult to create rules because digital re-touching varies on a case-by-case basis, Edwardson said. “To create solid standards you would have to develop so many scenarios in a legal form that it may be difficult to enforce,” he said. “The best way to determine if something is ethically unsound, is to ask if the image goes beyond the realm of truth.”

How much is too much may be easier to detect with the system developed by Professor Farid. Connor said it began by looking at the common types of manipulation that can be identified in a photo. There are two tools they use to reveal the amount of manipulation: geometrical distortions – when contours are moved around and colours are changed; and photometric distortions, which affect things like tone and texture. These are used to formulate the rating system that compares the manipulated image to the

You have to be aware of what people might believe is- Kevin real Connor original and produce a score out of five. Connor said Farid came up with algorithms to measure how these things had been changed in the photo.

Farid developed this system after working with people to determine their perceptions of images. Connor said the key was whether the image appeared to look drastically different to the viewer. To determine this, Farid presented people with before and after images that had been edited and had them rate the degree to which they thought the images looked different.

Connor said this new rating system could be the best way to standardize editing in magazines. “It’s really tricky to legislate any of this stuff, because you can’t say it’s wrong to do image manipulation, because there are many instances where it is justified and appropriate,” he said. “With editing it really comes down to good judgment and it’s really hard to regulate good judgment.”

He said instead of restricting what editors can do, it would be more practical to use something like Farid’s algorithm to inform readers about the level of image alteration. “By including a score of the altered image inside a publication, it wouldn’t restrict what people can do but it ensures that viewers will be reassured about what they are looking at,” Connor said.

Editing programs shouldn’t be feared but readers should know what they are looking at. “It’s totally appropriate to do editing but you have to be aware of what people might believe is real,” Connor said. Having Photoshop in the mainstream for years has educated magazine readers more than they realize.

Connor said if someone looked at an image 20 years ago they would just take it at face value. Today there’s greater awareness that images are manipulated, because the tools are so easily accessible. “There’s nothing wrong with doing an illustration, surreal imagery, or altering images to the extreme for effect, if people looking at that image know that it has been manipulated.”

As Tina Fey described the use of Photoshop in her book Bossypants, “as long as we all know it’s fake, it’s no more dangerous to society than a radio broadcast of The War of the Worlds.”

MAGAZINE WORLD 2012

Mad Mags

PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY RUSSELL PIFFER AND HELEN SURGENOR

THE LOOK

Advertorials and sponsored sections are increasingly common in magazines.

How blurry have the lines between copy and advertising become?

BY KAITIE FRASER

T

he characters depicted in the popular television drama Mad Men may have erratic, sensational personal lives, but as it turns out their professional operations may not be far from those of real magazine ad departments today. Despite mid-afternoon cocktails, the brainstorming and collaborative work that the fictional Don Draper and company accomplish is very similar to that of the strategic creative department at Rogers Media Inc. “The bullpen allows for a lot of teamwork,” said Marla Berk, client solutions and art director at Rogers, but she said it’s too loud to make a phone call and she has to find a quiet boardroom.

Berk agrees there are some similarities between her office and the one on Mad Men, and it has been that way for some time. The mad men (or women) of a magazine company are there to ensure everything goes smoothly.

The legendary battle between editorial and advertising still haunts the industry. Even though both are so heavily dependent on one another, people in the business insist this is a line that isn’t to be crossed. But what about when ads are dressed up like stories?

Advertorials and sponsored sections are gaining popularity because they become a way to inform and educate the reader. These types of advertisements can finely target a specific group of consumers and a 2009 study conducted by Starch Research for Magazines Canada said that about 76

per cent of readers agree that advertorials are “a good way for advertisers to communicate info about their products.” Magazines Canada attributes this high number to the fact that the more alike advertisements are to editorial, the more integrity the advertisement absorbs from the magazine.

Advertisers are continually trying to find new ways of promoting products to keep up with shoppers’ demands and consumer skepticism.

“Consumers are hesitant to part with their money,” said Gary Garland, executive director of advertising services at Magazines Canada. “Advertisers are trying to provide information to customers to make decisions, so they need more copy,” he said. It isn’t enough for advertisers to just throw something at the buyer’s face; they have to offer ways in which it will help the consumer. To captivate consumer interest and meet journalistic integrity, advertiser-editorial relations have had to come closer together than ever.

“The lovely thing about these supplements is that people self-select to read them based on their own interests,” he said. Although advertorials must adhere to strict guidelines to separate them in appearance from the editorial, often the advertorial gains credibility from the magazine. The magazine brand “rubs off onto the advertising, awarding it authority and trust,” the Magazines Canada report said. The content of the magazine that surrounds an advertorial sets up the reader’s mind to take it in differently than it would other forms of advertising.

“Advertising is important to readers and it supports what editors do,”

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said Sid Holt, chief executive for American Society of Magazine Editors (ASME). “Advertising gives readers more information on what is being offered to them, which readers appreciate,” said Holt, who was also managing editor for Rolling Stone magazine. This makes a highly effective tool over other forms of advertising, but there are many other details that may help or hinder its use.

“What’s attractive to an advertiser is the context that readers embrace and trust,” said Holt. “I’m not troubled by that.” The balance between advertisements and editorial was more closely looked at in the late 1980s, prompting the creation of the ASME. The main focus for the ASME at that time was advertising inserts. A set of guidelines was created to help keep advertising content and editorial separate, because advertorials were becoming more prominent in magazines, Holt said. “Advertorials are a relatively new phenomena,” he said. “Disguising ads as editorial content is fairly hearty and continues to be used in magazines. Especially women’s and lifestyle mags.”

There are also new types of advertorials popping up.

“One of the new things we’ve seen is sponsored sections,” said Holt. These are reoccurring parts of a magazine that an advertiser will buy and sponsor. When an advertiser puts forward a request for proposal that asks for such a section, often the art department will use other methods to get the product message across, Berk said. “We will do a lot with folding,” she said. “Usually we will pitch a funky idea with lots of fold outs, and then a few conservative ones as well.” Berk said often advertisers will say they want an advertorial, but really they just want a new way to stand out.

On the other hand, if tipped in a slightly different direction, the advertorial can make a magazine look cheap. “Some readers may not be savvy enough to recognize a sponsored page or an advertorial,” said Allan Britnell, president of the Canadian Society of Magazine Editors, and current managing editor of Renovation Contractor magazine. Britnell wants his readers to know that the magazine is sponsored, but he doesn’t want to give the impression the ads influence the content. When a company demands its advertisement look more like the magazine, the magazine can lose integrity.

“We need to keep our credibility as a magazine, and our group is pretty experienced on what will fly and what won‘t,” Berk said.

“We have to ask ourselves, ‘will this run?’” she said. “Otherwise the editor or publisher could reject the ad.”

Some publications are better equipped to turn down ads they don’t consider credible to them, Britnell said. “I’m in a unique position with this trade magazine,” he said. “We are lucky readers and advertisers love us, even though we play by the rules.”

The Canadian Society of Magazine Editors helps magazines keep their balance between editorial and advertisement with a set of specific guidelines. These guidelines were adapted from the American Society of Magazine Editors, which oversees the National Magazine awards, giving the ASME a bit more leverage over magazines that don’t adhere.

“The guidelines themselves don’t make everybody obey the speed limit,” Holt said. “But you don’t go any faster because it becomes dangerous.

“

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MAGAZINE WORLD 2012

”

PHOTO BY SARAH RIX / PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY KAITIE FRASER

When a company demands its advertisements look more like the magazine, the magazine can lose integrity

THE LOOK

The Lines on Scandal

Magazine producers rely so heavily on advertisment revenue that the creative within the ad is often deemed irrelavant.

BY HEATHER VANANDEL

They run it without giving too much thought to what the ad says.

If it is legal, they will do it

Shauna Gutoskie, another national account manager for Elle Canada and Quebec at Transcontinental Media said, “If there were any kind of, for any reason, controversial content, we would evaluate that on a case by case basis.”

“It would have to be on an individual basis and it is rarely a situation that comes up for us.”

The approach toward female models and how they are outfitted and presented could offend some readers but, “because it is a fashion and beauty brand, it is a little more edgy and open-minded,” Gutoskie said.

Nonetheless, Flare tries to be conscious of its readers’ values when it comes to how revealing their advertisements are, Pascoe said.

“The whole nature of Flare is to be very positive,” he said. “We don’t want anything that is demeaning to our readers.”

A few years ago Flare received a campaign from a fashion client that consisted of controversial content, Pascoe said. The image depicted a girl exposing herself by holding up her shirt.

Though the photo was taken from the back and nothing provocative could be seen by the reader,

Ads rejected

Subscriptions News Stands Ads

Ads accepted

ELLE CANADA ADVERTISEMENTS

- Peter Stamp

HUMBERJOURNALISM.COM/MAGAZINEWORLD2012

ELLE CANADA REVENUE

PHOTO AND PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY HEATHER VANANDEL

S

he was lying down, he explained with a smile, and it was sort of a profile shot.

“It was a naked woman,” said Mark Pascoe, advertising director of Flare Magazine. She was lying down, he explained, and it was sort of a profile shot.

But the fragrance house advertisement that ran in Flare didn’t raise concerns, or even eyebrows.

In fact, the content of advertisements is rarely a concern for magazines.

“If it is something that is representing bad behaviour or is demeaning, that is where we would draw the line,” said Pascoe. “But if it is done tastefully, then I think we are ok.”

Magazines rarely turn down an ad based on its content, said Peter Stamp, an advertising professor at Humber College.

“We get paid for advertisements, and we need ad revenue,” said Stamp. “I don’t know how many publishers would turn business away because they didn’t feel it was quite right.”

At Elle Canada, this is seldom an issue.

“There has rarely been anything where we have received some creative and have not been able to run it,” said Alicia Perrotta, national account manager for Elle Canada and Elle Quebec.

“Especially because it is a fashion and beauty title, you can run pretty much anything as long as it is not derogatory or offensive in any way, unless it is something that’s really offensive. I think there has been one or two instances where creative has come in to question.”

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PHOTO BY HEATHER VANANDEL Mark Pascoe, advertising director at Flare.

MAGAZINE REVENUE FLARE Advertisements: $16,320,640 Subscriptions: $1,119,759 Newsstands: $316,707 ELLE CANADA Advertisements: $11,410,168 Subscriptions: $1,417,557 Newsstands: $620,943 FASHION Advertisements: $11,958,691 Subscriptions: $643,397 Newsstands: $246,015 LOU LOU Advertisements: $7,656,492 Subscriptions: $1,358,236 Newsstands: $377,276 MORE Advertisements: $4,136,776 Subscriptions: $1,444,080 Newsstands: $368,766 PHOTO BY HEATHER VANANDEL

he said Flare asked the client to provide a creative that “was a bit toned down.”

“We have to be careful that, while we understand that clients want to do the shock value, we also have to be respectful of our readers, so that when they pick up the book, it is something that makes sense and that they are not offended by,” Pascoe said.

“The whole nature of our editorial content is not to say you have to use this product, or you have to look like this. We make sure that we are representing women in a positive light, and that our readers, when they read the magazine, can see themselves reflected in the pages.”

Stamp said advertisers approach the magazine wanting to advertise. “They negotiate a price, the publisher says ‘thank you very much’, and they run it without giving too much thought to what the ad says. If it is legal, they will do it.”

In 2008, a full-page, four-colour ad that ran in one edition would cost a business from $8,385 to $22,220 (what Flare sold a full-page ad for in 2008, according to a Canadian Advertising Rates and Data publication) depending on the magazine. This number decreases with size, location and number of issues.

Before the ‘90s, there was little negotiation or debate behind the price of ads, Stamp said.

He said negotiation was heightened when the media was hit with declining revenues that followed the recession. It is a long held belief that the first thing businesses cut is their advertising budget, and that played out strongly in the magazine sector. This caused magazines to open negotiation in an attempt to keep their regular buyers.

“Any business is better than none,” Stamp said. “Even if you only get $25 for it, it is better than getting nothing.”

“Advertising is essential,” said Perrotta. “The magazine is dependent on ad revenue for us to produce it, and same with the website, and vise versa. They are dependent on each other.”

Pascoe said it is however very hard to calculate the Return on Investment (ROI).

“That is certainly one area that is always a challenge (for a magazine) because clients are always saying that they’ve got to get ROI,” said Pascoe.

Internet advertisers are able to determine the ROI for a company based on the amount of clicks an advertisement receives. Through this they can see, immediately, what sort of return and response they are getting, Pascoe said.

“With magazine advertising it is more about brand marketing and image marketing,” he said. “It’s not so much about ‘you might see this at the Bay’ and ‘you might buy this product because you saw this ad.’ So it is a little more difficult to measure the exact ROI from magazines vs. the Internet, and it is always a challenge we are looking at, but we don’t hear from clients, (about) say, an increase in sales from an ad.”

Gutoskie said they don’t normally calculate the ROI for a company who advertises in Elle.

“Generally it is up to the customer to measure their ROIs,” said Gutoskie. “So if they are running a campaign in a magazine they should be tracking their sales in the time period. So a lot of times they will attribute an increase in sales to an increase in advertising.”

A mock fashion photoshoot with model, Jenna Desautel

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Dishing Out the Scoop National Post columnist Shinan Govani gives us an inside look into the world of gossip journalism

BY KRISTIN ANDREWS

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of many, if any, listed credible sources.

