Congratulations to DesignEdge

Congratulations to North Island Publishing Ltd., publishers of Masthead, for its successful launch of Designedgecanada.com and Design Edge Canada print magazine. It was created to serve the Canadian graphic design industry with news, a national job board, events calendar, contests, links and resources. Its companion e-mail bulletin is published every two weeks and alerts readers to what’s new on

You can cover Warrior

Warrior, the feisty, colourful and almost indefinable Montreal-based magazine, is holding a cover design contest, deadline June 1. Details here. The magazine, which was largely controlled, has also switched to paid.

Transcon goes heavier into shelter

Transcontinental Media is launching two special-interest publications (not to be confused with the maga-directories it is to produce in cooperation with the Yellow Pages): Western Living Condo, a 25,000 circ controlled spinoff from Western Living and an extra issue of Canadian Home Workshop called "Renovations". A more complete report is available at mastheadonline (sub requ'd).

There's more where that came from...

Here's an interesting promotional device from Britain, one we're not aware is being widely used in Canadian or other North American magazine launches: the "taster edition". It seems to be a cross between a sample issue and a free-standing insert. In this case, as reported in the Guardian, News International, Rupert Murdoch's behemoth publishing company (among other titles, the London Sunday Times

Go west, young imam

Domestic competitors should watch their backs: Islamic Tourism Magazine has written its first feature on Canada, about Alberta: The magazine publishes its first article on North America. The assistant editor, Karen Dabrowska visited rural Canada: Pincher Creek and Crowsnest Pass in Alberta. It is an area of small towns which encompass a handful of once-bustling coal-mining communities, including

Sheppard opines on CBC web

Rob Sheppard, a former senior editor at Maclean's magazine, has popped up columnizing on CBC.ca. Here's his take on the very mild sauteeing* of Harper's Supreme Court nominee (*it could hardly be called a grilling, now, could it?)

Glacier wraps up Hollinger purchase

Glacier International Ventures Corporation has completed the acquisition of all of Hollinger, including its stable of trade publications. Here's a release from one the acquirees, with the details.

You like me, you really like me...

Awards programs can sometimes weave a tangled web. Organizations apparently can't afford to pay for their own prizes without help -- and naming rights -- from sponsors. Sometimes those sponsors are altruistic, or interested only in promoting themselves as good corporate citizens. Other times, it's harder to tell. In some cases, things can be pretty cozy between the watched and the watchers.Take

So You Want to Start a Magazine?

The next session of So You Want to Start a Magazine?, a two-day intensive seminar offered in Toronto by the Chang School of Continuing Education at Ryerson University, is scheduled for Friday, April 28 and Saturday, April 29. It focuses on the practicalities, templates and tools necessary to start a magazine successfully. To find out more, click on the heading or on the link at the right.[Fair

Transamerica Q&A

Senior Editor Jeff Goldsmith interviews writer/director Duncan Tucker about Transamerica

Not Currently Available

Weekly Scoop publisher out?

Word is that Kathryn Swann, the ex-Money Sense publisher who went to Torstar to launch its celebrity mag Weekly Scoop has left the magazine, barely 4 months after its debut (see pic). Swann told the Globe and Mail today that she resigned, as a lifestyle choice, because of the hectic pace of the launch and its aftermath.Word on the street, however, is that, in the face of competition from the

Top 10 plus top 10

The top 10 sub and newsstand gainers among Canadian titles has been extracted from the Audit Bureau of Circulation's Fas-Fax report for the second half of 2005, and published on the Mastheadonline site (sub'n required).

Ravary profiled

The Globe and Mail today carries a profile by Val Ross of Lise Ravary of Rogers Media. It tells us little new, but it's nice to see a senior person in the business featured.

Freelance union holds information meeting

The Canadian Freelance Union will be holding an open information session and public discussion in Toronto on March 2 at 7:30 p.m. in the Northern District Library (near Yonge and Eglinton). All independent contractors in the media, communications and public relations industries are invited. This includes freelance journalists, writers, columnists, photographers, illustrators, web writers, etc.

