Grids: News: March 2011 Archives

Fast News for March 31, 2011

SPD MEDIA MIX is our regular list of publication design, digital, and media news and updates. Please send your links and news items to SPD at mail@spd.org and we'll add them to the Mix.

>> A Beast, Daily: According to a recent study of iPad users, Apple and Rupert Murdoch's The Daily's "content is lacking, [and] superior content is available elsewhere online for free." In addition, there appears to be some general confusion as to what the pay and/or download model actually is.

>> Make Your Own App ... Free! For a limited time, iBuildApp, is ready to bring digital magazine publishing to the masses--and without charge. According to Folio, "users who want to create a digital magazine for the iPad can do so without the help of an IT team." The web-based creation tool allows users to upload images, video and content and choose a template. The magazine is then ready to be published.

>> Jihad Quarterly: al-Malahim Media, the media wing of Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, recently launched Inspire, a magazine "aimed at readers living in Western countries -- who, if seduced by the argument, will be capable of putting together sophisticated [terror] plots."

Fast News for March 29, 2011

News 03.29.11 posted by The Editors

SPD MEDIA MIX is our regular list of publication design, digital, and media news and updates. Please send your links and news items to SPD at mail@spd.org and we'll add them to the Mix.

>> Back on the Radar: After going dark for a couple of years, the founder of Radar, Maer Roshan, is back with a new media property: thefix.com. The site will focus on addiction, recovery, rehab.

>> Hearst's Growth Spurt: Mag giant Hearst is set to buy Lagardere's US group Hachette Filipacchi, which publishes Elle, Woman's Day, and Car and Driver. The deal will inch Hearst closer to US magazine giant Time Inc. in overall size.

>> New Stuff for Dennis: Felix Dennis, the founder of Maxim, Stuff, and The Week, recently purchased Mental Floss,the irreverent magazine and media company that brought us swimsuit photos of Albert Einstein and Eleanor Roosevelt. It will run separately from Dennis Publishing and will keep its offices (and retail store!) in Chesterland, Ohio. Its 12 employees will remain on the payroll, but its HQ will move to Manhattan.

>> Good. News. According to Good co-founder and creative director Casey Caplowe, things at the magazine are looking up. Money is coming in, but not from venture capitalists. Good is opening an advertising wing to complement its editorial operation. "We view our business in two pieces: all the media stuff, and now our new unit 'Good to Business," where the indie publisher will look to help companies brainstorm more socially-conscious campaigns.

Fast News for March 24, 2011

News 03.24.11 posted by The Editors

SPD MEDIA MIX is our regular list of publication design, digital, and media news and updates. Please send your links and news items to SPD at mail@spd.org and we'll add them to the Mix.

>> Getting in the Game: Search giant Google quietly launched its own online publication Think Quarterly, which calls itself a "a breathing space in a busy world." The design features a strong focus on infographics and large photos, but is sans advertising. The publication is designed and edited by creative agency The Church of London.

>> New Design Pub: Using a service called paper.li, the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum premieres The Cooper-Hewitt Daily, a "newspaper" built from all the articles, blog posts, videos, and photos shared by the people @CooperHewitt follows on Twitter.

>> Side Job: Former 2wice CD -- and current Pentagram partner -- Abbott Miller has just released a line of "ink-drip" wallpapers with KnollTextiles.

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Fast News for March 22, 2011

News 03.22.11 posted by The Editors

SPD MEDIA MIX is our regular list of publication design, digital, and media news and updates. Please send your links and news items to SPD at mail@spd.org and we'll add them to the Mix.

>> Back in Print: Why have four big-time editrixes given up their digital gigs to return to print? See what Tina Brown, Brandon Holley, Pilar Guzman, and Deborah Needleman said about bailing on the (purely) digital life.

>> A July Rolling Stone cover featuring Lady Gaga won a min Readers' Choice poll as the 2010's best cover of a weekly or biweekly magazine. The RS cover edged-out covers from The Economist and Forbes.

