Quote, unquote: Demands follow conversation:Adbusters founder

"This has launched a national conversation that is bigger than anything in the last 20 years. It is totally magical. And after the dust settles there will be crystal clear demands that emerge out of the movement."-- Adbusters founder Kalle Lasn, responding in an interview with the Montreal Gazette to the criticism that the Occupy Wall Street movement didn't have a simple, clear goal.The genesis

Quote, unquote: Getting Toronto's groove back

"Toronto has many admirable qualities, as John Lorinc acknowledges in the introduction to his article “How Toronto Lost Its Groove.” No city in the world has as successfully absorbed so many nationalities and religions. And it continues to be one of the safest big cities on the planet. But it is no longer the city Robert Fulford celebrated in his 1997 book, Accidental City, which argued that

Quote, unquote: How cover dreams come true

“I have been after Gwen Stefani for a Fashion cover ever since I arrived at this magazine more than two years ago. I think Gwen is a perfect Fashion cover girl – a glamourous mom, talented performer and fashion devotee.My dream finally came true last spring when our beauty editor Sarah Daniel flew to Cannes to interview Gwen during the Cannes Film Festival.”-- Bernadette Morra,

Quote, unquote: Sticking with news and digital

"I plan to focus my energies on two areas: digital innovation and integration and, no surprise here, the news."-- New York Times's new executive editor Jill Ambramson, in a memo to the staff about changes to her team and her plans for the future.

Quote, unquote: It's my magazine, my cover and my campaign

“I worked for eight years building this magazine, I did it on my own, we have no other shareholders,” said Ms. Thomson, who was a candidate in last year’s Toronto mayoral race. “I put my blood, sweat and tears into the company and I think anybody else could do the same thing, they could start a magazine.”-- Sarah Thomson, publisher of Women's Post magazine, quoted by the Globe and Mail. She

Quote, unquote: On readers putting their money where their mouths are

"I cannot stress enough how important it is for readers to put their money where their mouths are. It kills me when would-be literature aficionados balk at buying books or mags—for likely less than the cost of the beer you’d drink at a launch."-- ARC Poetry editor Katia Grubisic, replying to a question on The New Quarterly's blog The Literary Type about how she defines success for her magazine

Quote, unquote: On pulling for the underdog

“As a kid I was like the patron saint of lost causes in sports. I cheered for the Whalers, the Seattle Mariners, and the New Orleans Saints when they were the worst franchise in football. I think about that a lot because the passion of sports fans is more emotional than rational. It’s about appealing to peoples’ hearts as much as their heads. These were teams that rarely won, but there was

Quote, unquote: Seeking the "porridge zone", just right for every reader

“People love their iPads and want to experience journalism through the iPad. If that’s the way they want it, we’re going to make it as seamless and wonderful as we can.”-- Bob Cohn, editorial director of Atlantic Digital, explaining  to NiemanLab the company's decision to bring all of its content together under one app, which goes way beyond a digital version of the magazine. It's a streamlined

Quote, unquote: More than booty

"If you saw the covers, you'd be like, 'All they want to do is look at this girl's ass.' But if you opened it, you'd be like, 'Wow, it's so much more than that.'"-- Datwon Thomas, editor-in-chief of XXL magazine reflecting somewhat wistfully about the late KING magazine, of which he was a founder and editor-in-chief. He was quoted in the Huffington Post Black Voices blog.

Quote, unquote: When being big isn't necessarily an asset

"The biggest challenge in my opinion for magazine companies is that when it comes to digital publishing, cheaper software and low-cost entries level the field no matter how much money and people you put against it. The entrepreneurial guy probably has as much chance to survive as large media companies" -- Tom Martin, vice president of manufacturing operations at Cygnus Business Media, in a Q

Quote, unquote: Defending freedom and fairness in journalism

"As journalists, we believe in free speech and a robust free press and media. We also believe we have an overall duty to serve the public interest and the common good. The press should be fearless, exciting, entertaining, waspish, commercial and competitive.

"At the same time journalistic integrity must be respected, encouraged and protected from political, commercial and other pressures. Any

Quote, unquote: The internet is improving/ruining journalism. Talk among yourselves

If we can agree that the internet, by altering the underlying economics of the news business, has thinned the ranks of professional journalists, then the next question is straightforward: has the net created other modes of reporting to fill the gap? The answer, alas, is equally straightforward: no.-- author and blogger Nicholas Carr, staking out one side of the interesting Economist debate

Quote, unquote: on rolling with it

"If we were younger and maybe a little bit more naive, but we've been doing this for so long ... we're pretty level-headed," he says. "We've spent so many years getting told 'no' to grants, and 'no' to shows and 'no' to festivals and so to be getting all of these 'yesses' it's more exciting and satisfying than it is we're thinking we're hot s--t. We've worked at this, being a band, for almost

Quote, unquote: For trade magazines, not so easy shucking print

"I don't know any publishers who are talking seriously now about a wholesale move to web only, but a lot of that is due to scale. If you own 200 titles and one goes web only well you still have the printing and distribution costs of 199 other titles."--Douglas McCabe of Enders Analysis, quoted in a story in the Guardian about the future of trade magazines. The article uses as examples a number of

Quote, unquote: The surprising place where NatGeo's new readers will come from

Even though it’s a very small piece of our circulation domestically, we see [new readers] coming from single copy sales. That’s something we watch very closely because that means someone put down $5.99 of hard-earned money and made the decision to buy this magazine. That is an especially important part of gauging relevance. There is an age group that’s probably 10 years younger than the

Quote, unquote: Spin drift

“The problem is, more and more journalists and college graduates are forgoing the trenches to pursue a different career path. Instead of reporting the news, they’re working to help manipulate it as public relations specialists. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, in fact, in 1980 there were .45 PR people and .36 journalists per every 100,000 workers. As of 2008, that number had

Quote, unquote: What magazines can do for the Internet