“The National Enquirer is this boiler plate of ‘a close personal friend revealed that...’ or ‘friends close to the star say...’ it’s all so clearly done by formula,” Keil said.

After the alleged phonehacking and police-bribery News of the World scandal, the methods of journalists of every degree have been heavily scrutinized by the public. It’s one thing for readers to know what their favourite celebrities are up to, but are intricate details of their personal lives and countless pictures of them walking down the street considered news?

Leah McLaren wrote an article for Maclean’s in January discussing Pippa Middleton’s sudden celebrity with the press at a time when the British tabloids are being conscious about the constant harassment and over exposure of celebrities. McLaren wrote of the Daily Mail’s photo editor, Paul Silva, and his struggle to justify using pictures of Pippa walking down the street or getting a coffee.

But as for the British tabloids, McLaren said that not much has changed on the surface of things, “however, I’d expect that there is not as much phone hacking or police bribing going on behind the scene.”

Canada does not have a traditional gossip rag in publication, but McLaren personally remembers Frank magazine.

In an email interview she said, “they printed a lot of nasty and mostly erroneous stuff about me when I was starting out in my career. It was an annoyance more than anything, but it did teach me to be thick skinned.” Shinan Govani, gossip columnist for the National Post.

COURTESY OF NATIONAL POST

H

e was the kid who didn’t go to the prom, books were his best friends growing up and he usually found himself eating lunch alone. For someone who didn’t consider himself as social, he has ironically found himself in the upper echelons of high society and celebrity buzz. He’s Shinan Govani, National Post columnist, freelance magazine writer, author and one of Canada’s most infamous gossip journalists.

Gossip journalists have the story that connects the average person to a world of glamour.

They fill the pages of magazines and newspapers with juicy gossip quenching a reader’s thirst.

But do readers hold gossip writers to the same journalistic standard of fact based reporting or are they let off the hook because of the entertainment value gossip holds?

“I’m lucky in that some of the normal rules of journalism don’t apply to the kind of column I write. I can present things as rumour and speculation because that’s the contract I have with the reader,” Govani said. “At the same time you can’t strike out too many times in a row.”

A seasoned writer like Govani has however reached a certain level of skill where he’s not just spinning stories. He has to please the reader while maintaining credibility and trust in the exclusive world he has access to.

“It is an ongoing trampoline act because I need to poke holes, satirize and sometimes be a town crier,” said Govani. “But at the same time I have to go to these people’s parties and sit with them at dinner. Often I need them to trust me and in turn be sources for me. It’s one big ecosystem.”

Charlie Keil, professor who teaches American filmmaking at the University of Toronto, said when it comes to tabloid journalism, the writer’s personality doesn’t come out and there is little in the way of standards for journalistic integrity. For example, magazines such as The National Enquirer write stories without the use

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The magazine folded, which McLaren said is a reflection of what the audience in Canada looks for in a magazine. “Canadians don’t much go in for nasty gossip,” she said. “We like our gossip light and bright.”

Govani admits that even with purest of intentions the most harmless methods require a mild degree of deceit.

“There are inevitable circumstances where you have to be disingenuous, where you’re drawing someone into a conversation about something in which you’re trying to be innocent, but you definitely have a motivation,” Govani said. “In general I’m not the ‘hiding in the bush’ sort of gossip writer. There are some, and I tip my hat to them in terms of industriousness because it does require a lot of waiting, a lot of patience, and a lot of waiting for the right thing to happen at the right time.”

Govani said one of the key elements of gossip journalism is timing; waiting for a story to ripen to the perfect point where it is sensational and scandalous, then cutting it open and squeezing the juice right out.

He admits that he’s always sitting on stories. “Right now I’m sitting on a story that’s about a week and a half old. It’s a big story about a household name in the country that is leaving their job and going to another big job,” Govani said. “Maybe there’s some plucky person who wants to get that story and they’re going to find out and they’re going to break it.”

Keil said the recipe for a great story rests in what the story is revealing.

“Stories that tell you something you didn’t know before,” he said. “Or that you feared and wondered might be the case, but now it’s been confirmed.”

I need to poke holes, satirize and sometimes be a town crier - Shinan Govani The sad, fall-from-grace stories make for good gossip content, but nothing has more legs than the romantic relationships of celebrities. Keil uses the example of the ongoing tabloid reports on Jennifer Aniston, Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie. “This is the longest non-existing relationship there’s been and it’s simply because it helps to sustain the notion of jealousy,” Keil said.

Tabloids have been able to keep spinning off the core of the story and turn them into a variety of different stories. “These are all made up, but they play into the central narrative of the triangle,” Keil said, and that’s certainly not a new tale in the gossip world.

Sensational style reporting is what initially fuelled tabloid journalism.

Scandals, highly publicized kidnapping cases and murder. “That is the sort

of journalistic context for the development of what we would consider gossip style reporting,” Keil said.

The development of the fan magazine and celebrity tabloid reporting was linked to the emergence of the star system and the movie business. Keil said during the 1920s there was a series of star scandals that changed the way the media would write about celebrities.

“It moved a lot of the coverage of the stars into the tabloid press,” Keil said. Celebrities became one of the more favoured figures to write about when it came to tabloid style reporting.

“It solidified the idea that stars are defined as much by their own off screen lives as they are by their on screen personas.”

Keil said that there are magazines that have a degree of respectability like People, US and In Touch and then down the line it goes to the sleazy ones. “It would seem the less reputable the title, the more they’re invested in full blown exposure or dirty secrets,” he said.

Magazines that are more respectable try to give the reader the sense that they are actually telling you the way the star lives as opposed to splashing rumours and speculations on their covers.

“They’re more inclined to have things like interviews and profiles because they are considered more legitimate,” Keil said.

He said the spectrum of the quality of a magazine can be measured by how embarrassed the reader is buying it at the grocery store or newsstand.

“If you’re somebody who enjoys reading that kind of stuff,” he said.

“What’s your level of humiliation if a friend were to come and see you holding it in your hand?”

After all the years Govani has been writing about celebrities and high society, oddly enough, he said he finds himself defending them when people pass judgment.

Although writers and readers stand ready to devour a great piece of gossip or celebrity scandal, there must be an understanding that people are people. Are they fair game just because they are beautiful, rich and famous, and choose to be in the public eye?

Their lives turn into subjects of ridicule and entertainment and the public become judges of character. But as Govani points out, the truth of the matter is any person who is constantly in the public eye will have a life that is going to look dysfunctional.

“If your life was documented to that degree and then blown up the way those stories are blown up, you would look like a mess too. Inevitably a lot of people would,” Govani said. “If you’re not a hermit and you’re not a nun, a lot of people’s lives would look weird.”

McLaren said it’s a two-way street when it comes to access and exposure for magazines and celebrities.

“Celebrities certainly use the gossip press to maximize their exposure, display brands and spin stories,” she said.

But Govani said a part of being a celebrity is staying relevant. Some celebrities need the constant validation and acknowledgment that they exist, and become discontent if the buzz surrounding them falls silent.

“If someone’s been famous and it stops, and there are crickets, I think it’s sort of like someone who has an addiction to prescription pills,” he said.

“You need another hit.”

“That’s the sort of thing that interests me and has interested me in this business: the psychology and anthropology of this,” Govani said. “People are kind of animals and its funny how people just want to be validated and seen in a certain way.”

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PHOTO BY PATRICIA BROTZEL Low freelance rates have writers chained to their computers to make ends meet.

Words for Sale Tips and tools to help Canadian freelance writers navigate the market.

BY PATRICIA BROTZEL

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here is a fallacy that a freelance writer’s career involves traversing the globe to give perspective to the pages of Canadian magazines. But freelance writing is not a journey from the pages of the Iliad, nor is it a glorified pyjama job, performed from the comfort of home with a cup of tea and slippers. The Canadian freelance writer is certainly faced with many challenges, but most of these battles occur on the pages of contract negotiations and pitch letters.

Writers aren’t left to slug out their battles alone. There are many resources available to help connect writers to editors, as well as to provide assistance for contract negotiations. Organizations have been popping up across Canada, dedicated to assisting writers, whether they advocate for better contracts and copyright laws, or help connect people.

Professional Writers Association of Canada (PWAC) is a prominent association working to support Canadian writers. It is a hub of creativity that helps connect professional editors and writers of all types. As a non-profit organization, PWAC is a frontline defence for freelance writers. Craig Silverman, president of PWAC, said the organization works in multiple capacities, backing writers when they need legal assistance, and providing networking services. “The most obvious way that PWAC connects writers to editors is through writers.ca. It has been around for at least

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five or six years and it is a website where all our members have profiles that editors can view,” Silverman said. Writers can be searched by location, style of writing or publication, making it one-stop shopping for editors in need of a freelancer. PWAC also has regional chapters that hold meetings on a regular basis where writers can crowd source and make connections.

Christine Peets is an Ontario-based freelance writer and the Ontario regional director of PWAC. Peets endorses PWAC as a great tool for all Canadian freelance writers for its ability to connect writers with new work. She has found work through PWAC’s resources like writers.ca. “The $240 membership fee I pay each year has been returned to me in all the work it provides,” she said.

Peets described the nature of freelance as “feast or famine” and with the connective work of PWAC she has been able to enjoy a feast as of late.

Peets is an example of how a freelance career doesn’t have to be dedicated solely to writing; while producing content for a variety of publications, including magazines, newspapers, blogs and websites, she also teaches parttime courses for individuals who want to write as a hobby. With the balance of writing and part-time teaching Peets has built an eclectic career.

But she said that every time she thinks about settling into a specialization, a new challenge comes along that she can’t resist. She is optimistic about

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Freelancers are the new serfs of the information age - Michael OReilly

Wilson said he fears Bill C-11 may mean any material being used for educational purposes could be photocopied without being in breach of copyright. With many freelancers contributing to textbooks, this bill could remove a source of income that is crucial to the freelance market.

PWAC and other organizations are working with social media to create awareness, tweeting the issue and creating Facebook groups. A Google search of petitions against Bill C-11 turns up numerous sites where individuals can add their signature and step up against the Stephen Harper’s conservative government’s bill.

Wilson said he’s worried there won’t be enough time to collect the number of signatures needed for the government to take notice. The bill has already been read a second time in parliament and given to a legislative committee for review. “We’re dealing with a very aggressive government. They kind of get their mind set that this is what it is, this is what we’ll do,” he said.

Things changed at Transcontinental Media, when the company underwent contract negotiations in 2009 and Canadian freelancers found themselves at battle with this major player. Michael OReilly, president of the Canadian Freelance Union was one of the people at the forefront of these negotiations and has seen how the deal they struck has affected the freelance market.

OReilly said the contract was “imposed upon writers” in 2009. When the contract was under negotiations, organizations were pushing freelance writers to boycott working with Transcontinental or to work with their editors to push the media mogul into offering better terms. Without the clout of a major corporation to back up the side of the writers, negotiations collapsed. Essentially Transcontinental created a contract that removed all copyright and essentially handed it to the publisher. “All the rights granted to original creators, granted to writers in the copyright act are now the rights of the publisher,” OReilly said.

Along with taking away copyright privileges, the rate of pay remains disturbingly similar to the dollar-per-word rate of 1979, even having dropped by a small amount OReilly said. “What is depressing is that while the demand and profits go up, the rates of pay have been plummeting.”

OReilly advocated seeking work outside of the larger publishers, working instead with the multiple small trade publications. But for steady work, he recommends the corporate world. “There is a lot of work in business writing. Working for companies and doing media releases and reports,” OReilly said.

John Lorinc is a Toronto-based writer, who works entirely as a freelancer. His topics of choice are the social, economic and political landscapes in Toronto. He said he indoctrinated himself into the city’s freelance writing scene in 1988, when he was fired from his job as a news reporter at The Kingston Whig-Standard. After more than 20 years of writing, his words have filled the pages of Canadian publications such as Toronto Life, Spacing and The Walrus.

Lorinc chalked his success up to reliability. “I’m not a great a writer.

I’m not a great stylist. I’m not in a position where I can act like a primadona,” Lorinc said. “But if you get a reputation for being easy to work with and producing good solid work you’ll get asked back.” He said that the unreliability of some freelance writers can be shocking, and consistency is often a person’s greatest asset. If a freelancer is consistent in meeting deadlines and turns out well-rounded articles, editors will keep coming back to them.

Lorinc also said a successful freelancer survives on a balanced diet of long, medium and short stories. The lengthier process of magazine writing can be more easily sustained by turning out shorter news pieces at the same time. It is a labour of love to create an article for a magazine. A writer may wind up dedicating months to one piece, and sometimes more than a year for longer feature articles. The time needed to tease out a story for a magazine can be supplemented with shorter newspaper articles, according to Lornic.

In the words of OReilly, “Freelancers are the new serfs of the information age. The owners give us enough to keep us alive and producing.”

PHOTO BY HELEN SURGENOR

the future of freelance and said writers should be aware of the opportunities out there. “A lot of things are opening up, writers need to be open and willing to change,” Peets said.

Bruce Wilson works on the advocacy side of PWAC, and is currently engaged in a discussion with the legislature to make amendments to the controversial Bill C-11. Wilson said he feels the bill does a poor job of defining fair dealing when it comes to copyrights – specifically in terms of clearly outlining the boundaries of sharing for educational purposes.

