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Topic: Will Seventeen & CosmoGirl be next (to be closed)?
| Author | Message |
| davidb26 | Posted – 7/11/2007 3:23:46 PM | show profile Jane was the much better magazine than Seventeen and Cosmogirl. Also, has anyone bother to see what Atoosa Rubenstein has been up to besides posting on her MySpace blog? (Would you leave a $1+ million job with enviable perks to do that?) |
| noname1234 | Posted – 7/11/2007 3:49:30 PM | show profile well, it doesn't really matter what mag is better editorially -- it only matters if the mag is bringing in the $$ that the company wants it to bring in. There might be other mags out there in more precarious shape. I've heard a few names thrown around. |
| tinat | Posted – 7/11/2007 4:14:10 PM | show profile Why Atoosa left "Also, has anyone bother to see what Atoosa Rubenstein has been up to besides posting on her MySpace blog? (Would you leave a $1+ million job with enviable perks to do that?)" She left because her husband is a hedge fund manager This allows her to "retire." |
| davidb26 | Posted – 7/11/2007 4:23:03 PM | show profile I don't really think that was the case... If they're so wealthy, why did they only buy a $600K rather small house in the Hamptons and not really own their Trump Place apt. on Riverside Blvd. (I believe they rent it through his business.) |
| s38 | Posted – 7/11/2007 4:23:52 PM | show profile i don't think they're really comparable. some teens read jane, but i feel like jane's audience was a little older than people who regularly read cosmogirl or seventeen. i think girls who would read seventeen or cosmogirl are more likely to regularly spend the(ir parents') money to buy the magazine, and everything advertised in it, than jane's intended audience. |
| s38 | Posted – 7/11/2007 4:24:55 PM | show profile i don't think they're really comparable. some teens read jane, but i feel like jane's audience was a little older than people who regularly read cosmogirl or seventeen. i think girls who would read seventeen or cosmogirl are more likely to regularly spend the(ir parents') money to buy the magazine, and everything advertised in it, than jane's intended audience. |
| seeattleme | Posted – 7/11/2007 5:17:56 PM | show profile Teens read Cosmo. Tweens read Cosmogirl. Teens always read the age they want to be, not the age they are. teens read Jane and Vogue, Instyle, In Touch, Star and Us Weekly (if that's reading). They get Cosmogirl Seveteen as gifts, but they don't read those magazines and they make fun of them more often than not. The tweens read them. Teens read TeenVogue because it's a younger Vogue, it's cooler and hip and it's not edited by someone trying to act like she's 16. Teens know better than to buy this. Seventeen could be great again, but it needs an editor--not someone trying to be a celebrity editor. I actually think the plan has been to put Seveteen online for quite awhile. Atoosa left because the magazine sucked. She wanted to get out before it tanked. She's no idiot. She'll deny it to the moon, but go pick up her last several issues --they were brochures. (They still are) And she had ethical problems with ASME (division of advertorial, putting Paris Hilton on the cover when she had a DUI, advertising cover lines for Old Navy, etc etc. To the point that ASME had to step in. There was an item that the new Seventeen EIC was meeting with Cathie Black and her syncophants long before Atoosa "quit". Chances are it was to talk about what to do with Seventeen. And it's my theory they are trying to gradually pull it the way of Ellegirl and TeenPeople (online). Which is too bad. Cause Seventeen was once and could be again a great magazine. It needs a good creative editor who knows what she's doing and can hire the right people; someone who has been in the business a long time who knows what teens want to know, what they need to know, and how to put the two together in a hip, funky, saucy litttle package. The problem with Jane and all the Sassy wannabees is that they think because they READ Sassy and Jane they can "create" sassy and Jane-ish magazines. You had to have worked with the Sassy and Jane gang to know how it was done, to get the vibe. You really had to have been there--and you can't be a corporate hack to do it (Jane was in trouble the second Christina left Kelly left, if you ask me. Talk about a corporate so NOT hack brown-noser.) You have to be willing to strike out, do risky things, be original and creative and really love doing it. There are few editors like that anymore. Most wanna be on TV or be photographed at parties and have their name in WWD a minimum of three times a week. |
| noname1234 | Posted – 7/11/2007 5:23:23 PM | show profile here's the real problem with teen mags: Teens don't read mags anymore. They find what they're looking for online -- and if they have additional time on their hands, they're text messaging, playing videogames etc. That's why these teen mags are in serious trouble. |
| seeattleme | Posted – 7/11/2007 5:30:16 PM | show profile They don't read teen magazines because the teen magazines suck. They DO read magazines. Go to your local library after school and see what kids are carrying around, on the subways, to the rec centers, etc. They read magazines. They don't read teen magazines. |
| noname1234 | Posted – 7/11/2007 5:40:28 PM | show profile Well, if I were trying to reach an audience of teens, I'd focus exclusively online -- the community, interactivity and multimedia available online makes it incredibly powerful -- there's no shame or failure associated with moving a brand into digital-only, as teen people and ellegirl did -- in fact, it can really help expand the brand. Not to mention that it is far more cost-effective to run a brand digitally -- no printing expenses, postage, etc. |
