Media Roundup: Jimmy Jellinek Becomes God, Fangoria Previews Stephen King, & More

The latest and maybe greatest:

• Fangoria features an excerpt/preview of the exclusive article by Stephen King slated to run over its next two issues: "What's Scary." You can read the preview. Or come on, don't be a chump. Buy the mag!
  
• New York-based media dude Andrew Fox is claiming to be bidding on lad-mag Maxim, even reportedly telling the mags' owners that if they didn't sell, the magazine would close by spring 2010. The problem? Maxim says it hasn't received a bid and is not in talks for a sale. When writing about Maxim, we can include the obligatory sentence we use with every magazine these days: The magazine has seen a serious erosion in its advertising pages in the past year and it has suffered financial strains that have helped it lose much of the luster it once held in the marketplace.
• So The Advocate is no longer a stand-alone print magazine, right? Well, then why did the company just promote its EIC, Jon Barrett, to the new role of editorial director of Advocate Group, and why is he tasked with growing the brand in "print, online, and television iterations and the HIV Plus brand as well as SheWired.com and PlanetOut.com, which also now operate under The Advocate Group banner"?
• Giant magazine has ceased print publication and will now join the ethereal realm as an online-only brand, reports FishbowlNY.
• Also from Gotham's bowl-o-fish people, is this news that recently shuttered upscale foodie magazine Gourmet has extended itself inside a Condé Nast Epicurious app. Frankly, it's a widget.
• Playboy Editorial Director Jimmy Jellinek has been promoted to God Emperor of Dune -- no, wait, just to chief content officer, a newly created role in which he will oversee all content for the brand's print, online, mobile, TV, film, and radio efforts. Presumably this comes with a company car, an extra secretary, and an additional 30 hours in the day.
  

My previous media roundup.

Death of Another Gay Magazine: The Advocate

Gay news-and-features magazine The Advocate will be folding, transforming into a 32-page insert in sister publication Out. That's the word from Queerty, which adds that the move follows "massive" layoffs at the title. "Some freelance and contract writers and photogs, meanwhile, have gone unpaid for months; some have threatened to stop working entirely until their balances are paid," reports Queerty.

Youch. I once briefly worked at a small magazine publisher that had been unable to pay some of its freelancers for about nine months. My short tenure there -- I jumped ship to a stable company after just two months -- was made sad by the constant hectoring from writers with very legitimate complaints about payments. Some of them needed it for rent or mortgage payments, and the poor accounts payable staffer had the unenviable job of fielding these requests/pleas/threats and paying the most urgent of them.

That company limped along for another couple years before it finally sold its assets. But it sounds like The Advocate's life will be shorter. (Owner Regent/Here Media already shuttered two of its gay porn titles, Men and Freshmen.)

Journalist and blogger (and he knows the difference) Matthew Rettenmund shares some thoughts on the loss of this long-lasting magazine and what it means to the gay community: "The Advocate has been around for 40 years chronicling gay news, following politics, tracing fads, providing a means by which stars (gay and straight) could directly reach a captive LGBT (not just G and not just L) audience. The death of The Advocate feels like a symptom of the admittedly slow death of 'gay' as an identity."

Frankly, I don't know if I'll miss The Advocate. It was only an occasional buy for me. I'm of the generation that did not go through Stonewall and that was still ignorant of my own homosexuality during the height (depths?) of the AIDS crisis in the 1980s. Nonetheless, I can still appreciate those who came before me and took on much bigger anti-gay boogeymen than I have had to face. But my intellectual response has always been to reject the magazine's simplistic attachment to outdated gay politics of the 1970s.

That said, Rettenmund is correct: The surviving media -- straight and gay alike -- is not prepared to cover gay topics well, and are unlikely to being to do so just because The Advocate has died. A new magazine is needed, but I'll be darned if I know what it is.

The Latest Shopping Spree

My stack of partially read periodicals grows, weighted down by my latest trips to the bookstores. At this rate, reading my magazines will become a full-time occupation. Or maybe I just need to start reading thinner magazines ...

Monocle number 23: Everything from kindergarten design to how the Danish navy (they have one?) is busy fighting pirates. Plus a report on terrorist funding methods, some manga, and -- shocker! -- Switzerland has efficient railroads.

The Advocate June/July 2009: Academy Award-winning screenwriter Dustin Lance Black (Milk) is the coverboy for an issue featuring a profile of him. There's also an extended special section profiling gay leaders under the age of 40. Not to mention lots of travel and some food info, reports on gay pride celebrations around the world, and a look at American Idol's maybe-gay finalist.

Der Spiegel Geschichte: A stunningly beautiful history magazine ("geschichte" is German for "history"), this issue is entirely devoted to the story of the end of the Roman empire and the not-too-minor role played by the Germans in wrapping up that chapter of history. The magazine's written completely in German, but it's almost worth the cover price just for all of the great photos and illustrations for those who don't understand German. Or it's a good incentive to brush up on your high school foreign language. It's published by Der Spiegel, the giant German newsweekly that is a favorite of mine for its high quality, in-depth reports, and lack of cover stories on Britney Spears.

Analog July/August 2009: A special double issue (which is part of its normal print schedule -- Analog publishes two double issues each year -- not a recession-induced doubling of summer issues, about which I wrote earlier), featuring tons of short stories (by Barry B. Longyear, Daniel Hatch, etc.) I hope I have the time to actually read.

Timeto hit the books.