Wilson said he feels this lack of clarity will be detrimental to freelancers and could greatly reduce if not remove a lucrative sector of work if it is not amended. “There will no longer be an incentive for textbook publishers, which will take away writers’ work,” Wilson said.

Writers are getting nickel and dimed in today’s freelance contracts.

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PHOTO BY HELEN SURGENOR

The Sporting Blues A crowded field makes it difficult for aspiring sportswriters to get published.

Finding a niche and pitching creative ideas can help get bylines.

BY TERRY ELKADY The goal for most sports writers is to cover the most popular events in the country. In Canada, hockey reigns supreme. Across the nation, writers and fans live and breathe Canada’s game. The unfortunate truth, however, is that supply is greater than demand. Freelancers trying to get their foot in the door are facing roadblocks. Publications like The Hockey News rely heavily on staff writers and part-time writers called stringers, making it difficult for new writers to get in the game.

Jason Kay, editor-in-chief for The Hockey News, said the number of freelance contributions to the publication varies, but it is generally in the 10 to 20 per cent range. The majority of these freelance pieces are assigned to what Kay calls stringers – freelancers who regularly write for the magazine and are recognized in the field. These are generally industry profes-

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sionals already employed as broadcasters or writers for other publications.

“The stringers we use, we are comfortable with. We have seen their work and have a history with them,” Kay said. “When approached by people we are not familiar with, we need a background check and to see credentials because it is our credibility that is on the line.”

Kay also said all of the big stories are done in house and only the smaller ones are given to freelance writers. He said it is important for The Hockey News to make sure sources are credible, which is best done by using trusted staff writers.

If you’re looking to pitch an idea to the editors of The Hockey News, it is also important to be aware of what it looks for. Kay talked about how the stories used have changed over time. He said blogs have played a part in

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THE WRITTEN big boys. Sometimes you have to start small,” he said. Freelancing also came with some extra perks. “As long as you have a good rapport, you can work when you want.”

When you’re getting started, Larkin said the hardest part is to figure out where and what to look for. “The best way to find work or learn where to look is to talk to people who have been in the business.”

Sports that are often overlooked by the ambitious journalist could be the source to gaining valuable bylines and an ever-important paycheck.

“Anyone looking for advice, I would say don’t limit yourself or be afraid to specialize in a niche area,” he said. “Say there’s a job about fencing, but you don’t know anything about it. Don’t avoid it. Go out and learn so you can become the only one that knows how to write about fencing.”

Getting a solid start takes perseverance. “Underestimating and underselling yourself because of fear and the need to get work to pay bills can hurt,” he said. “Doing that means you’re setting a precedent and it will affect future jobs and could affect future workloads resulting in underpayment.”

Larkin did not have the ability to work without pay, but he also said it’s an option for some writers. “There is always an opportunity to find unpaid work if you have that buffer. It could help,” he said.

One outlet is the continuously growing world of blogging. In terms of sports, Bleacher Report is a prominent website dedicated to the craft. This site is a means to building a portfolio, and could result in a paying job.

King Kaufman, writer program manager at the Bleacher Report, said the site is a good place for aspiring sports writers.

“Writing is one of those things where you learn by doing and get better by practicing,” he said. “ Bleacher Report is a good platform that provides a large audience and allows you to get feedback.”

Kaufman said that Bleacher Report gives writers the opportunity to grow and build a readership – and this can help bring the reputation Kay and The Hockey News seek.

“I remember when I started writing and my mom forwarded my article to my dad. That doubled my readership,” he said. “Eventually, two turned to eight and soon people I didn’t know started reading my work – that was exciting.”

In addition to helping build a portfolio and getting some followers, sources like Bleacher Report have grown to the point where they offer paying jobs for writers. Lead writers and feature HUMBERJOURNALISM.COM/MAGAZINEWORLD2012

columnists are paid. Kaufman said that they are currently in the process of hiring and will total around 30 new paid positions this year in various sports.

Bleacher Report has also had writers who have gotten positions outside of the website. In fact, they have a section on their website titled “success stories,” outlining some of the people who have been able to turn their passion into a sports writing career.

FREELANCING TIPS COURTESY OF STEVE MAICH

the transformation of the magazine. “We’ve been cognizant of it for years, as the media world changes, we have to adapt, grow and branch out.

10 to 15 years ago, we were news-oriented. Now we have changed our perspective so that if you pick up a magazine a month or week later, it is still relevant.”

Sportsnet Magazine is considered the new competition, but Kay is aware of it and does not consider it a threat to take away readers.

“Rogers is a very powerful corporation. We have to be aware of them and make sure we are at our highest level, but it is not the same animal as The Hockey News,” he said. “Hockey is Canada’s game so they are going to cover it but, after picking up a Sportsnet Magazine, I think the die-hard hockey fans still want to read The Hockey News.”

Matt Larkin, a former freelancer turned copy editor for The Hockey News, talked about the grind of trying to survive as a freelance sports writer and getting your foot in the door.

Larkin sought a career in sports writing from the beginning but was wise enough to know that as a newbie in a competitive market, it’s important to be willing to compromise.

“You don’t always get want you want,” he said. Realizing that, and continuing to build a portfolio is an important step to the growth of a career. Decisions throughout depend on each writer’s aspirations.

“If you’re just looking to make a living, it doesn’t matter as much which publication as long as it pays well,” he said. “If you’re looking to expand your resume, you might want to hold out for a more reputable publication.”

There are other mediums for sports writing that are sometimes overlooked. Larkin talked about the early stages in his career when he wrote about sports betting for sports websites to build a reputation and portfolio. “A lot of sports oriented websites that focused on betting had work – that helped.”

At one point, Larkin recalls putting an ad on Craigslist to seek work. From then on, a willingness to diversify helped him acquire jobs and contacts. To do so however, he had to “broaden his horizons” and learn to write outside of his comfort zone. Learning about MMA (Mixed Martial Arts) rather than hockey got him jobs that would have otherwise been inaccessible.

Through all the turmoil and difficulties as a freelancer, Larkin said he was able to get work – specifically work in sports. In fact, he said around 80 per cent of his work as a freelancer was for sports publications.

“It’s not always easy to find work with the

FROM SPORTSNET EDITOR STEVE MAICH SPORTSNET USES ONE OR TWO FREELANCE PIECES. They range from 800 words to full features KEEP A GOOD BLOG. Editors use blogs to see the quality of a reporter’s writing COME UP WITH UNIQUE IDEAS. Freelance writers are competing for space with the Sportsnet staff PITCH AN ANGLE THE STAFF WRITERS WOULD NOT HAVE. If you do a story on Albert Pujols, give a unique perspective

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Objective Perspective There is more than one way to tell a story: Content is often framed according to writer bias and audience expectations.

BY LISA GILLAN

W

hile many journalists are often thought of as objective observers, when the idea of how a story is framed is taken into consideration, the description seems a bit misleading.

Karen Rothmyer worked as a journalist in the United States for many years. She said she recalled the experience of a Puerto Rican American colleague who was responsible for writing about the Puerto Rican American community.

“There had to be some kind of deviant behaviour of some sort, or something bizarre. That was what editors were expecting to see,” Rothmyer said. “And not just editors of course, ‘cause in a way it’s editors standing in for readers.”

Rothmyer, who has also been a professor at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism and managing editor at American magazine The Nation, now lives in Nairobi, Kenya, where she has been for the last five years. Her current job title is public editor of The Star; a newspaper based in Nairobi.

In 2011, she wrote an article for the Columbia Journalism Review and a paper for Harvard’s Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy, about how American coverage of Africa has been focusing too much on its negative stories, while largely neglecting those of prosperity.

Non-governmental organizations are among sources consulted by North American journalists, Rothmyer said, and she thinks the fundraising goals of those groups are in part to blame for the media’s focus on the downtrodden.

“From the NGO side, they have very big and sophisticated PR offices, and they do their best, just as any other interest group does, to pitch stories to journalists,” Rothmyer said. “It’s not sinister on either side – I don’t want to portray it that way, but it’s like this is how business gets done, and it explains a lot of what comes out the other end.”

Rothmyer said it’s common for journalists to start thinking about how they’re going to write their stories before they’ve even begun covering them. This practice can also make it difficult for reporters to accurately represent their subject matter.

“There’s a preconception – and that preconception isn’t just from previ-

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ous journalism – it’s from films and kids’ books and all kinds of things that make people think that they know what it’s like and then the journalism just plays into that or the NGO’s play into that,” she said.

Rothmyer said journalists who come to Africa from abroad should educate themselves about the area from the perspective of its residents.

“If I was a journalist coming to Africa I think what I would try to do is find somebody at the local university who’s teaching African studies or something and say, ‘tell me the five or the 10 books I should read before going there,’” she said. “And I doubt that they would say The Snows of Kilimanjaro by Ernest Hemingway. I would think they would say something a little more contemporary, and from an African perspective.”

It’s not that telling the stories from the perspective of an outsider makes those stories wrong, but mass media does play a role in shaping readers’ views of the world.

“I’m not saying, and I was not trying to say in the article that you don’t do stories about poor kids or places where there is famine or whatever,” Rothmyer said. “[But] why not more stories about people that are similar, rather than always about people who are different?”

But is it the responsibility of media producers to ensure all aspects of every story get coverage in their publications?

“I think it depends on the type of work that you’re talking about,” said Ivor Shapiro, who is the chair of the Canadian Association of Journalist’s ethics committee, as well as the founder of the Canadian Journalism Project, its current ethics moderator, and an associate professor at the Ryerson School of Journalism.

“The degree to which the writer is expected, or the journalist is expected, to be independent of the subject matter of what he or she is writing about just depends on what the subject matter is, where in the publication it is being placed, what type of publication it is, the particular style that attaches to that publication – there’s a whole bunch of complex things.”

Shapiro said the objectivity of a journalist shouldn’t be dependent on the medium he or she is working in. Instead, he said it depends on what the expectations are of the outlet’s audience, and whether that audience is being misled.

“I think the difficulty with the whole objectivity arises when something

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THE WRITTEN photographer’s cultural origin in the American edition subtly positions them as ‘objective’ reporters, validating their claims about the cultural experience of ‘many Japanese.’”

This illustrates the subliminal effects a magazine’s story-telling can have – not only through

PHOTO BY HELEN SURGENOROR

is presented in a form that suggests objectivity, but actually is subtly distorted by one’s experience,” he said.

An interesting example which illustrates Shapiro’s point can be seen in a study done for The Association for Education in Journalism

Journalistic articles are a lot like pictures. As this photo illustrates, when the bigger picture is taken into account, the original portrayal of any subject matter can seem a bit misleading.

and Mass Communication by Fabienne DarlingWolf and Andrew L. Mendelson. The focus of the research was a story written for the American National Geographic about Japanese samurai culture, which was re-edited for the Japanese edition of the magazine.

The story titled “The Samurai Way,” was primarily written by American journalist Tom O’Neill. O’Neill told Darling-Wolf and Mendelson he had approached the story wanting to show the links between samurai history and modern life in Japan. When it was printed in the American edition, Darling-Wolf and Mendelson wrote that it did discuss current Japanese cultural practices, which can be linked back to samurai culture.

When the story was printed in the Japanese edition however, it was repackaged and sold to its audience in a completely different way. The American background of the original article was flagged in the Japanese piece with a reference to its author’s nationality in the table of contents, and that of both the author and photographer on the article’s first page.

In comparison, the study’s authors assert “the lack of reference to the article’s writer and

articles and pictures, but even in its formatting.

This point is extremely important when considering the subject of scope. It isn’t that O’Neill was necessarily wrong in attributing samurai traditions to current cultural practices. What could be considered misleading was the emphasis he assigned to its current relevance.

“On one hand, the informants resented the Western tendency to exoticize Japanese culture by focusing on its more traditional aspects,” wrote the study’s authors. “This frustration with what they perceived as a Western obsession with Japanese tradition was tied to a concern over the possible eclipsing of more contemporary aspects of Japanese cultural identity.”

Although it may have missed the mark, the students did not perceive the coverage as entirely bad, according to Darling-Wolf and Mendelson.

“In fact, National Geographic’s alleged tendency to idealize traditional aspects of Japanese culture was often a source of pride and gratification.”

In spite of the students’ feelings toward the piece, and their contention with its representations of their home, the editor of the Japanese edition of National Geographic at the time “vehemently asserted the accuracy and value of the HUMBERJOURNALISM.COM/MAGAZINEWORLD2012

piece from a journalistic point of view,” wrote the study’s authors. “As he put it: ‘That story is true. Samurai have many elements; this is one of them. You can’t cover them all.’”

The key to all of this is keeping in mind the lens through which the subject is seen. As Darling-Wolf and Mendelson put it, “The study does not suggest that individuals involved in the story were more or less ‘biased’ about the piece, but points to the different perspectives they contributed to it.”

Jay Rosen is a press critic who has been with New York University’s faculty of journalism for more than 25 years. His work has spanned many print and online publications; a radio show he used to co-host, and the book, What Are Journalists For? Another of Rosen’s projects is his blog, PressThink [or pressthink.org] which he uses to share many of his thoughts on the current state of journalism. On Feb. 26, 2012, Rosen took to his blog to discuss (American) National Public Radio’s latest handbook on ethics.