That's so yesterday

The allure of the "new" seems to be affecting executives in the U.S. who choose how to allocate marketing dollars and the news is not good for traditional media like magazines. If a study of the attitudes of these senior executives is correct, reported in Media Daily News, they are going to divert something close to 10% of their spending towards new media and alternative marketing strategies that

Osprey pays, but it's getting harder

Osprey Media Income Fund continues to pay unitholders about 9 cents a unit according to its year-end financials just released. However, the newspaper and magazine chain, headed by Michael Sifton, appears to be struggling to keep up the payments.According to the data released as of December 31, 2005, the company had net income for the year of $23.6 million and was carrying forward a deficit from

CMA Journal editors fired

Canada doesn't get noticed much by the New York Times, but oh boy did it catch their attention with the firing of the two top editors of the Canadian Medical Association Journal. On Monday, the CMA dismissed Dr. John Hoey, the editor and Anne Marie Todkill, its senior deputy editor.Graham Morris, the president of CMA Media, denied that the firings had anything to do with a dispute late last year

The 50th Outpost

Not that anyone thought it wasn't worthy of it, but at various points during Outpost magazine's early days, informed observers might have thought it would be a stretch for the magazine to last into its 10th year and to publish 50 issues.This is the milestone that the adventure travel magazine has reached with its just published issue and it is apparently going from strength to strength.The recent

Maclean's paid circ down; newsstand up

[NOTE: This post has been updated.]According to the Audit Bureau of Circulations Fas-Fax report issued yesterday, Maclean's magazine has a paid circulation as of the end of December 2005 of 369,486.In the second half of 2004, the comparable figure was 401,080 average paid; in the same period in 2003, 453,120.The year over year decline in subscriptions in the six months ended December 31, 2005 was

Online subscription agents: Naïveté or phraud?

Is your magazine being sold to the public without your authorization?It appears that some folks think they can hang out a shingle (URL) and start selling magazine subscriptions online.The snag? They may not realize that (in Canada, at least) they require authorization from the publishers in order to do so.Apparently some Canadian publishers recently discovered that their subscriptions were being

Sorry...sort of

Ezra Levant, the Publisher of the Western Standard magazine, sort of made an apology to Alberta Premier Ralph Klein's wife Colleen today in the Calgary Sun. The Standard had quoted an unnamed Klein friend saying something derogatory about Ms Klein. Levant apparently feels badly and has written to Ms Klein personally. But in his Sun article, he certainly didn't make the apology unreserved: The

People in glass houses do throw stones

Solid Waste and Recycling Magazine promises editorial comment in its February-March issue about the failures of the Ontario recycling program. It is giving a taste on its website where it publishes a summary report and an opportunity to download a letter from O-I Canada Corporation, a wholly owned subsidiary of glass and bottlemaker Owens-Illinois.And while the glass maker has a clear vested

What mayhem is that?

Interesting panel at the forthcoming Canadian Media Director's Council (CMDC) on Mining Growth: Discovering Potential in Media Mayhem taking place on Tuesday, March 28 in the John Bassett Theatre of the Metro Toronto Convention Centre. The full day, with several panels and individual addresses, is $495 ($425 if you register by Feb. 28th).A panel of media CEOs will be moderated by Michael Vaughan

Yellow Pages and Transcon in magazine venture

The term "hybrid magazine" is new to us, but it's the phrase being used to describe the joint venture between the Yellow Pages Group and Transcontinental Media in the projected launch in Toronto and Montreal of two, new, as-yet-unnamed, magazines -- one in the home improvement/homes/shelter category, one aimed at aging boomers and their families.The Yellow Pages Group is Canada's largest

Not necessarily charitable

For those magazines who thought that the recent decision to give charitable status to The Walrus Foundation (after a bruising, and expensive, two-year battle that went all the way to the Finance Minister's office) was going to loosen up the rules for other magazines, think again.The Canada Revenue Agency has just issued a "Policy commentary" on the matter. But the whole thing remains as clear as

High costs of getting satellite subscribers

According to a report in the Wall Street Journal, the acquisition cost of each of the subscribers to XM Satellite Radio was an astounding $US141 in the last quarter. It's likely to be similar at Sirius* as the two companies are locked into a ferocious battle to sign up users. This should make magazine circulation directors everywhere feel a bit better. On the other hand, that's less than a year's

If they had to choose...