| seeattleme | Posted – 7/11/2007 5:55:11 PM | show profile Go talk to teens. A lot of them are saying that online is "boring", that everyone's on it so its not fun or cool or hip anymore. Plus there's all the ways mom and dad can now find out what you're up to... All you have to do to get to teens is put something out there that's cool and hip and feels insider-y to them. Teen Vogue is doing fine! It can be a book, it can be a magazine, it can be a dog you carry around in your purse. The medium isn't important--the message is. In the teen world, it's about Style AND substance and that's what Sassy got--that's what the teen mag editors DON'T get. They didn't get it then and they don't get it still. They underestimate teenagers and try to make it simple as a result. You don't talk down and you don't hard sell them They won't buy or do or listen to anything you tell them to. You simply suggest material and let their own innate curiousity and youthful bold experimental state of mind do the rest. |
| noname1234 | Posted – 7/11/2007 6:13:14 PM | show profile If the medium's not important but the message is, why not focus on the medium -- digital -- that provides greater flexibility and is also, after the initial build, cheaper to run? |
| seeattleme | Posted – 7/11/2007 7:08:27 PM | show profile I might even suggest--gasp!--going offline. Or use the net to allow teens to talk to you, use the magazine to talk to them. But that means you gotta get them in there. And it probably means coming out twice a month, if not weekly. And it would mean spending money at first--til the Internet trend fizzles, then you'll be ahead of the pack. All the people who said you were crazy to suggest it will be scambling offline. Magazines can offer teens and tweens more information that they can carry around. Teens aren't sitting in front of computers all day anymore. They've got stuff to do, places to go--and besides, their parents won't let them sit on computers all day. They'll stop letting them carry them around in their pockets once the Internet pervs hit that medium. Teens are already getting sick of cell phones, because as a bunch of teens told me for a story I was writing on the teen market for the new iphone, "once everyone has it, it's not cool anymore--besides, who wants to be accessible to their parents 24/7?" One girl purposely kept "losing" her cell phone because her parents wouldn't leave her alone on it! It's all just another trend that's gonna be tired soon. Teens goes through trends like toilet paper. You need to offer them new trends, not offer the current trands, to stay ahead. And you need to be in a position to tell THEm what the next trend will be. If cool hip bands made the Internet the Rolling Stone of it's day (Nirvana refused to be on the cover in the early 90s, dooming RS to uncooldom for a decade following)and refused to have anything to do with it, for whatever socially relevant reason, teens would follow. It's only a matter of time before some band figures that out and does exactly that. |
| noname1234 | Posted – 7/11/2007 7:18:20 PM | show profile The internet -- or more specifically, digital information -- isn't a fad that's going away. It's a real shift in how people share information and form communities. It's also really changed how advertising works. And one huge thing is, which I've mentioned before: It's cheaper to run a digital operation than a print operation. In this age of budget slashing and layoffs that is a serious consideration. So... I guess my thought is: maybe 17, cosmogirl etc will go all-digital. And maybe that's a really good, potentially really creatively energizing thing. |
| seeattleme | Posted – 7/11/2007 9:22:14 PM | show profile It may not be a fad that's going away with our communities, but anyhting--ANYTHING--with teens can and will be and usually is a fad. Go ahead, name something. teens don't even email anymore, they IM and Text message. Emailing is considered dweeby. If they don't have the time to sit down at their computers and write and read emails, how are they going to spend the time reading Internet material? Magazines give teens that ability to take information where they want so they can have it when they want it. When they're grounded from their computers --it happenes a lot these days--they have their magazines to tote along. That's why TeenVogue is the size it is: so kids can sneak it in their schoolbooks and fold it up in their backpacks. And it saves money--editors at the other teen mags laughed at the idea it would be the size it is. Now their copying it. And again, teens are reading magazines. TeenVogue is up, they read Vogue, Cosmo, Instyle, Star Us Weekly, etc. They're not NOT reading. I couldn't care less if Cosmogirl and Seventeen go digital--but they already have a huge online presence and that's not helping their performance in the least. Both are down. Down Down Down. Why? The content SUCKS. You have epople there trying to do something they don't know how to do. You have people following trends instead of starting them. You have people trying to SELL to teenagers instead of getting involved with teenagers, to find out what teens are actually talking about--not buying or wanting, but talking about, and what they want and need to hear. Sure going all digital would be a move--though it hasn't helped Ellegirl any, really (Ellegirl was actually doing fine before it was folded, because the content was uniquie and polished and not chatty and juvenile and hyper). But I don't care whether you go digital or not--it depends WHAT you go digital with. If your material is sucky and pathetic, teens aren't going to read it. They'll check it out, cause they 'll check ANYTHING out--teenagers jumping on a couch, for example-- but that's not going to sustain their interest. Also with teens and tweens you have a new audience every four years. Half the teens have already read all the prom-hair-makeup-SAT-drivingsafety crap by the time they're 15. You have to keep your material fresh, and get in front of the trends, not lag behind. |