In his post, Rosen commends NPR for committing itself “to avoid the worst excesses of ‘he said, she said’ journalism.”

The point Rosen focused on is that it isn’t always best for journalists to give equal coverage to differing sides of the stories. If one side is inaccurate, or misleading, it shouldn’t be over-represented for the sake of ensuring equal coverage.

In an earlier blog entry, where Rosen wrote about a similar topic, he said that having a point of view does not necessarily take away from a journalist’s authority on a given subject matter.

“It may even add to it,” he wrote.

Shapiro drew on author George Orwell to illustrate that subjective framing of stories has been practiced in journalism for many years.

“When he went pounding about the streets of England a century ago, you know, to see what life was like as a homeless person, or when he dived into the kitchens of Paris, you know, I don’t think he was objective,” he said. “I don’t think anyone expected him to be objective, I think he was working as a journalist for sure and I don’t think there’s anything new about that.”

Shapiro said his advice to journalists regarding this topic is pretty standard.

“For a start, be aware of your biases and compensate for them. And the compensation can take several forms. One is avoiding a topic that you feel you’re expected to report on independently but you can’t. Avoid that. Avoid the conflict of interest,” he said. “Secondly, if you do have a prejudice or a bias make that clear to your reader. Transparency in other words.”

21

I

n 2001, Vice was a monthly magazine. Today it is a record label, a retail clothing line and an online television network. It is a brand.

Documentaries like The Vice Guide to North Korea have circulated on Facebook, and Vice programming is shown on MTV2 and CNN.com, as well as Vice’s website, reaching viewers who have never even read the printed publication.

“A lot of the print stories are inspiration for video and vice versa,” said Jonathan Hunt, director of global marketing at Vice, over a crackly telephone connection to New York City.

Vice TV, like the magazine, features edgy, arguably offensive stories, not likely to be found elsewhere. Stories like Swedish student hazing rituals and fetish novels popular with menopausal women, to name a couple.

There are also regular series like Art Talk and the Vice Guide to Sex, which has broached subjects such as “the biggest ass in Brazil” and “Icelandic elf sex.”

Magazines, of course, don’t need to cater to edgy, urban hipsters to move into TV. National Geographic has had its own television network since the late

22

’90s and Playboy since 1982. In Canada, children’s science and nature magazine, Owl, had a half-hour show that ran on CBC, and later CTV, from 1985 to 1994.

Elle, Ladies’ Home Journal, and The Onion all have high-quality online television. In January, The Walrus launched its own programming on specialty network eqhd, as well as the magazine’s website.

Industry insiders have said the future of magazines is becoming less about the printed publication and more about creating strong, multimedia brands.

“It was Chickadee that took us to television,” said Annabel Slaight, cofounder of Chickadee and Owl, and executive producer for Owl TV. That first foray was an ill-conceived, early ’80s pilot for CBC, Slaight said.

“It starred David Suzuki with Luba Goy dressed up as a giant chickadee,” Slaight said chuckling. “It was so appallingly horrible, it was unbelievable. David Suzuki looked completely terrified.”

Suffice it to say, CBC did not pick up the series.

A couple years later though, Slaight said an independent producer

MAGAZINE WORLD 2012

THE INDUSTRY

Building a Brand:

In a world of iPads and YouTube, moving beyond the printed page is more important than ever before.

Experts from across the industry share wit, wisdom and technical details about delving into TV.

BY RUSSELL PIFFER

PHOTO BY HELEN SURGENOR

The Walrus Branches into Television

named Paulle Clark approached her about an Owl-based show.

Slaight said the magazine needed to be more involved than it had been during the Chickadee debacle and Clark agreed.

After being rejected by Canadian networks, they shot the pilot with funding from PBS. “We knocked on every door in Canada,” Slaight said. “Everybody looked at it and said there’s no way you know how to make a TV show, so forget it.”

Slaight said after PBS showed interest, CBC did as well.

According to her, coming from outside the industry leant itself to a different approach to children’s television.

“Because we came from publishing and we didn’t know what could be done and what couldn’t be done with television technology at the time, we stretched the television technology,” Slaight said.

For example, Owl TV used green screen (when it was still blue screen) technology to ‘shrink’ children and insert them into nature footage to recreate the magazine’s Mighty Mites segment.

Slaight said Canadian television production values were so low then

that “there wasn’t anyone within our own country we could ask how to do things we wanted to do.”

Owl TV regularly used advisers from the U.S. and the U.K. and because of this, the show looked different and moved faster than contemporary children’s programing, she said.

“We didn’t want to have a host, because kids’ shows in those days often had a sort of dreary person talking at you and they would announce, ‘Now you’re going to see this,’” Slaight said. “We just had little animated jokes and factoids as numbers between one section and another, which was a very unheard-of idea in those days.”

Slaight said it was impossible to directly translate magazine articles to the screen.

“You had to do it thematically, and represent the spirit of the magazine,” she said.

Slaight is retired now, but chairs the Shaw Rocket Fund, which donates $17 million a year to Canadian children’s television.

According to a 2010 report from Magazines Canada, Canada has one of the strongest magazine industries in the world. Without getting too bogged down in dry statistics, there were about 1,250 Canadian consumer magazine titles as of 2009, an increase of 36 per cent over 10 years, according to the report, which looked at the relationship between magazines, the Internet and advertising.

The Internet has hardly sounded the magazine’s death knell.

Fifty-nine per cent of Canadian magazines were launched “after the Internet became commercially available in 1989,” the report said, and advertising revenue steadily grew from 1996 until the 2008 recession.

At the same time, the 18-24 demographic is the most likely to read magazines, with 82 per cent having read content online in the last 30 days before participating in the study.

This is also the demographic “most associated with the use of digital media,” it said.

“The next generation has even higher expectations of connectedness” than its parents, said Shelagh Stoneham, vice-president and general manager of brands and marketing communications at Rogers Communications, during her speech at Magazines Canada’s The Page is Turning Workshop in March. “This means the expectation for more and more content channels is only going to grow.”

The workshop addressed how the digital age is changing magazines.

About 200 magazine industry professionals sat around large circular tables draped in white tablecloths in the Toronto Reference Library’s Bram and Bluma Salon for the event.

“To succeed in the new media reality, magazines have to be flexible in how content is presented and magazine publishers have to think about how their content will transcend the printed format,” Stoneham said, posed behind a lectern and in front of a red and white Magazine’s Canada banner. “Magazines have to be thought of less as a publication and more as a brand.

“Magazine publishers are not just magazine publishers, they are brand managers, with extensions in print, digital, social, mobile, television, radio and events,” Stoneham said. She said Playboy and National Geographic are great examples of magazines that have developed into brands.

These magazines started with a brand point-of-view: an overarching idea or character that defines a company, and applied it to multiple mediums and products, Stoneham said.

“Playboy is the greatest magazine to ever broaden its scale into a fullyfledged brand,” she said. It started in 1953 as “sophisticated entertainment for men,” moved into TV in the ’80s and now has its tentacles in satellite

HUMBERJOURNALISM.COM/MAGAZINEWORLD2012

23

The only cost to the magazine is maintaining Walrustv.ca, where the programing is shown online.

The Walrus TV pieces are companions to the magazine, Leonard said.

Some are short documentaries like The Meaning of Hockey, based on a Stephen Marche article of the same name, while others like Dogwalker’s Law with Linda Besner feature poets published in the Walrus reading their work.

It is a huge step up from the Walrus’ previous online video, which consisted mostly of public service announcements and events filmed by a single camera at the back of the venue.

Walrus TV is constantly filming fresh content, Leonard said, and there should be a new documentary for each issue.

The biggest challenge is finding innovative ways to make stories that are intended for print “visually dynamic,” said Natasha Negrea, producer of Walrus TV at eqhd.

“You read a lot of things and they make you think and they’re wonderful, but they need to have that visual element,” she said. “You can’t just have talking heads. You can’t just have numbers. You need to have something that tells the story visually.”

Negrea said she was about to begin editing a piece based on the Walrus magazine story, That Time we Beat the Americans, about the War of 1812.

To get that visual element, her crew went out and shot at Fort York and Fort George so that they could show “where the actual battles took place,” Negrea said.

Kidnapped, based on an excerpt from Canadian diplomat Robert Fowler’s book about being held captive for several months by Al Queda, posed more of a challenge, Negrea said.

“You don’t know how something like that is going to work,” she said.

“You don’t have any extra footage and we certainly weren’t going to go to Niger to shoot any b-roll.”

“We had him do sort of a dramatic reading of part of that excerpt on camera,” Negrea said. To hold the viewer’s attention, her team coupled the reading with creative sound design.

“I think it was a very counter-intuitive approach and it just worked very nicely,” Negrea said.

Negrea and her manger at eqhd meet editors at the Walrus to decide what upcoming stories might lend themselves to television.

The project benefits everybody involved, she said. The Walrus and its writers get time on the airwaves, and eqhd gets exposure with the Walrus’ readership.

“We want to be where people are watching smart content,” Leonard said. “Our goal with that is, obviously, reaching people who might not read magazines at all. Someone who is watching documentaries, smart television, comes across us – great for the brand, great for the content, great for the writers.”

“As much as we might all be words people, TV is really sexy,” he said.

PHOTO BY RUSSELL PIFFER

radio, the Internet, wine and countless pieces of merchandise with varying degrees of tackiness.

“Playboy has fallen on ‘hard’ times,” Stoneham said, “but the brand is reputedly still worth more than $300 million” and is a testament to the strength of a strong brand POV. Vice has capitalized on the brand POV strategy to a similar effect, but on a smaller scale.

“Vice TV began in 2007 as Vbs.tv, a joint venture between Vice and Viacom,” Hunt said, and Vice bought out Viacom’s share of Vbs.tv in 2009, rechristening it Vice TV. Along with its various media and retail lines, Vice is working with Intel on the Creators Project.

“It’s an artistic incubator of sorts. We work with emerging artists around the world to create amazing things and bring them to life at live events,” Hunt said. “We had one in New York last October, we have one in San Francisco in March, one in Sao Paolo, one in Seoul, Beijing, Paris, all over the world.”

Past events have included an eclectric assortment of artists such as electronic musician “Squarepusher, U.K.,” collective United Visual Artists and Chinese independent filmmaker Peng Lei. Videos of the events and interviews with the artists are broadcast on the projects’ website.

Vice is completely independently owned, Hunt said, and partnerships with corporations like Viacom and Intel have no effect on content.

“At the heart of our larger campaigns is original content,” Hunt said.

“That is what Vice brings to the table” as is the common thread through all its product lines.

The Magazines Canada report said that of the people who accessed magazine websites, 75 per cent said video content enhanced their online experience – the most of any online feature. Even highbrow publications like The Walrus are using television to extend their brand.

Walrus TV is a partnership between the magazine and intellectuallyoriented cable network, eqhd, said David Leonard, Walrus manager of events and special projects. Leonard is a friendly, quick-talking man who had a shaved head and looks to be in his early 30s.

He sat behind his desk in an office filled with back issues and Walrus swag like tote bags left over from past events.

The eqhd network approached the Walrus last fall with the idea of using the magazine’s content as inspiration for television pieces, Leonard said.

“They have this digital channel with no advertising,” he said. They buy programing that is 22 minutes, or 44 minutes, or whatever, then they have eight-minute, six-minute, 12-minute gaps where they have no programming, where they need small docs to fill those gaps.”

Eqhd’s slogan is “smart in here” and the network is interested in “intelligent, thoughtful content on things that matter,” Leonard said.

The Walrus was a perfect fit, he said. “It’s a great brand moment for us.”

The Walrus TV team at eqhd produces all the content, Leonard said.

Eqhd producer Natasha Negrea at work on Walrus TV with online editor Johnathan Zweig.

24

MAGAZINE WORLD 2012

THE INDUSTRY

WHAT A DIGITAL WORLD PHOTO BY ANDREW RUSSELL

Subscriptions are down and online readership is up. Canadian magazines must decide how they incorportate digital technology.

BY ANDREW RUSSELL

P

eople are doing it, at coffee shops, on buses, park benches and in the library. They are eReading. iPads, Kobos, and Kindles are gradually becoming more ubiquitous wherever a person can find the time to read. And with this rise of tablets and e-readers magazines are still trying to find their place in this new era of digital reading. Industry experts – quickly taking note of this new trend – have sounded the death knell for the printed word, saying the glory days of print editions are a thing of the past. As print publications try to reach a progressively more tech savvy audience they are finding themselves locked in a survival of the fittest competition.

Martin White, a magazine marketing consultant, and former VP of publishing for TIME Canada, said prognostications about the impending doom of print media are still premature. “Since Guttenburg invented the movable type, no medium has been completely replaced by another medium,” he said during an interview over Skype. “From print to radio to

The Canadian market for print magazines has been exempt from the drastic decline seen in the U.S. and U.K. television to the computer – not one has disappeared.

“We’re heading into something called the ‘value economy,’” he said.

“What I preach to magazines is, if you want to evolve your (publication) in today’s world it’s ‘what’s the value of what you’re creating?’”

White describes how the magazine world has changed rapidly in just one decade. “Going back 10-15 years, if we wanted to publish a magazine we would start with whatever the subject is that we’re passionate about,”

he said. “Success would be determined by how well (a publisher) could marshal that content and create something of value.”

