MediaWeek to go online-only; 18 Brand Media editorial jobs cut

Due to a restructure at Haymarket, MediaWeek is to end its print edition and publish online-only, as part of a BrandRepublic.com team.

Today’s issue (November 17) is the last, the publication has reported. Monthly digital marketing magazine Revolution is to become a quarterly supplement.

Eighteen editorial positions (out of 58) will be lost from Brand Media, the group reported.

“We will do everything we can to keep job losses to a minimum, and we are looking to redeploy affected staff in other parts of the group,” said Jane Macken, managing director of Haymarket Brand Media.

“I would like to place on record my appreciation of the efforts of all our editorial staff. Throughout a very difficult time they have continued to produce editorial content of exceptionally high quality.”

It’s the latest of the media industry titles to feel the pinch: in April 2009, Press Gazette’s closure was announced, before it was bought by Progressive Media and re-opened.

More details at this link…

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Empire and Nursing Times take online prizes at BSME Awards

The British Society of Magazine Editors (BSME) announced the winners of its annual awards this week. The list in full can be seen below:

Editors of the year:

Business & Professional Magazines (non-weekly): Matthew Gwyther, Management Today – Haymarket Media
Business & Professional Magazines (weekly): Adam Leyland, The Grocer – William Reed Business Media
Entertainment & Celebrity Magazines: Mark Dinning, Empire – Bauer Media
Customer Magazines (business readership): Sarah Bale, BT Upload – Redwood Publishing
Customer Magazines (consumer readership); Mark Hooper, Electric! – Redwood Publishing

Lifestyle Magazines: Ed Grenby, the Sunday Times Travel Magazine – News International

Men’s Magazines: Terri White, ShortList – Shortlist Media

Newspaper Magazines: Merope Mills, Guardian Weekend – Guardian Newspapers

Special Interest & Current Affairs Magazines: Jason Cowley, New Statesman – New Statesman

Women’s Magazines (monthly or less frequent): Lorraine Candy, Elle – Hachette Filipacchi (UK) Ltd

Women’s Magazines (weekly or fortnightly): John Dale, Take A Break – H Bauer

Youth Magazines: Ian Foster, Match of the Day Magazine – BBC Worldwide

Fiona Macpherson new business editor of the year: John Stepek, MoneyWeek – MoneyWeek

Fiona Macpherson new consumer editor of the year: Peter Grunert, Lonely Planet – BBC Magazines

Business magazine art director of the year: Cecilia Lindgren, the Architectural Review – Emap

Consumer magazine art director of the year: David McKendrick, Esquire – the National Magazine Company

Launch editor of the year: David Rowan, Wired – Condé Nast

Business magazine website editor of the year: Gabriel Fleming, nursingtimes.net – Emap

Consumer magazine website editor of the year: James Dyer, Empire Online – Bauer Media

Innovation and brand-building initiative: Tony Chambers, Wallpaper* – IPC Media
(for Made in China Issue, an issue dedicated to the new China and produced by the London Wallpaper* team in China)

Campaign of the year: Denise Chevin, Building – UBM Built Environment
(for Safer Skyline, a Campaign to improve safety of tower cranes on building sites after a shocking spate of fatal accidents)

Mark Boxer award: Andy Cowles, editorial development director, IPC Media

2009 BSME editor’s editor: Morgan Rees, Men’s Health – Natmag-Rodale

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Press Gazette: Ian Smith quits as Reed Elsevier chief

Ian Smith has stepped down after just eight months as chief executive of publisher Reed Elsevier.

Elsevier chief executive Erik Engstrom will replace him.

Full story at this link…

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‘Twenty tweetable truths about magazines’

MagCulture has shared the below animation from the Magazine Publishers of America (MPA), which has produced a list of twenty ‘tweetable truths’ about magazines.

Agree or disagree?

magCulture.com / editorial design.

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The end of Gourmet – a photographic view

Last month Conde Nast announced the closure of luxury food magazine Gourmet in a move by the publisher to cut costs, which saw several other titles shuttered.

Marking its closure the title’s former art director Kevin Demaria has published a collection of photographs entitled ‘Last Days of Gourmet’ – an office landscape that meant a great deal more to Demaria, as he explains:

“In shock and disbelief, using garbage pails for long exposures, I took these photos of the last few days at Gourmet. Although at times it was hard for me to shoot the common places in the offices at Gourmet, I knew I needed to document where I loved working for the last eight years. It was a unique opportunity to have worked with such amazingly talented people in such a friendly work environment. Gourmet became my family and I will always look back proud to have been part of such an amazing magazine.”

(Hat tip MagCulture.com)

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Papua New Guineans now suing for $45m in Jared Diamond/New Yorker case

Remember the Papua New Guineans suing Jared Diamond and the New Yorker for $10 million in damages? Background at this link.

Damages have been raised from $10 million to $45 million.

Last week, attourneys for Diamond and Advance Publications filed their answer to the lawsuit in New York state court, denying all of the defamation allegations.