| seeattleme | Posted – 7/11/2007 9:40:35 PM | show profile And magazines don't have to be expensive to put out. That's just the way these companies do things. Remember 'zines? These companies, well now it's just Hearst and Conde Nast--hire huge staffs of poeple who do very little, hire freelancers, have expensive photo shoots with big name photographers, hire expensive freelancers. They burn money. Sassy was all staff written. There were about half a dozen people at a time running the edit department, two running the art department, three in fashion. That's it. Magazines can save money as soon as these corporates forget the lessons of the 80s they learned when they were up and coming (and the Internet didn't exist): That spending a lot of money on something does not mean that thing is a quality product, that editing magazines needs to be instinctive, that magazines need to have style and substance. And that you need to put material out there that stimulates your reader--not material that lures her in and tries to sell her something all the time, material that reduces her to a commodity. Teens don't buy it. They may buy it, but not if you tell them to. You can only suggest it. But like I said, eventually with everything that's happening on the Internet,teen access will be limited and they'll get bored with it and look for something else. In the end, they have their most important medium for information: their circle of friends, their cliques at school, their older, cooler siblings, and the fashion magazines. |
| seeattleme | Posted – 7/11/2007 9:41:06 PM | show profile And magazines don't have to be expensive to put out. That's just the way these companies do things. Remember 'zines? These companies, well now it's just Hearst and Conde Nast--hire huge staffs of poeple who do very little, hire freelancers, have expensive photo shoots with big name photographers, hire expensive freelancers. They burn money. Sassy was all staff written. There were about half a dozen people at a time running the edit department, two running the art department, three in fashion. That's it. Magazines can save money as soon as these corporates forget the lessons of the 80s they learned when they were up and coming (and the Internet didn't exist): That spending a lot of money on something does not mean that thing is a quality product, that editing magazines needs to be instinctive, that magazines need to have style and substance. And that you need to put material out there that stimulates your reader--not material that lures her in and tries to sell her something all the time, material that reduces her to a commodity. Teens don't buy it. They may buy it, but not if you tell them to. You can only suggest it. But like I said, eventually with everything that's happening on the Internet,teen access will be limited and they'll get bored with it and look for something else. In the end, they have their most important medium for information: their circle of friends, their cliques at school, their older, cooler siblings, and the fashion magazines. |
| noname1234 | Posted – 7/11/2007 9:42:45 PM | show profile i agree, granitegirl -- sucking is sucking, whether the suck occurs on paper, on a computer monitor, on a cell phone, whatever. and sure -- trends are fickle and fleeting, but the job of these brands is to keep up. Teens may or may not read online -- but they may watch video. or make video. or create video/music mashups. or something else. You seem very interested in the teen space particularly -- did you at one time work at a teen pub? |
| seeattleme | Posted – 7/11/2007 11:54:07 PM | show profile I've worked on most of the teen books, but that's not why I care or why it matters to me. I just think the more information you can get to teens--detailed, well-written, complex and educational information that improves their lives and empowers them (not to mention gets them to sit down and READ something)--the better. Magazines can do this. Good magazines, anyway. You can't do this on the Internet. Sorry, you just can't. And it's a trend. MYspace is already down thirty per cent. Teens are turned off by cyberbullying, etc. -- they've stopped with public notices and have turned instead to the private spaces on Facebook. Eventually they'll get tired of that. All it's going to take is one hip cool alterna-band deciding that the Internet is a money-making evil machine for the Suits of America. They'll log off and tell kids to do the same. It'll become hip to log out and unplug. And corporate America will be scrambling once again to get the teen market back. They'll put human sacrifices on the Web. Oral sex demonstrations with links to oral sex parties. Gossipfests featuring their own children. Whathaveyou. It won't work. Kids will go back to using a tin can and a string for communication mediium, and corporate America will scramble to market that trend by putting out a Paris Hilton Tin Can on a String. And you can say you heard it here first. |
| seeattleme | Posted – 7/11/2007 11:55:01 PM | show profile As for what Atoosa is doing now, I bet she's trying to get pregnant. |