Now publishers have to contemplate the choice between print, digital, or both. White said the two are not mutually exclusive. “Imagine you’re at home reading a four to five page magazine article, and you can’t finish it before you have to go out,” he said. “Now you can finish the article on your portable reader.” Most people, he said, don’t bring their magazines everywhere they go, but people do tend to use their portable reader when they’re out of the house.

With the March release of the iPad 3, it’s hard to believe that it’s only been little over two years since Apple first launched its revolutionary tablet computer. Beleaguered publishers read the writing on the wall and began pouring millions into developing the digital magazine. Now digital newsstands, like the world’s largest, Zinio, have hundreds of magazine titles available for download to your tablet, smartphone or eReader.

Among the titles including SPIN, US Weekly, and Oprah’s O magazine, is Canada’s Maclean’s. With a full 52 issues being offered for $44.99 (84 per cent off the print edition) Maclean’s seems to have completed the next phase of the magazine industry’s evolution. The move to portable tablets allows publishers to engage the reader in ways never thought possible.

Video intros, extended high-resolution photo galleries, and interactive content (including ads) are some of the ways magazines are engaging readers. No longer stuck to a bulky laptop or stationary desktop, tablets and eReaders allow magazine lovers to enjoy their favourite titles anywhere.

And although larger publishers like Roger’s and Transcontinental Media have successfully made the move toward digital editions, how the rest of the Canadian magazine industry will react is uncertain.

The Canadian market for print publications has been exempt from the drastic decline seen in the U.S. and U.K. Canada has weathered the storm because of our slower shift to embrace technologies relating to how we

HUMBERJOURNALISM.COM/MAGAZINEWORLD2012

25

read. “Canadian magazines are not known for being tech leaders. They have been following what is happening the U.S.,” said Alan K’necht, partner of Digital Media Always, a Toronto based full-service search engine optimization (SEO), and web analytics firm.

K’necht said he’s been noticing a puzzling trend; while new magazines have been increasing in number, no one is paying for subscriptions – a vital part of revenue. “Everyone thinks they should be a publisher and are allowed to because of grants and alternative funding that’s out there,” said K’necht referring to money available to publishers, like a $5,000 grant from the Canadian Council of the Arts. And while this might seem like small potatoes to some people, every dime is helpful when starting out. New publishers are still choosing the print route rather than creating a digital format because it’s cheaper and still in demand. “The 60 plus demographic still likes to read a physical piece of paper,” said K’necht speaking about Canadian seniors who remain powerful purchasers and are resisting new technologies like tablets.

But this trend may not continue beyond the foreseeable future, as a major role of advertising also shifts. “Heading into the world of apps, people don’t have to go to a website anymore,” said K’necht. “They get everything in one area which leads to more ads and more convenience for advertisers.”

Advertisers play the most essential part in any magazine and as trends shift towards a digital format publishers will have to follow suit.

For decades the longevity of magazines has been sustained by their subscription based model of business. As magazines begin to see these numbers dwindling, they will have to find a new way to connect people to content. Social media is now a key tool to help publications reach younger audiences.

One Vancouver-based writer said the magazine industry is seriously failing to capitalize in this area however. “Magazines need to create a bigger fan-base to get people interacting,” said Angela Crocker, author of The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Creating A Social Network. She spoke from Vancouver about how publishers and writers need to go beyond the standard model of a simple Facebook or Twitter account.

“The problem with these traditional models is that companies can now offer you 1000 followers or ‘likes’ in a week. Are these real fans who will read your work?” she said, speaking about the downside of marketing

through the standard social media.

Canadian magazines need to take advantage of the interactive environment that social media provides. “I’ve seen it with major U.S. magazines, but not with major Canadian magazines,” said Crocker. Yahoo! launched an exciting news feature on Facebook, which allows a user the ability to see what news stories her friends have read on both Facebook and Yahoo!

News. This simple two-way stream of information makes it possible to discover news content through your friends. “Think about the possibility for real-time debate with publications like Maclean’s and The Walrus,” said Crocker. “It’s very exciting.”

One publisher who’s no stranger to capitalizing on new markets is Oprah, who has been a leader in the move to digitize her magazine, O. “Oprah’s magazine is a great example of how magazines can work with tablets,” said Crocker. “Instead of a still cover you get a video message from Oprah.”

Not everyone seems to feel that things like apps and the current digital format offered by companies like Zinio are the best possible way for publishers to reach their audiences.

Mathew Ingram, a former writer for the Globe and Mail and current tech blogger for GigaOm.com, found time to speak from a tech conference in San Francisco. “Canadian magazines aren’t taking advantage of what is out there,” he said. While others have praised the offerings from digital newsstands like Zinio, Ingram said the format can be very limiting, and while some magazines offer interactive content, most are exactly like the print edition except in a digital format.

This can lead to magazines being further consumed with the app economy, and failing to acknowledge the other options available to Canadian publishers. “I think magazines should spend less time on apps and more time thinking about the open web,” Ingram said. “The Boston Globe uses something called responsive formatting. It formats to what you access it with instead of being limited to an android app or iPod app.”

This innovative thinking could prove useful to a magazine company looking to maximize readership rather than being constrained to the trend of portable readers. “Print will always be around for whatever reason,” Ingram said. He cautioned however that magazines should think “outside the jar” and focus on creating a product that looks good on all devices.

TOP CANADIAN SUBSCRIPTIONS

26

TITLE

PRINT

DIGITAL

TOTAL

CHATELAINE CANADIAN LIVING MACLEAN’S STYLE AT HOME HOUSE & HOME CANADIAN GARDENING FLARE HOCKEY NEWS CAN. BUSINESS

453,471 384,801 309,736 174,655 165,629 99,497 97,119 86,083 71,318

0 0 709 0 2,295 0 0 286 168

453,471 384,801 310,445 174,655 167,924 99,497 97,119 86,369 71,486

MAGAZINE WORLD 2012

THE NEWS

FIGHT NEWSPAPERS vs. MAGAZINES vs. ONLINE Print mediums are struggling to stay relevant in a news game now run by the online world. As newspapers move toward in-depth reporting, magazine writers are asked to do more and do it better than before.

BY SARAH RIX

HUMBERJOURNALISM.COM/MAGAZINEWORLD2012

27

yebrows were raised when, in a July 2010 interview with the Daily Mirror, the musician Prince declared the Internet “completely over.”

The irony of the way this quote spread like wildfire through the online world was not lost on hoards of hungry technophiles, flocking to the World Wide Web’s vast resources. Over and dead? It’s hard to fathom. The same applies to the print medium. Although it has faced changes and challenges in the wake of an ever-increasing online readership, it still remains relevant.

In an attempt to keep readers buying and interested, it’s become a race against the clock in a 24-hour news cycle for magazines and newspapers.

Both have had to adapt to the popularity of social networking sites such as Twitter. Both have also had to adjust to the massive amount of information available on the Internet.

This competitive process has pressured writers to create an elevated standard of writing that balances timeliness and investigative reporting.

With news constantly breaking and websites frequently updated, there is an ongoing battle for magazines and newspapers to stay relevant. The result has been a blurring of the lines between print mediums. Slowly but surely, magazines and newspapers are acknowledging their similarities.

“The phrase that’s often used in newspapers is the ‘holy s*** story,’” said Nicholas Köhler, a senior writer at Canada’s weekly current affairs magazine Maclean’s and former reporter for the National Post. “And many papers will keep those for the Saturday or Sunday paper, if they have one.

As a weekly magazine, we’re kind of that Sunday paper. That’s how we see ourselves, I think.”

John Macfarlane, current editor and co-publisher of The Walrus, and former editor of Toronto Life (1992-2007), expects both mediums to keep their audiences captivated.

“Radio didn’t kill television, television didn’t kill movies and the Internet isn’t going to kill newspapers or magazines,” Macfarlane said. “There’s no doubt that magazines are going to be affected by the Internet in the same way that all heritage media are always affected by new media.”

Sylvia Stead has worked as a reporter and editor at The Globe and Mail since 1975 and is now the paper’s public editor. The position is a relatively new one for the national newspaper, introduced in late January 2012. According to a Jan. 22 article on the Globe and Mail’s website, Stead’s position was created “in an effort to make the organization more transparent and accountable to its readers and the general public.”

As part of the Internet’s impact, Stead said publications have had to make significant strides to update their mandates and appease reader demands. Changes include newspapers increasingly having to dig deeper to tell more of their stories.

“What our readers expect from us is that we will give them more depth, more context, more analysis and we will explain things to them,” said Stead, citing expectations of explanatory, in-depth pieces with coloured backgrounds and newsmaker profiles. “What the readers expect is something different from The Globe and Mail, because there are basic news stories everywhere.”

Magazines have had to adapt to this rivalry, adjusting to elevated expectations of comprehensive coverage. With an eye on readership and influence, the success of the magazine world depends on its ability to embrace the situation, differentiate from competitors and even embrace the online medium.

“A lot of stuff is going to happen on Twitter… [But] the demands of those two different kinds of writing – in-depth on the one hand and minute-by-minute on the other – are just so different,” said Köhler, who has been at Maclean’s since October 2005.

28

PHOTO BY SARAH RIX

E

Digging deeper for dirt is now standard procedure in print mediums.

“Twitter is the biggest source of breaking news, but the reason is because there’s a lot of media properties on Twitter who are using it very smartly,” said Karen Wickre, editorial director at Twitter and former senior media liaison at Google. “It’s the media taking advantage of its real time nature.”

And the growth and power of Twitter is in its numbers.

In September 2011, the site announced it had 100 million active users, listing world leaders, entertainers and journalists among them. Started March 21, 2006, it took the website three years, two months and one day to reach one billion tweets. According to Twitter statistics from 2011, it now takes one week to achieve that same amount, with users averaging 140 million tweets per day.

As Twitter CEO Dick Costolo said at the 2012 All Things D conference in California, its role is to distribute the content, not create it. Users create the posts and highlight what’s important to them, providing in-demand news aligned to personal interests. This circulation, on a massive scale, has impacted the distribution of information across the population.

But it’s not only “ordinary citizens” that compete for page views and followers. Magazines and newspapers have also sought out an online audience, though they have had to be careful with the distribution of information. Recently, media outlets like the BBC, Sky News, and The Globe and Mail have changed or are in the process of looking to blogs and Twitter for their journalists. Magazine outlets have also been turning to digital

MAGAZINE WORLD 2012

THE INDUSTRY content.

“The smart magazines do a couple things. They are promoting their own content in timely ways, but they’re also participating in the daily ebb and flow of what’s happening in the world,” Wickre said. “[They] say, ‘Based on the news right now, you might want to read this story we wrote last year about this very subject.’”

But despite The Walrus’ extension to non-traditional forms of magazine publishing, such as Walrus TV, Macfarlane expressed hesitation at Twitter’s importance for the publication. He sees it as a tool for promoting content, not creating it.

The competition is greater because news is everywhere right now - Sylvia Stead

“It helps to the extent that people use their Twitter accounts to tell other people about stories in The Walrus. I think Twitter is kind of irrelevant in what we actually do in the magazine because you can’t say in that few words anything terribly meaningful,” he said.

Even so, he acknowledged the importance of additional content for the magazine’s Internet audience.

“To be a vital online presence, you can’t simply be regurgitating what you do in print. We try to do as much as we can afford to do with our limited resources to supplement [magazine content],” Macfarlane said. “The magazine is an important part of what we do, but it’s not all of what we do.

At the moment, it’s the foundation for almost everything else, but it’s by no means any longer the totality.”

Köhler is also hesitant to commit to the value of Twitter, beyond its ability to raise awareness and its real-time role.

“I think we’re doing a better job of promoting stories as they come up,” he said. “But in terms of a reporter, on the ground, I’m not sure that a magazine is well served by having its writers tweeting. Unless it’s an unfolding event… It doesn’t stand for many of the writers who may be engaged in doing features.”

But turning to features, whether a magazine is published monthly, weekly or even daily, by the time it hits the newsstand, it’s old information.

Maclean’s has pitch meetings every Wednesday, with magazine production wrapping up the following Tuesday.

“Some stories will survive a couple of weeks, obviously. Then there are other kinds of stories that are so of the moment that they will evaporate, almost immediately,” Köhler said.

“It’s pretty tough,” for a magazine to break news, Macfarlane said. The Walrus has story conferences once a week to develop both writer and editor-submitted ideas. He said they try to schedule conferences at least six months in advance – indicative of magazines’ longer timelines.

“It’s getting harder for newspapers to break news too. It begs the question, ‘Can you only be relevant in people’s lives if you’re the first to tell them something?’” Macfarlane said.

It’s no secret that magazine producers have been fighting an uphill

battle for content and consumer dollars. Yet people are struggling to have them made and in this effort, the audience has received an unexpected benefit: articles are better and the people writing them are conscious of new approaches.

“The competition is greater because news is everywhere right now, so to grab the reader’s attention you have to be sharper,” said Stead, who believes writing standards have increased for print journalists. “Credibility with our readers is what we have, and it’s the most important thing that we have.”

In the survival of the fittest, as long as print mediums are able to adapt to and separate from the online world, it is the reader who will reap the benefits.