>> "The tablet really is a magazine medium. Magazines have been liberated from the limitations of paper. Just because magazines have lived on paper doesn't mean that's what it is. A magazine is ideas and visual style and values." Read more in the MPA Digital: E-Reading conference notes.

>> Inspiration Alert: A new website, MagSpreads.com, bills itself as "the world's #1 magazine design website" -- present company excepted, we're sure.

>> Touchy Retouching: Wired is mired in a controversy regarding their April 2011 cover girl, electrical engineer Limor Fried. Good magazine is claiming that Wired's photo is "an almost cartoonish Photoshop." A response from Fried herself is at the end of the article.

Fast News for March 10, 2011

News 03.10.11 posted by The Editors

SPD MEDIA MIX is our regular list of publication design, digital, and media news and updates. Please send your links and news items to SPD at mail@spd.org and we'll add them to the Mix.

>> Pilar Guzman is the new Editor in Chief for Martha Stewart Living. She was the founding editor of Cookie. Former EIC Vanessa Holden left earlier this year for West Elm.

>> AIGA Maine is presenting Abstract, a day of business-focused design discussion--including an in-depth practicum on launching an iPad publication--led by some of the most accomplished design and media talents (Gael Towey, Luke Hayman, and Rem Duplessis, among them) in the country. The event will take place in Portland in June.

>> Hearst CEO David Carey paints a somewhat optimistic picture of the future of iPad publishing.

>> Adobe announces an intriguing new web design technology that is "intended to support sophisticated, magazine-style layouts using CSS."

Fast News for March 8, 2011

News 03.08.11 posted by The Editors

SPD MEDIA MIX is our regular list of publication design, digital, and media news and updates. Please send your links and news items to SPD at mail@spd.org and we'll add them to the Mix.

>>

Must Be Redesign Season: After last week's big unveiling--and yesterday's--today brings news of Ebony's "first cover-to-cover redesign since its introduction in 1945." New CD Darhill Crooks (former AD at Esquire) spent the winter working with new editor Amy DuBois Barnett on what they're calling a "top-to-bottom redesign." We hope to have a sneak preview in the coming days.

>> Typography Shout Out: Four fonts (HTF Didot, Gotham, Mercury and Retina) from our friends at Hoefler & Frere-Jones were added to the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art last month. "Type design is an essential dimension of the history of modern art and design," writes Senior Curator Paola Antonelli. "The best typefaces belong in MoMA's collection."

>> Conde Nast "Reexaming iPad Pricing": Despite the less-than-stellar results for digital magazines, the GQ and Vanity Fair iPad app prices are going up next month.

>> Haters Gonna Hate: Dirk Barnett talks about his redesign of Newsweek.

Fast News for March 3, 2011

News 03.03.11 posted by The Editors

SPD MEDIA MIX is our regular list of publication design, digital, and media news and updates. Please send your links and news items to SPD at mail@spd.org and we'll add them to the Mix.

>> If you just bought an iPad, you needn't bum out about Apple's release of the newer, shinier iPad2. The changes--front- and rear-facing cameras, lighter weight, increased speed--are not that dramatic.

>> ASME News: The Daily Beast, New York, The New York Times Magazine, Sports Illustrated, and Vogue are the finalists for the "Digital Ellies" for design. The award honors overall excellence in the design of magazine websites and online-only magazines. The winner will be announced on March 16.

>> But that's not all! Finalists for ASME's Digital Ellie for photography are Discover, Foreign Policy, LIFE.com, National Geographic, and TIME.

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Fast News for March 1, 2011

News 03.01.11 posted by The Editors

SPD MEDIA MIX is our regular list of publication design, digital, and media news and updates. Please send your links and news items to SPD at mail@spd.org and we'll add them to the Mix.

>> In advance of Apple's special event on Wednesday (supposedly about an updated iPad), Magculture's Jeremy Leslie has some thoughts about the state of the tablet for magazines...

>> Talking about this Sunday's coming redesign of The New York Times Magazine...

>> from Musical Chairs: Christopher Martinez leaves T for Barneys; Ian Adelman leaves NYMag.com for NYTimes.com...

News: March 2011 Archives

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