Consumers in Britain were asked what medium they'd least like to do without and said: Regional Press 20%, National press 14%, Magazines 8%, Internet 4%. I have no idea what this means. It's part of a presentation and report by the World Association of Newspapers, so perhaps it should be taken with a grain of salt. The full text of the presentation is available for reading, printing or

Return on Google-ness

In addition to getting into the sale of traditional media, including on-page advertising in magazines, Google is also considering creating a "backchannel" way of measuring the ads' effectiveness. This could involve putting URLs into text or print ads and driving readers back to Google in some way whereby their exposure to the ad's message could be tallied. The outcome of such a system might be

The greening of Explore

The current issue of Explore magazine (Quarto Communications) has definitely joined the good guys by switching to 100% post-consumer recycled stock.Editor James Little says the switch saves 1,034 trees a year, conserves 1.3 million litres of water, reduces solid-waste production by 87,600 pounds and cuts CO2 emissions by more than 200,000 pounds.If you want to know more about forest- and

Another departure at Toronto Life

The reconfiguing of St. Joseph Media and its properties proceeds apace as it has been announced that associate group publisher Susan Zuzinjak is leaving Toronto Life as of Friday. The announcement was made today. Zuzinjak has been with TL for 8 years, and was deeply involved in the marketing of the magazine.

Do they have him at Hello?

Word is that Christopher Loudon, the VP and Editor-in-Chief of Kontent Publishing's Inside Entertainment has the inside track to be the new Editor of Rogers' Hello! magazine franchise (see our December 1 posting for details). Loudon was previously Editor of TV Guide. The Canadianized version of the magazine is due to launch this fall with a staff of 10.

Paying the price

Now we may know what it has really cost Ezra Levant to have published the Muhammad cartoons in Western Standard magazine. And regardless of whether you think his decision was impassioned principle, or vainglorious opportunism, it could be very expensive.Air Canada seems to have pulled 7,000 copies from its flights and its lounges. That represents perhaps 25,000 to 30,000 claimable readers.

Provocation for the nation

Western Standard publisher Ezra Levant has published the infamous Muhammad cartoons in this week's issue of the magazine. And, of course, immediately the blogs and the papers and the other media were into full-scale motive attribution: it was a cooly calculated ploy; a courageous strategy to defend freedom of the press; or an outrageous and racist attack on Islam. Take your pick.Since no one can

Come off it

Ottawa blogger Mark Bourrie is being sued by fellow blogger and Liberal gadfly Warren Kinsella, (who has just begun his gig as media columnist for the National Post). Journalists shouldn't sue other journalists. If they're annoyed, they should write about it. To use a parenting term: you have words, use them.(After this brief diversion, back to magazines.)[UPDATE: Mark Bourrie has apparently

Quebecor's TVA Group takes a mag bath

On its surface the February 13 press release seems to say that things are tight, but still OK for the TVA Group, the largest publisher of French language magazines in Canada. The company is the highly diversified media arm of Quebecor, with interests in television (it owns SUN TV) film and publishing of both the traditional and web kind. The company (TVA.NV.B) announced net income for the fourth

Is 2006 to be the year of the "mobizine"?

British Glamour (Britain's best selling magazine) and Gentlemen's Quarterly (GQ) are launching dowloadable "mobizines" that can be read on mobile (cell) phones.(Mob- is pronounced MOBE), according to the UK Press Gazette. Read about it here.The teeny-tiny pages will not replicate the parent title, but will feature "sections" adapted from the main magazine.Unlike "celeb alerts" and other bulletins

CanWest challenges drug ad ban

CanWest Global Comunications is going to court to challenge restrictions on its right to carry prescription drug advertising. It filed and application in Ontario Superior Court, saying the laws governing drug advertisements offend charter rights, threaten freedom of expression in Canada and are unjustifiable "in a free and democratic society."The Canadian magazine industry has for years been

Oh, dear...

Now, we're all in favour of new magazines and wish almost all of them well. And we know there are all kinds of audiences out there. And not everyone's taste is the same. But don't you have to wonder at the mentality of The Official CFL Magazine? It's on newsstands now and there is no other way of describing it except as old-fashioned cheesecake. It is largely pictures of professional football

Google tests bulk mag ad buys

Google is testing a new system whereby online advertisers would bid for on-page national ad space in a range of major consumer magazines. Reported in MediaPost. Should ad reps stop buying any green bananas...?