“I think the best stories are the kind you’re able to revisit, even six months later,” Köhler said. “There’s something still compelling about them, that will remind people why they were interested in the first place and why there’s even more that should intrigue them.”

g S C lic flockin I b u p T l a r S e I #STAT ians, celebrities antdrothleeingethn e crea1ti1onshaonwds the

20 rtan litic akers, paos played an impoased by Twitter in ch. m s w e n 6 h rele 200 laun Wit eh it n ly s o u ti e J a s th it m r r, e to Twittetion of news. Infos and power sinc distribu etwork’s progres social n ORK NETW. L A I C S..

THE SO UMBER N AVERAGE NUMBER OF TWEETS E H T BY SENT PER DAY IN FEBRUARY 2011:

THE TIME IT TOOK FROM FIRST TWEET TO BILLIONTH:

3YEARS,2MONTHS & 1 DAY

140 MILLION ACTIVE USERS:

100 MILLION+

THE TIME IT TAKES NOW FOR USERS TO SEND A BILLION TWEETS:

1 WEEK #

HUMBERJOURNALISM.COM/MAGAZINEWORLD2012

NUMBER OF TWEETS AFTER STEVE JOBS’ DEATH (OCT. 6, 2011)

@

6,049

29

THE INDUSTRY

New Faces, Old Medium How one group launched a new magazine in an uncertain marketplace.

BY ANDREW MILLICHAMP

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and pivot our minds!” Pivotr is based around ideas, the urge to share information, to look from a different angle and the need to broaden horizons.

While the magazine’s editors hope to inspire in others the same entrepreneurial spirit it took for them to launch, its content won’t be limited to information about startup companies. Anything and everything could see the light of day in the pages of Pivotr.

“If there’s something very interesting going on in physics and we want to write about it or one of our contributors wants to write about it, it’ll be in there,” Grabowski said. He described it as an “amalgamation of several different topics.”

Despite the magazine’s angle towards business and technology, the three founders don’t want to rehash every sort of new tech craze, hoping instead a mix of topics will enrich the magazine.

The first issue featured an article about Internet cookies and online advertising, as well as a look at mobile advertising. It also explored the development of humanity throughout time, and gave a 200-mile smoothie recipe, for the active individual, as part of a larger article on cooking and eating habits for those on the go. It included an interview with Zak Homuth, CEO of Upverter, an online hardware tools website designed to share electronic schematics.

Bruski said “Pivotr is a lot about making a change” to the way ideas are expressed. Through Pivotr, Bruski hopes to bring about more “innovation, ingenuity and creativity in the business world.” He also said he feels a lack of creativity is damaging to the business world. “Everyone is coming out with Internet apps or web apps and it’s just a clone of Facebook or a clone of Groupon.”

Pivotr, like almost all magazines, launched its first issue entirely out

COURTESY OF ROBERT BRUSKI

n the late 1990s, more than 100 new magazines launched every year in Canada – a number that’s declined to a low of 13 in 2010. With an average of 30 magazines or more closing their doors every year over the past decade, has the magazine industry suffered a grim death or is there more than meets the eye? Just what does it take to not just brave the waters, but thrive in an industry that can, at best, be described as turbulent?

In November 2011, a new magazine called Pivotr, began in the Kitchener/Waterloo area, based around the entrepreneurial spirit of its founders, Robert Bruski, Michael Grabowski and Patryk Laskowski. Focusing on the world of technology, this magazine was more interested in sharing ideas with startup businesses than turning a profit. But why have these three chosen the magazine industry? The answer provides an excellent case study demonstrating the challenges of magazine publishers everywhere.

To start a magazine, Doug Bennet, publisher for Masthead Online (formerly Masthead Magazine) said “Firstly you have to have a good idea. The editorial idea has to be something that is going to fulfill a need of some sort. There has to be demand for it.” Assuming Pivotr will follow traditional magazine business models, it will need a strong advertising base.

“A lot of magazine ideas are great editorial ideas but there’s no advertisers for it, and therefore they fail,” Bennet said. Thirdly, a magazine must have distribution; a way of getting the material to the audience that wants it.

Currently Pivotr is distributed in the Kitchener/Waterloo area as well as in certain parts of Toronto. Finally, Bennet said an initial investment is key “to get the magazine up and going” and also to survive until you are cash flow positive.

The first issue of Pivotr, launched in November 2011, ended its letter from the editor with the simple quote: “Let’s prepare to change our lives

Current editors/publishers of Pivotr magazine. From left to right: Patryk Laskowski, Matt Dragan, Robert Bruski and Michael Grabowski.

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COURTESY OF PIVOTR MAGAZINE

of pocket. The first run consisted of 2,000 copies and cost an estimated $1.50 per magazine. With a readership of “roughly 1.5 to 2.25 reads per copy” the $3,000 investment was viewed as a way to test the waters. With advertising as the backbone of most successful magazines, Pivotr hoped to include selective advertising that helped its unique audience.

“Our advertising is, for lack of a better word, by invite,” said Bruski.

“We really want to make sure that the advertisers we put in there add value to the reader and we can add value to those advertisers as well.”

Grabowski wants to make sure the advertisements were “services that the readers can actually utilize. We don’t want advertizing for something we don’t think our demographic will hit. We don’t want advertising for the sake of advertising.” Grabowski acknowledged the risk in turning down advertisers but said Pivotr’s owners would pay more to keep the magazine focused.

Bennet said advertising is a large source of revenue for most magazines. No advertising dollars can quickly equal no magazine. “There has to be some sort of advertising revenue base for most commercial magazines to survive,” he said. “The traditional model is advertising supported and if you don’t have that then you’re not going to have a magazine no matter how brilliantly written or designed it may be.”

Bennet said one of the hardest aspects of launching a magazine is gaining advertising. “It’s very difficult to come by advertising early and it’s probably harder than it’s ever been in some respects because there is just so much competition now for the advertiser’s dollar.”

Bennet said a lot of advertising is free right now on social media so “you have to have a pretty compelling argument to get people to part with their dollars.”

A further hindrance to new magazines is that many advertisers want to see a successful track record; something that takes awhile to establish. Any advertisers who want to see a magazine audited by the circulation auditing bureau would have to wait over a year for the cycle to be complete before giving the magazine a single cent. “It can take awhile to get your magazine up and established without the kind of advertising support at the beginning that you’re hoping (for).” Due to its limited distribution area, Pivotr has been able to tap into local businesses in a way that larger magazines would be unable to, starting the road to what its founders hope is consistent advertising.

Priya Ramanujam, co-founder and editor-in-chief of Urbanology, a hip-hop and urban culture magazine, said advertising is a challenge for any new publication.

“Before you start a magazine it’s important to know if there’s a market of potential advertisers that actually spend money on advertising and are looking for outlets to advertise.” Ramanujam said it was hard to get new advertising during the early days of Urbanology.

“Our market wasn’t exactly a thriving market to begin with. A lot of the businesses in that market don’t have huge budgets for advertising.”

Ramanujam said it took Urbanology “five or six years” to become profitable. “The printing costs a lot of money no matter what quality of magazine you’re trying to put out there. If you’re trying to put out a higher quality product the cost obviously goes up.”

While it took Urbanology five to six years to become profitable, Bennet said this is common, and notes Sports Illustrated famously took 11 years to turn a profit. In the age of quarterly results, investors are also less willing to wait for a magazine to become profitable.

“People want to see profits or at least cash flow positive within two or three years,” he said. If a magazine takes a long time to make money its investors flee.

Pivotr’s first magazine cover, published in January 2012.

One thing working in Pivotr’s favour is that it’s a niche magazine. Ramanujam said “niche magazines have an easier time in that they can reach their readers very easily.” She said that knowing exactly who your readership is helps a great deal.

“We know what events to go to, what events to sponsor, where to have our presence and where to connect with them.” This is an area where Pivotr should do well, with an intimate knowledge of its target audience.

Grabowski said he doesn’t view Pivotr as a career. “We don’t view it as being an income source. We can do this whenever, no matter how much time it takes. I don’t see it becoming a tremendous income source – that’s not the point.”

Bruski echoed his sentiments. “We’re really doing this to make a change in the industry, not to become billionaires releasing a magazine,” he said.

With countless magazines in the market today, all feuding over advertising dollars, Bennet said you need a very compelling story and a very compelling audience to generate ad revenue. Something that Bennet said has led to the creation of fewer new publications in recent years.

“People are excited about launching websites and apps and things like that whereas before they might have been excited about launching a magazine,” he said.

With the first issue of Pivotr launched, some advertising secured and more content on the way, Bruski, Grabowski and Laskowski hope to create a positive atmosphere around the magazine that entertains, encourages and grows.

While more than 300 magazines have failed in Canada in the last 10 years, more than double that number have launched, proving the magazine industry is far from dead.

MAGAZINE WORLD 2012

PHOTO BY HELEN SURGENOR

THE ALTERNATIVE

Alberta Veiws and The Walrus host public talks to attract readers.

In a Community Near You...

The Walrus and Alberta Views share experiences about organizing public events.

BY HELEN SURGENOR

W

hen a swanky soiree or chat over nachos and beer hits the right note for readers, the sense of community can be a potent way to help magazines compete with other favourite media. Whether a publication is looking to raise funds, friends or profile, hosting an event is a way for magazines to play a more meaningful role in the lives of its audience.

“For (us) to come to their city and for them to get to meet all these people, I think it’s really special. It really adds life to the magazine,” said Peter Worden, former department editor for Alberta Views, who helped organize the magazine’s monthly “Brews & Views” event.

Brews & Views is the magazine’s way of reaching out across the province, one intimate gathering at a time. It gives long-time subscribers and potential new readers the chance to meet and discuss topics affecting Albertans. The team at The Walrus also aims to foster conversation, but on a comparatively grandiose scale.

“Our model is not a model that you will see elsewhere in Canadian magazines,” said David Leonard, manager of events and special projects

for The Walrus Foundation. “Almost every event that we do, because we’re a charitable foundation that runs a magazine, has the end goal to actually make us money. And that budget allows the magazine to exist.”

The walls of Leonard’s Toronto office are piled high with the remains of the foundation’s charity gala from two weeks prior: back issues, Walrus tote bags, piles of schedules, liquor waiting to be returned to the store.

He admits that as a one-man events department, his room is the first to be turned into a storage closet. Pushing the piles aside, Leonard shares a three-page listing of all events planned for 2012 some open to the public, some reserved for Canada’s one per cent.

In addition to public talks and festivals, the list’s more exclusive events include leadership dinners offered to the upper echelons of Toronto’s financial district at $1000 a plate, and a house party where guests who can afford the $300 cover charge get to play literary bingo with Margaret Atwood.

Each of these events is carefully designed to offer thoughtful content

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and stimulate valuable Canadian discussions, but the end goal is to raise funds and entice donors to the foundation.

Leonard said events like this allow The Walrus to make those same important discussions available in more affordable mediums: online, in the magazine and on Walrus TV. “There are lots of ways for people to connect with us. We also make sure there are lots of ways for people who have more money to spend to connect with us too,” Leonard said.

There’s another advantage for The Walrus to have a room full of major players. Even though closed events are kept private and strictly off the record, they sometimes generate ideas and bring forward new viewpoints to be further analyzed in print. Leonard said he sees potential for this to happen with a string of talks being hosted across the country in conjunction with the Royal Bank of Canada.

The RBC Conversation Series on Children’s Mental Health seeks to engage Canadian stakeholders in the field of mental health. Four of the eight planned talks have already been held and Leonard said the insight shared at those events may inform an in-depth piece in the magazine.

“That’s a great example of how the magazine has had bits about kids’ mental health, but we haven’t had the landmark piece on children’s mental health,” he said. “Yet on the events side, we’re putting together this incredible body of work with lots of really engaged people talking about this important issue.”

For Alberta Views, events are a platform for readers to come into a conversation that started with a piece in their magazine. The Brews & Views concept was developed when a particularly controversial article about campaign financing by city developers, written by soon-to-be Calgary mayor Naheed Nenshi, ran in its April 2010 issue. In his article, Nenshi estimated that about 90 per cent of campaign financing in Calgary municipal elections came from developers and the construction industry, raising concerns about undue influence on city council.

“He wrote this article in a sort of scathing way, and we wanted to give it a little more airtime, bring it to life. And Brews and Views event in Canmore, Alta. so we had him come out as the author who wrote this piece, Worden said as moderator, a shift in conversation like that isn’t someand we had a developer on the panel,” said Worden, describing the first talk held in a friend’s bar in Calgary. “It was just supposed to be a thing that needs to be brought under control, as long as people seem to be enjoying themselves. “You’ve just got a patio full of people drinking, and discussion where you get all sides of things,” he said.

However, Worden said the talk turned out to be quite revealing when the conversation is what it is sometimes.”

Magazine-hosted events attract new readers, something Leonard called the developer admitted that most major development players made contributions to any candidate with a chance of winning, because it was the ‘friend’raising. “I think events are sort of like a blunt tool of marketing. It’s only way to get face time with city council. “The room just had this ‘whoa’ just one tool you’ve got in the tool belt.

“When we’re in a city we don’t just do an event, we do publicity and moment,” he said.

Since then, Brews & Views has run regularly in cities and towns all over advertising. We sort of go in and make sure we’re not just dropping in Alberta. A panel of writers and experts is brought in and a magazine staff and dropping out again,” he said. When organizers at The Walrus host a member moderates a debate relevant to the latest issue and the concerns public event in a city. It tries to connect the topic to something discussed in the magazine. This usually results in an increase in newsstand sales and of the community.