| noname1234 | Posted – 7/12/2007 12:28:33 AM | show profile I just don't agree with your skepticism about the web. is there a lot of crap online? yeah, sure. Is it a medium in flux, constantly evolving with new technology? Absolutely. But the web allows for an open, free exchange of information and a pooling of shared wisdom, knowledge and creativity that is really powerful. It's hard for me to see what can be done in print as far as conveying information that's simply impossible to do online. As for the myspace stats, i haven't looked into those lately, but one thing is that facebook is really taking off and stealing some of myspace's thunder. Individual entities wax and wane -- same as in print (even sassy lasted, what, less than 10 years). |
| seeattleme | Posted – 7/12/2007 1:17:24 AM | show profile sassy was closed down because advertisers were pissed at stories like" Become a Model Scams" and because of the Moral majority. It's all fairly well detailed. You say you don't share my skepticism. I think you don't really get my point. Will the web continue to thrive? Sure. Just not with teenagers. Nothing thrives for long with teenagers. Eventually there will be something better--there always is. Plus the web is moving too fast. It's headed for its own burnout. No one wants to have to buy a new computer every two years to get the latest web tech, and that's what you have to do now. Once the planet starts falling apart, people won't be able to sit on the web all day; they'll have to get out of the house and start doing shit (walking to work and school etc, growing their own food, etc. making their homes more ecological to survive the depleted ozone layer, etc). Their (our) concerns will very soon become more immediate. Americans are alazy culture. We're obese and have borderline ADD. We feed off images and fast information. That will have to change if we are goung to survive. The Internet has fed into our lazy obese illiterate culture. Eventually people will begin to reguylate its use in their homes, with their families, with themselves. But that's years off. As always, youth--who are ahead of the times and tire of things more quickly, will get bored with it a lot sooner. It's not skepticism. Its history. The youth got bored and disillusioned with the Beatles, with free love, with illegal drugs (now their sneaking Oxycotin from their parents medicine cabinet) and increasingly sex (now saving yourself is hip, less teens are having sex (three-four years ago teens were having less sex but MORE oral sex, by the age of 12..that was the trend then, the trend now is The Promise crap. And that may last another four years, til they turn twenty and go nuts). If you know teens--have known them for twenty years, you'll realize its just the way of ways with them. They're fickle. What's cool with the rest of us is uncool with them. |
| seeattleme | Posted – 7/12/2007 1:20:16 AM | show profile The Myspace article is posted on MSNBC.com. Right now. And that's exactly my point. Something will eventually steal the Internet's thunder. That's how it goes. What are we disagreeing about if you've just agreed with my point? |
| seeattleme | Posted – 7/12/2007 2:04:13 AM | show profile here's another thing about Cosmogirl and Seventeen, now owned by the same compnay: The last three EICs of Seventeen have come from Cosmogirl. Wiel, Rubenstein, now Shoket all founded Cosmogirl. The magazine has declined under all three. The magazine hasn't had a decent editor since the mid to late 1990s--the editor was from Lears, who then went to new York magazine. She knew how to edit. She hired a young hot hip staff who knew what they were doing. It was the first teen magazine since Sassy to be nominated for an ASME. Then the decline began after she left. Seventeen went younger and younger until the aforementioned string of Cosmogirl editors--all have performed disasterously. It doesn't take agenuis to figure out what was so terribly wrong about these hires. You said at first that teens don;t read magazines. That's not true. Theya re reading magazines--they are reading agazines that don't have a huge web presence (I already mentioned which ones those were). Hearst has gone so far as to BUY a web site for the specific purposes of peddling Seventeen and Cosmogirl and so far less and less are reading the magazine. At some point, those who do the hiring at Hearst are going to have to admit they are doing something very wrong. Sure, they canb fold up the magazines and put them online. But who says the kids will hit that? Why hit lame shit on the web (and it will still be lame shit, regardless of whether its online or on paper) when there is other good stuff out there? It's about the content, not the medium. If Sevteen and Cosmogirl fold, it will be because they suck, not because they suck on paper. |
| seeattleme | Posted – 7/12/2007 2:10:59 AM | show profile and i totally agree that the web offers all that you list: freeform flow of information. magazines don't. Why? because everything is overedited, secondguessed, red-lined, red-lighted, dumbed down and genericized. The editors of magazines are just not that bright. They don't know how to edit; they rewrite, they make everything snappy, they regurgitate information over and over and over. People are LAUGHING at magazines. The web doesn't overanalyze everything and wait six months to assign astory after running it past seventy senior exec deputy and in chief editors first. If magazines had content that was more like what you find on the web--distinct, unique, funny, timely, relevant, original, more reflective of American everyday life, and not just life in the tri state area or in manhattan, magazines could use the web and still sell. But magazine editors are too arrogant and too in love with the attention they get from their colleagues, they want to be celebrities and be on the Today show and shit. They don't want to be editors of great magazines. |