The court trial date is yet to be set.

Full Science Magazine post at this link…

Also at Gawker.com / Forbes.com

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NUJ Journalist Editor Election: Mark Watts’ ‘exposé’ circular to NUJ members

Mark Watts, one of the candidates campaigning for the NUJ Journalist magazine and website editorship, has issued a statement to 19,000 of the union’s members claiming to ‘expose’ another candidate Rich Simcox as a member of the NUJ Left, arguing that this section of the NUJ ‘is trying to hijack the union from its members’.

However, scepticism over whether Simcox’s allegiance was much of a secret has already been raised by Jon Slattery on his blog:

“Watts names the NUJ Left candidate as Rich Simcox. But is this such a shocking revelation? Simcox told me when I revealed he was standing in the election on September 3 that he had the support of the NUJ Left and I reported the fact here in the second paragraph of the story.

“Watts, however, alleges that Simcox has not revealed his NUJ Left backing in his election material. His email ends dramatically: ‘Lance the boil. Save the NUJ’. Simcox told me today: “I didn’t realise it was such a secret. It comes up fourth when you Google my name.”

Journalism.co.uk has contacted Rich Simcox for a response to Watts’ statement, in the meantime, please leave your thoughts below this post. What questions would you like to ask Watts or Simcox?

We’ve created a special section of our bulletin board for you to quiz the would-be editors on their plans for the union title and why they should take the helm. It’s already very active, with numerous responses from six of the eight candidates. Add your question by posting a new topic on the forum at this link or by emailing us at laura or judith [at] journalism.co.uk.

Mark Watts statement as follows:

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New York Observer: Ruth Reichl on Gourmet’s closure – ‘Our circulation had never been better’

Some chilling observations on the idea that good content will out in the current industry downturn from (now former) Gourmet editor Ruth Reichl, after publisher Conde Nast announced the magazine’s closure.

“It was a magazine that depended on luxury advertising, unlike many of the epicureans. Most of our competition gets a lot of different kinds of advertising. Our main categories were travel, automotive, financial, jewellery – that all went away (…) I guess at a certain point the company decided that advertising wasn’t coming back. I wasn’t privy to those discussions,” Reichl told the Observer.

She goes on (suggesting perhaps too much distance between the magazine’s editorial and commercial teams?):

“I did know that this was bad, but on the other hand our circulation had never been better. The editorial product was a big hit with the readers, and I did not anticipate this.”

Full story at this link…

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Dear Deidre invite sparks criticism from Community Care magazine

Community Care has once more challenged the Sun’s attitude to social workers following an invitation from the General Social Care Council to its annual conference to the paper’s problem page editor ‘Dear’ Deidre Sanders.

According to a blog post from workforce editor Daniel Lombard, Community Care forum users were outraged by the move, arguing that the views of Deidre’s employers would prevent the two parties from working together. Some called for the invitation to be revoked.

The agony aunt responded with an article for the magazine’s site in which she outlined her commitment to improving the sector and using her clout within the newspaper industry to build bridges.

But according to Lombard, her mention of the baby Peter case in the piece undermined the agony aunt’s intentions:

“It was a clear and convincing argument – until the arrogance of her employers seeped into an otherwise sensible contribution to the debate (…) Was it really necessary to once again seek to justify her employer’s misguided attack on the profession in the wake of the baby Peter case?”

ComCare’s campaign to improve media coverage of social work, Stand Up Now for Social Work, was launched partly in response to the Sun’s coverage of baby Peter’s death. The newspaper ran a petition calling for every social worker who had been involved in the case to be sacked and prevented from working with children again. Readers were encouraged to contact the newspaper if they knew any of the social workers involved, community editor for Community Care, Simeon Brody, told Journalism.co.uk back in March.

The magazine also recently ran a survey of journalists to gauge their knowledge of social work in the UK. Sixty-eight per cent of respondents thought that a care worker was a social work post, while 37 per cent said they didn’t know if social work was better today than 15 years ago.

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US National Magazine Awards 2010 to award podcasts, video and mobile

The US-based National Magazine Awards are adding 12 new categories to the original 22 so that online magazines can receive the awards. The new categories will reward work in mobile media, interactive tools, podcasting, video and community.

The National Magazine Awards, which will be presented in April 2010, have been running since 1966; winning one is considered the industry’s top accolade. The digital awards are to be given out at a different ceremony to the others, however: a lunch during an online magazine conference in March. Sid Holt, the chief executive of ASME insisted that they will still be as prestigious as the rest of the awards, according to the New York Times.

The Digital ‘Ellies’ (named after the Alexander Calder ‘Elephant’ trophy) categories include: General Excellence, Digital Media; Mobile Media; Design, Digital Media; Photography, Digital Media; News Reporting; Blogging; Regular Department or Section; Multimedia Feature or Package; Interactive Tool; Podcasting; Video; and Community.

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