Although Worden said a heated conversation can occasionally veer off subscribers.

“For us, it’s a way to get the brand in front of more eyes, and then those track: “In Crow’s Nest Pass we fogged the windows up good with people’s people – who knows – they might become sponsors, they might become complaints.”

The intended discussion was future plans for The Pass, but the arrival subscribers, they might tell a friend,” Leonard said.

Worden and his publication are less focused on brand, concentrating of a guest from nearby Fernie, B.C. resulted in a lengthy argument about B.C.’s new HST and the economic rivalry it caused between the two towns. instead on strengthening the sense of community with current subscrib-

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COURTESY OF DOUG HORNER

on our website, they link to us on theirs.”

The Walrus also turns to external sponsorship as a way to recover the cost of hosting an event. Sharing an event title with a sponsor can be a tricky balancing act, but Leonard is aware of how that relationship may influence an event. He said The Walrus is so fiercely against falling under the sway of advertisers, it’s easy to maintain the integrity of event content and keep it separate from sponsorship.

He pointed to a recent arts festival talk hosted with Enbridge and the Calgary High Performance Rodeo. “The Rodeo is very good at staging theatrical events. We’re very good at editorial content. And Enbridge is very good at, other than drilling for natural gas, paying for stuff.”

“I mean, they have a commitment to fostering arts and conversation in Canada. We have that same commitment, so does the Rodeo. So, that’s easy, we’re all on the same page,” he said.

For Brews & Views events, sponsorship happens in the form of favours and is less about corporate advertising.

Usually hosted at a restaurant or bar, the events are open to everyone at no charge and those who wish to sign up for a subscription get a free beer.

“At a couple (events) we used AlleyKat (beer) from Edmonton and their brew master Neil, is really good. He likes what we’re doing, so occasionally he’ll say the beer’s on us – that’s happened a couple times,” said Worden. “If we host in a restaurant, sometimes they’ll let us do it for free because they want us there, but that’s the limit.”

Worden said Alberta Views has tried hosting more glamorous debates, once hosting a Brews & Views at the Art Gallery of Alberta. He said that even though there was a large turnout, it wasn’t received as well.

“The AGA had this big theatre so that was a problem because you had people who were on stage and up on a pedestal, and the room doesn’t feel good,” he said. “The other thing is you couldn’t drink in the theatre. So, ‘Brews’ and Views is essential.”

It was a valuable lesson in understanding its readership.

Finding partners to help finance a flashy event was an unnecessary hurdle, because smaller gatherings worked better in building the Alberta Views community.

When all of the planning, sponsorship and advertising comes together with perfect timing, what does the event look like? For David Leonard, it was a debate on the aesthetics of Toronto, hosted in the Art Gallery of Ontario. The debate was timed to coincide with the release of the November 2011 issue of The Walrus, which had a cover story about city planning.

“What I loved about it is the issue came out on the Monday ... and then our debate was on the Wednesday,” he said. “So there was all this media fussing about the debate. That ended up driving people back to the content of the magazine, which was completely germane to all the media we got.”

Leonard said the success of the event carried on long after the night ended, thanks to an outpouring of response on social networking sites. “All the Twitter love, all the Facebook love, all the media that was there – you know, the #TOdebate hashtag was going for two weeks after the debate just because people got so excited about the conversation that happened in the room ... all of that drove back to the fact that The Walrus was creating this conversation about Toronto.”

ers, and bringing in readers who feel participation is part of the experience.

“The future community of readers, who come to these things not really knowing what it is and then decide to become part of the community, I think they already have a relationship with the magazine and they feel sort of close to it,” he said. “We’re probably more likely to hear from these people in letters, and we’re probably more likely to interact with them.

That’s an important thing.”

Enticing new subscribers often means bringing an event to a location away from the home base, as Alberta Views does when Brews & Views travels throughout the province. But for a national magazine, the process becomes more expensive and requires some strategy.

Leonard said the main challenge for The Walrus is finding the resources to hold regular events in every region of Canada. “We have writers across the country,” he said. “When I have a writer writing a story on Halifax, that author’s doing Halifax media with me. So we have a presence in some way.”

His magazine also partners with literary festivals across the country to attract readers in a mutually beneficial way. “They get magazines, we do outreach, we give special offers to their audience, we promote their festival

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PHOTO BY HEATHER VANANDEL The Journal of Prisoners on Prisons presents a view of incarceration not found in other magazines.

Writing Between the Bars Supporting freedom of ideas in a world of confinement, a Canadian magazine is studied in universities, read by academics and written by prisoners.

BY CLAIRE MCCORMACK

T

he Journal of Prisoners on Prisons is a non-profit journal written by people who are, or have been, in prison. In an effort to shed light on what incarceration really means to those shut away from the rest of the world, the journal presents arguments from the alternative but important perspective of people behind bars.

Founder and editor-in-chief for 24 years, Robert Gaucher said, “The thing that really came away for me was that there are people in prison that actually were able to make more sense of the prison system than virtually all the criminologists I’ve worked with.

“My concern was to actually monitor what was going on in Canadian penitentiaries, Canadian prisons. Who better to tell you what’s happening than prisoners?” said Gaucher.

The Journal of Prisoners on Prisons is published twice a year by the University of Ottawa Press and has been in regular print since 1988.

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Used in criminology courses and cited in other articles, the idea behind the magazine is to give a voice to the people inside prisons so that they can describe the issues that are important to them with eyes from the inside.

This journal gives prisoners an opportunity to analyze their situation from a place of experience.

“There have been over 250 penal press publications in Canada and the U.S.,” said Melissa Munn a criminologist and board member for the JPP, who runs the online archive of the penal press. In the1950s, Canadian prisoners began producing their own publications. In Drumheller, Alta. there was The Drum. Outside Vancouver in the 1970s, prisoners of the Matsqui Institution produced Tarpaper. Most of those papers that came out of Canadian prisons no longer exist.

In the United States, there are many prison papers and magazines still in production. In Canada, there are only a few. According to Munn, there

MAGAZINE WORLD 2012

THE ALTERNATIVE are less than a handful of prison newspapers left in the country. She said in Canada, as far as prisoner-written magazines go, the JPP is “really the only one.” The reason for this, Munn said, is nowadays “There’s more of a focus on providing punishment and getting prisoners to be more individually focused.

“Internationally, we see that the penal press has declined over the past 15 years or so. There was really a lot more through the ‘70s and ‘80s,” she said. Back then, prison life had more of a group focus and urged prisoners to work together to produce publications. “The penal press was seen by the state as something positive. It was a good way for prisoners to communicate with each other to enhance their rehabilitation and to build their literacy skills,” Munn said.

The justice system in Canada has changed over the years. The newer style of prison community doesn´t leave as much room for producing a publication, which Munn said is the reason for the drop in prison publications. The angle the JPP takes is valuable, Munn said. “It provides a counter-narrative to the dominant one. Those counter-narratives are really important if we want to get a big picture of how the correctional system is operating.”

The difference between the JPP and the traditional penal press is that the JPP is academically focused, while most penal press publications are not, Munn said. Other publications have a variety of writing styles.

“They may have had academic articles but they also had cartoons, crosswords, personal reflections and poetry.” The JPP articles are meant to present a coherent, analytical piece of writing that will stand up to other academic articles and magazines.

In the mid 1980s, JPP founder Robert Gaucher noticed a significant difference between how prison officials described correctional situations and how prisoners described them.

“There were essentially no prisoners involved in the discussion at all and I remember saying at the time, that it would be like a women’s liberation movement without women.”

“We did a panel [in1988] where we presented prisoner’s writings, of prisoners who couldn’t be there,” Gaucher said. “It really went over well, and we got a lot of support for it.”

After that, he decided to start up the journal.

Gaucher stressed the value of first-hand knowledge of prison life, saying that many academics, try as they might, cannot fully understand incarceration as a whole because they don’t have the first-hand experience.

Co-managing editor of the JPP, Justin Piché,

There are lots of people who do research on prisoners, but not with prisoners - Justin Piche

agrees with Gaucher. “There are lots of people who do research on prisoners, but not with prisoners. They go in there and hand out their surveys. They do interviews with prisoners and then take their voices and use them for whatever narrative that they want to tell. The JPP is about providing a forum for prisoners so that they can tell their own stories,” Piché said.

Piché is an assistant professor of sociology at Memorial University in St. John’s, Newfoundland. He described how the journal gets in contact with prisoners and how they initially receive articles.

“We have some of our subscribers who are prisoners. We send in free samples when they’re requested from prisoners. A lot of prison libraries subscribe. Most people on our board are involved with some kind of initiative that involves contact with prisoners,” he said. The process, Piché said, goes like this: “The first initial triage is about trying to see whether or not the articles respect our submission guidelines. The articles aren’t to focus on personal cases unless those personal cases illuminate a broader issue surrounding the sociopolitics of incarceration and the experience of imprisonment.”

After that, an accepted article gets peer edited. A rejected article is sent back to the writer with encouragement to re-write the piece. The article then goes from members of the board and editors to the writer and they work together to produce an academically legitimate piece of writing.

“The majority of the time, the authors do resubmit the pieces once they’re gone through the peer (academic) review stage,” Piché said, explaining the back and forth nature of the writing process.

“We’re there to work collaboratively with them, to be positive throughout the process and to give them as much feedback as we can.”

The level of education each prisoner has varies. Some earn degrees while in prison. “(For) most of the authors – we’re talking high school – typically, who just have a lot of time on their hands to practice the craft of writing,” Piché said. “Some of our authors have at least BAs or a HUMBERJOURNALISM.COM/MAGAZINEWORLD2012

master’s, the exceptional few have their PhDs.” Piché said the journal is international in scope.

“Over the years most of our writers have been from the United States, just by virtue of the amount of people that are incarcerated there. We do get submissions from time to time from Canadian prisoners. We just had a special issue on criminalized women last year and a lot of those contributions were from Canadian prisoners and ex-prisoners.”

Many subscribers are prisoners themselves.

“We do print runs for each issue of 500,” Piché said. Some of the issues go to subscribers, and some go to universities. “Typically, we do end up selling out the full 500 print run,” he added. “We’re not in every university and we’re not in every college, but we certainly welcome people to ask their librarian to ask for the journal.” The funding for the JPP depends upon university sales and subscriptions along with the contributions of editorial group members.

“The University of Ottawa Press helps us with mailing costs and the universities help us,” Piché said. “No one draws a salary from this; it’s basically a volunteer position. All the money we get from this goes back into the production of the journal itself, and sometimes we use our own money to cover other expenses,” he said.

Moving forward, Piché said the journal is looking to expand its readership. “We have our 25th anniversary in 2013 and as part of that we want to make our entire back issue catalogue available online,” Piché said. “We’re also going to continue publishing hard copies because (some) prisoners don’t have access to the Internet.”

The JPP is a small operation that has survived largely out of academic interest and the dedication of board members, editors and prisoners who want to be heard. Looking at the many years he’s spent with the journal, Gaucher said “What I’ve seen with these writers are people who are actively engaged in the world they live in, as narrow and confined as it is. I think that’s a really important aspect of staying alive and surviving in what can be a horrendous situation, especially over a long period of time,” he said.

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They are Legion How a small publisher in Kanata, Ont., plans on turning the story of our past into the magazine of the future.

BY ELTON HOBSON

M

ost of Dan Black’s office space is devoted to historical memorabilia.

He’s the editor of Legion, Canada’s largest historical magazine, and the walls of his office are filled with old photos, maps, and an assortment of past Legion covers and spreads. On the back wall, behind and to the left, is a simple plaque. It’s black marble with white text; only “THE GLENS” visible at a distance. It’s the kind of thing easily passed over, or mistaken for something Black’s child won at a little league tournament.

It honours the time Black changed history.

It started with a photograph, taken during the Second World War, of Canadian troops disembarking a landing craft during the assault on Juno Beach. Legion’s art director had located the photo at Library and Archives Canada, and the magazine planned to run it as accompaniment to a story.

According to the National Defence and the Canadian Forces website, the picture was originally “incorrectly identified as either the Highland Light Infantry of Canada or the North Nova Scotia Highlanders.” Legion ran it accordingly.

Then Black’s phone rang.

“It was one of our readers, and he was upset,” Black said. “Turns out history got it wrong.”

Seems this Legion reader was a member of the Stormont, Dundas, and Glengarry Highlanders unit association often abbreviated as the SD&Gs, or The Glens. The men wading ashore in that old photograph were from his unit, despite what the photo’s caption said. To the men of the SD&G’s, the small detail meant a lot. It was their brothers-in-arms going ashore in that iconic photograph. Black decided to see what he could do.

“I just did my job,” Black said. “I collected as much information as I possibly could, then forwarded that information to Library and Archives Canada.”

So began a process to revise the photo’s accreditation – a process that ended with the caption on the photograph being changed, and “The Glens” at long last getting their due as the men in that iconic shot.

“When the official record changed, the SD&G unit society decided to thank me,” Black recalls. “They surprised me at my office and offered to take me out to lunch. They gave me that (pointing to the plaque). It was a special moment.”

A misconception about historical magazines is that nothing new ever happens. History is alive, and so are many of the people who made and lived it. As editor of a magazine that aims to cover Canada’s history, Black hears from many of them. And history buffs, as you might imagine, can be sticklers.