It's way more than coverlines

"If I wasn't here, I'd be working on cover lines like'Mattress Moves So Hot His Thighs Will Go Up in Flames.' -- Kate White NEW YORK -- Kate White, the editor-in-chief of Cosmopolitan has some rules about covers and she shared them this week at the 20th Annual DMA Circulation Day. What is normally a fairly technical discussion among direct marketing associates (hence, DMA) about rate

Here we come a Carrolling

Futurist-about-town and author of umpteen books, Jim Carroll, was chosen to give the curtain-raiser speech for the Ontario Media Development Corporation annual conference, Six Degrees of Integration, on Wednesday evening in Toronto. This is a by-invitation gathering of leaders from various media, including books, magazines, television, film, video, sound recording and multimedia.What they got was

Faces of the arts in Toronto Life

Toronto Life and the City of Toronto are jointly presenting a 10-month series of portraits of key champions of the arts in the city. As part of the 40th anniversary of the magazine and Toronto's Live with Culture campaign, starting in March the magazine will feature Face the Arts, photographs of individuals "who, through artistic promise, achievement or vision, [have] enriched the cultural life

Maisonneuve stakes future on Montreal

National? Or local? It has been a debate in the crowded, creative nest of Maisonneuve magazine in Montreal for some months and it apears that it has come down firmly on the side of morphing into Canada's newest city magazine.Starting in September, it will focus on young, hip and happenin' English readers in Montreal, though it will continue to circulate single copies nationally. It's all a matter

The Lasagna Chronicles

Masthead magazine's online service (sub. requ'd) has an excellent report today (probably by Editor Bill Shields, though it's not credited) on the speech last week by Maclean's Publisher and Editor Ken Whyte to a conference at the Rotman School at U of T on the subject of turnarounds.Go here to read the whole report, which has Whyte joking that he says Maclean's is a magazine with the mind of the

Meet the new Heritage minister

Beverley Oda is the Minister of Canadian Heritage in the new Stephen Harper cabinet. As such, she is responsible for administering the government's magazine policy, including the Publications Assistance Program (PAP) and the Canada Magazine Fund. Oda, a former teacher and broadcaster, MP for Durham, and the Conservative heritage critic, has been heard to muse about the future of the CBC, which

The incredible vanishing TV magazine

There was a time when TV magazines were hot stuff, fat with retail advertising, competitive in the marketplace and vital to the menu of offerings of a daily newspaper. If ever there was proof that this time has passed, it was this past weekend's edition of Globe Television, a magazine slimmed down (some would say stripped down) to a shadow of its former self.In his opening column, Editor Andrew

$50,000 prize announced

The $50,000 Premier's Award for Excellence in the Arts has been announced by the Ontario government, recognizing outstanding achievement and contribution to arts and culture in Ontario by an individual or group. Nominees must be engaged in a professional arts practice including arts, crafts, dance, music, opera, theatre, visual and media arts, writing or cultural industries such as book and

Is that a glimmer of light?

Mastheadonline has done a great service by getting on the blower and asking for answers from Canada Post concerning its recently announced publishing deal with Rogers Publishing.Many in the industry were steamed a) that the post office was competing with its own customers, b) that Rogers, which had led the charge against postal rates, had negotiated such a deal, c) about whether movers had given

The comeback kid?

The Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto is hosting a conference on February 3 called Rebound: Staging a Comeback that Lasts. One of the panelists who will be talking about "what it takes to face up to the unique challenges of a turnaround situation and craft a new strategy for lasting success" is Ken Whyte, the Publisher and Editor in Chief of Maclean's. Is the magazine quite

You guys want to be alone?

Department of backscratching: Here is Paul Wells in his Inkless Wells blog at Maclean's, who was praising the Rebel Sell blog of new columnist Andrew Potter. And here is Potter, oozing admiration for Wells's recent roundup of the federal election, which Potter calls a "thoroughly rewarding first draft of history".

On being more than a magazine

"There's just something I find very compelling about high-quality journalism with good design, all in this one tangible magazine," says Joe Mansueto, the CEO of Morningstar, an online entrepreneur and the recent acquirer of Inc. and Fast Company. However, according to an article in Media Daily News, he cautioned his audience on Tuesday at the Software and Information Industry Association