“You wouldn’t believe how much even the smallest facts matter to some of our readers. We once got into trouble because one of our writers said a landing craft had landed at Juno beach a few feet from where someone else thought it had. It was unbelievable,” Black said.

Founded in 1926, Legion magazine was originally known as The Legionary and was the news outlet of the Royal Canadian Legion. That

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makes Legion the third longest continually published magazine in Canada, behind Chatelaine and The Beaver. The magazine separated from the Royal Canadian Legion in 1972, and is now owned by Canvet Publications – an independent, one-title publisher. There are exactly nine full-time employees, working out of the first floor of a Royal Canadian Legion building in Kanata, Ont. “Our mandate is to get as much history – the stories of the nation, the stories of our heroes, the story of us – to as many corners of this country as we can,” said Jennifer Morse, general manager of Legion.

At the top, Legion is a two-headed animal, with Black handling the editorial direction, and Morse handling the business and administration side. Her job is to keep circulation numbers up, raise the profile of the brand and guide a publication focused on events of the past into a rapidly changing future for the magazine industry.

Legion is a magazine devoted to history. It has a rich, almost century-long history of its own.

Over the coming pages we highlight notable Legion magazine covers through the ages, from the magazine’s first issue in 1926 to the modern day.

MAGAZINE WORLD 2012

A HISTORY OF

COVERS

THE ALTERNATIVE “With most publications, subscription price is less important than ad revenue,” Morse said. “The broader your circulation, the bigger your ad revenue, because generally in the magazine industry you charge on a per thousand basis (for advertisements). Legion magazine is primarily a subscription-based magazine, which gives us a different financial model from the norm.”

That bigger subscriber base is largely due to the magazine’s readership among members of the Royal Canadian Legion. Although no longer directly owned by the Legion, the two are still closely affiliated, and Legion members can opt to include magazine subscriptions in their yearly fees.

Still other parts of the history magazine stereotype ring a little truer.

“Fifty per cent of our readers come from communities of 50,000 or less.

We’re a very rural readership,” Morse said. “Our readership is also a mature readership. We’ve found that once you hit 45, concern with history and heritage goes way up, along with things like genealogy.”

Legion magazine strives to cover both past and current affairs. “We want to be a magazine of record for Canadian servicemen and veterans, and for developments within the Royal Canadian Legion,” said Tom MacGregor, news editor at Legion.

A former journalist for papers like The Huntsville Forester, The Edmonton Sun, Maclean’s Magazine and a former political speechwriter in Ottawa, MacGregor is charged with filling the pages of the magazine not concerned with historical discussion. The magazine’s news efforts fall into two beats: military affairs, and health and veterans’ affairs. These echo the magazine’s goal of writing about issues of concern to aging veterans. So

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how do they stay on top of veteran’s issues?

“I read. A lot,” said Sharon Adams, a full-time staff writer charged with covering the health and veterans’ affairs beat. Coming from a long career in daily newspapers, Adams is used to the exhaustive research involved in beat reporting.

“All the reports that come about from Veterans’ Affairs, (the) Canadian

We are out there covering news that no one else is reporting on - Sharon Adams

Forces, and the Legion. I go to as many of the Senate and House veterans affairs committee meetings as I can, and I read all the reports,” Adams explained. The result is a comprehensive and unique news offering.

“We’re out there covering news that no one else is reporting on. We’re writing about issues that affect millions of Canadians across the country,” Adams said. In being a dual history/veterans’ affairs magazine, there’s a chance Legion could stray into controversial territory with some of its stories. It’s only natural; wars are controversial and writing about them can stir up passion.

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19 3 9

The Legionary is first printed

Depression stories dominated the

This issue of Legionary features a photo of

as the “news organ of the

L e g i o n a r y o f t h e 19 3 0 s , i n c l u d i n g

King George VI and Queen Elizabeth atop

Canadian Legion of the British

this cover of a ragged farmer

their “Canadian Thrones” in the Senate

E m p i r e S e r v i c e L e a g u e .”

standing in a tilled field.

Chamber of Parliament

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39

“The truth is we apply the same standards of good journalism as any other magazine. We try to get both sides of the story, be as fair and accurate in our reporting as we can be; even if it involves something controversial to the Canadian Forces, the government, or the [Royal Canadian] Legion.”

Despite Legion’s close affiliation to the Royal Canadian Legion, Black said readers can be assured editorial decisions are not influenced by the association.

“I don’t recall the [Royal Canadian] Legion ever telling (us) what to write, or that we couldn’t write something. We have an arms-length, but very comfortable, relationship,” Black said. “We have no affiliation with the Canadian Forces or Department of Veterans’ Affairs. So we have the editorial freedom to explore the good and bad about how veterans are treated.

“We never want to glorify war,” Black said.

“Past or present. We want to remind people of the true cost.”

Which leads to another misconception about historical magazines: Working for one means being chained to your desk, reading Senate re-

19 5 0

40

ports or researching obscure historical facts.

Quite the contrary – Black is currently in the final stages of planning a trip to Haiti to cover efforts by the RCMP and various Canadian police agencies to aid the country’s reconstruction following the infamous earthquake of 2010.

“They asked me if I wanted to go on the official tour with the RCMP Commissioner, but I said no,” Black said. A hallmark of Legion’s reporting is getting “boots on the ground” in places where Canadian forces (or in this case, Canadian police personnel) are engaged, like Afghanistan or Haiti.

“The guy who’s picking me up from the airport joked that he’d be the guy driving the white 4x4, and carrying a silver Smith & Wesson. I’m thinking ‘OK, so am I going to see you waving your gun around at the airport like it’s a sign or something?’” Black said.

To aid in research, Legion calls upon its own in-house library of historical accounts, unit records and official reports. Black said not a day goes by where he doesn’t go to the library to clarify or correct a fact or two. Then there’s Legion’s massive photo collection, acquired from the Ar-

chives of Canada, purchased from various museums, or donated to the magazine by readers. It is primarily from these archives that the photos for each issue of Legion are selected, including the magazine’s often striking cover shots.

“When I look for a cover image, I look for four primary things: eye contact, is the shot iconic or well known? Does it send a strong message? And a singular subject,” said Jason Duprau, art director at Legion. With a background in advertising and graphic design, Duprau had little interest in military history before coming to work for the magazine Instead, it was the challenge that caught his attention.

“What attracted me to Legion Magazine was the chance to work on a product, and develop it into a popular magazine for everyone. It’s my passion,” Duprau said. “And it is a vision that is shared throughout the entire team, including Dan (Black) and Jennifer (Morse).”

Two years ago, Legion magazine was shipped to newsstands for the first time. (Previously, the magazine was purely subscription-based.) The challenge for Duprau is to craft a brand identity that can compete on the shelf next to the main-

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19 8 3

This post-war issue features a soldier

Now known as Legion

Cold War nuclear fears are

caring for an orphaned child, and urges

Magazine, the magazine

r e f l e c t e d i n t h i s c o v e r, f e a t u r i n g a

Legion members to donate to support the

became independently

mushroom cloud and the headline

children of fallen soldiers.

p u b l i s h e d i n t h e 19 7 0 s .

“THE SPECTRE OF ARMAGEDDON”.

MAGAZINE WORLD 2012

stream magazines. His process for determining Legion’s cover image is striking in both the way it mirrors – and differs – from the magazine industry norm.

“What we’re trying to do is get Legion even further into the public sphere,” Duprau said.

“And cover design is a part of that. I pick the overall color schemes depending on factors like what season the magazine is going to be sold during. For instance, summer issues would feature light colors, blues and whites – so we might have a nautical-themed issue. In the end, it depends heavily on the content of the magazine of course, so it’s always a collaborative process.”

Jennifer McGill, a graphic designer with the magazine said the art process works in cycles “From more relaxed to somewhat stressful, depending on how far we are along in the publishing process.”

“Luckily, we have a good system in place and we’ve gotten into a good routine, so it doesn’t pile up,” she said.

Part of moving Legion further into the publishing sphere is pegging historical-themed stories to modern day events. Great examples are

19 9 2

the many War of 1812 centennial anniversary celebrations happening across Canada in 2012.

“So for the War of 1812, rather than do one big issue on the whole war, we’ll peg the story to something happening today,” Tom MacGregor said. “So for instance this year is the anniversary of the Battle of Queenston Heights, so we’ll do something pegged to that. Next year is the anniversary of the Battle of Chateauguay, so we’ll do another feature pegged to that, and so on.”

Another way the people at Legion are trying to expand the magazine’s reach is through the use of special interest publications.

“I wanted something that felt like those old Life features,” Morse said. The end result was a special feature titled World War One which appeared on newsstands last year.

The work was a comprehensive review of Canada’s role during the war, featuring contributions from some of Canada’s top historians. It entailed an exhausting amount of work selecting photos, composing layouts, organizing content enough to fill a history text and finally, producing (and selling) an expensive new magazine format for Legion. Did the gamble pay off?

“The average sell-through rate for magazines on newsstands is 20 to 25 per cent,” Morse said.

“For [World War One], the average sell-through rate was 50 per cent. We did phenomenally well.

Better than we could have hoped.”

The magazine also won an award at the National Newsstand Awards. The success prompted the magazine to make another “special interest publication” – focused on World War Two this time – for sale this year. The plan is for Legion to release these features on a yearly basis, outside of their regular publication schedule.

So the history magazine business, at least as far as Legion is concerned, is vibrant, interesting, relevant, and most importantly – growing.

There are plenty of misconceptions about what it takes to make a history-themed publication not only interesting, but profitable as well. And in the end, the biggest misconception of all is that working for a historical magazine is boring.

“It can be lots of work, and some late days,” Black said. “But we have a great atmosphere here, and everyone enjoys what they do. I really do look forward to coming in to work every morning.”

2008

2 012

P o s t - C o l d W a r, t h i s c o v e r i m a g e

This cover focusing on Canadians in Afghanistan

This dynamic cover reflects

reflects the magazine’s shif t

reflects the magazine’s mandate of investigative

Legion’s modern-day goal of

toward a more broad,

reporting in places where Canadian forces are in

competing on newsstands next to

mainstream appeal.

combat

mainstream publications.

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41

A Parting Note W

BY ELTON HOBSON - COPY EDITOR also rock at Settlers of Catan, which may be the most important skill of all.

And of course, I would be remiss if I didn’t give a giant shout out to our art department. Sarah Rix, Heather VanAndel, Russell Piffer and Helen Surgenor put more of themselves into this magazine than I would have believed possible. No one put in longer hours, and no one pushed themselves harder and demanded more of themselves than these incredibly dedicated individuals. Their hard work and creative vision transformed our stories from simple words on a page into a magazine: vibrant, interesting, and engaging. We all owe you our thanks – now go take a nap!

The hard work didn’t stop there. Kaitie Frasier and Neetu Thind were in charge of our web content, meaning they often worked around other people’s schedules and on short notice. What might have been nothing more than a formality or a sideshow became an interesting, involved bit of Internet content thanks to their never taking no (or “no reply”) as an answer.

Before the words you read made it to this page, lots of folks helped craft them from simple stories to articles worthy of being published.

Our fact-checking team, led by Patricia “Trigger” Brotzel did a thankless job with style and panache. Our managing editor of words, Claire McCormack, reviewed all the stories you read along with our section editors, transforming them from thoughts and ideas on a page to polished, professional magazine articles.

And our copy editor, some chap named Elton Hobson, helped a bit too.

We hoped you enjoyed our guided tour of the magazine world, and remember – this is only the beginning of the story, not the end. Magazines are a fantastic, complicated medium where the future is by equal turns bright, tumultuous, exciting and scary as heck.

And where we go from here is anyone’s guess.

PHOTO BY ERIN EATON

ebster’s dictionary defines magazine as…on second thought, does it really matter what the dictionary definition is?

That’s not a slight to the fine folks at Webster’s. But if you’ve learned anything over the course of reading this issue of Magazine World, it’s that the definition of the word is wide, fluid, and ever-evolving. Any dictionary definition that tries to capture magazines today might not be worth the paper it’s printed on a few years from now – and that’s assuming we still print things on paper!

We each approached the magazine industry from our own direction, letting our curiosity be our compass and our pens (or tablet computers, as the case may be) chart our course. We each sought to shine a light into some small corner of the labyrinth, and what emerged in these stories is a picture of the magazine industry: as it once was, as it is today, and as it might be in the future.

Making Magazine World was truly a labour of love – but it was still a labour. The magazine you hold in your hands is the culmination of the hard work and dedication of many a starving, sleepless journalism student.

First, of course, is Lisa Gillan, our fearless leader. If I were a soldier fighting in the trenches, I would take strange comfort in the fact that the general is as stressed, mud-caked, and tired as the men she leads.

So it was always comforting to see Lisa stressing out just a little more than everyone else come crunch time. (And every other time!) Her vision guided the magazine from the beginning, her hard work kept us on track as the work piled up, and her extreme dedication (and resulting stress!) reminded us all to stop complaining and get back to work!

No one could have made this magazine alone – except maybe Kat Ward, our executive editor. I’ve never encountered a head screwed on more tightly than Kat’s, nor someone so able to tackle massive amounts of work in a short time-frame. She was often the calm centre of our chaotic storm, and the encouraging voice in moments of doubt. You

The Magazine World 2012 team.

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MAGAZINE WORLD 2012

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