Magazines

Condé Nast and Adobe Systems formed a strategic alliance, and the first crop to be harvested from it will be a digital-magazine application built on Adobe AIR runtime.

The two companies said they expect the app to be compatible with devices including laptops, netbooks, smart phones and the upcoming electronic color-slate devices.

Wired will be the first Condé Nast publication to deploy the digital-magazine app, which the companies said will "deliver full-color, high-resolution magazines that combine the immersive experience of its award-winning titles with the convenience and functionality of a digitally distributed and internet-connected product."

Condé Nast president and CEO Charles H. Townsend said:

This is the next piece of the puzzle for developing our unique magazine content in a digitalized format that will drive the new devices that will hit the market in 2010. Our hope is that the product of our work with Adobe will be used widely throughout the magazine industry.

These initiatives are part of a strategy by the company to extend its iconic brands into the digital world. Condé Nast's goal is to create experiences that closely resemble the process of reading its print magazines. The creation of a digital magazine using Adobe's authoring tools will create reader engagement that matches or even exceeds what it achieves in print.

And Adobe senior vice president of creative solutions John Loiacono added:

Condé Nast is home to renowned publishing brands, with magazines and reporting that help drive and hold a mirror to our culture. Our unique collaboration is a natural extension to the commitment that Condé Nast has made to the Open Screen Project and their support for the Flash platform. Condé Nast is trusting Adobe technology to deliver, in digital format, the high design values and visual aesthetic that readers and advertisers expect from them. We're confident that the resulting work will set new standards in visual impact and reader engagement for Wired and other flagship Condé Nast magazines.

If you don't like the name Techland for the just-launched technology site from TIME.com, you should see some of the alternatives.

In fact, thanks to a post by Techland's Lev Grossman, you can see some of the alternatives.

Grossman wrote:

So we heard a little grumbling after we unveiled the new name for this site. You know, the name that wasn't Nerd World. Some of that grumbling may even have been coming out of my mouth.

But naming a Website is harder than it looks. We couldn't get Nerd World. And when you're attached by a hideous Giger-like umbilical cord to a multinational mega-corporation, people like to sue you, so you can't get afford to get within a parsec of some chickenass trademark fight. And people assume you have infinitely deep pockets. Seriously, we had to bid on domain names through a proxy, so no one would know it was us who were sniffing around. One of the things that made Techland so damnably attractive is that Time Inc. already owned it.

Some of the rejected names for Techland, as described by Grossman:

1. BLASTOPH Personally I have no explanation for this idea. They liked it, I hated it.

2. TERABOSS Believe it or not, a strong contender. I take full credit.

3. BYTE CYCLE Yeah, that was mine too. Sort of like lightcycle. You know, like in Tron? But like with bytes? I hated this one 10 seconds after I thought of it.

4. NERDFORUM Dear Nerdforum: I never thought things like this happened in real life…

5. ECHOLATOR I challenge you to tell me what this means. I challenge all of you!

6. EMUL8TOR

7. DEE20 Awesome, right? Josh didn't get it.

8. NERDACITY This one polled well. But everybody pronounced it "Nerd-a-city." As in, let's go nerd a city. Not as in, the nerdacity of hope.

9. REPLIC8TOR

10. NERD CHRONICLE…of Higher Education? of Prydain?

11. GENIUS CLUB You know what? I still like this one.

TIME.com opened the gates to Techland, which it describes as a one-stop shop for technology, entertainment, games and culture.

TIME.com technology editor and former CrunchGear writer Peter Ha leads the Techland team, which also boasts TIME senior writer, book critic and lead technology writer Lev Grossman; TIME.com/Nerd World contributor and The Simpsons executive producer Matt Selman; and Steve Snyder, who will cover the latest films, DVDs and TV.

Techland will feature interviews with icons of the tech culture world; breaking tech news and features; previews of products, books and shows; weekly video wrap-ups with Grossman and Ha playing new games while discussing tech news; weekly video reviews; Battlestar Galactica updates; news on comic books, science-fiction literature and films; and exclusive clips, commentary and video interviews on TV shows, DVDs and video games.

TIME.com managing editor Josh Tyrangiel said:

Techland understands that the same people who care about the latest Apple news also happen to like Star Trek and World of Warfare. It's a link between technology and culture, with the resources and standards of a mainstream media outlet. We believe there's really nothing else like it.

Esquire will enter the world of Augmented Reality when its December issue hits newsstands Nov. 17, as the Hearst Magazines-owned men's-targeted title teamed up with digital-services and design firm The Barbarian Group and design and animation studio Psyop on the interactive issue.

The issue contains coded markers that "cause the magazine's pages to come to life in ways that have never been seen before" when held up to a Webcam, Esquire said, adding that five articles will contain the technology, including the cover, which features actor Robert Downey Jr.

Along with the Downey cover, the other Augmented Reality articles are: actor Jeremy Renner (The Hurt Locker) on the issue's fashion portfolio; Gillian Jacobs (NBC's Community) acting out two additional jokes in monthly feature "Funny Joke from a Beautiful Woman"; and profiles of rogue photographer JR and musician Robert Glasper in Esquire's annual "Best and Brightest" section.

Esquire editor in chief David Granger said:

For the last three years, we've been working at creating new ways for readers to interact with a magazine—using new technologies, as well as simple print innovations, to attract new readers and advertisers to the magazine. Magazines are the most compelling medium, and this project is a way to call attention to the fact that magazines are capable of things no other medium is.

The Barbarian Group co-founder and CEO Benjamin Palmer added:

The Esquire AR project is exciting to us because it represents a legitimate experiment in fusing print and digital media. Yes, it is fancy and fantastic, but it's not just a stunt—we're using technology to enhance, not usurp, the print medium. Our hope is that this is just the beginning of finding the best of both worlds.

Last month Time Inc. launched an initiative called "Assignment Detroit," in which Time journalists committed to "living in and reporting from the city of Detroit" for one year.

We're only a month in, but Amanda Ernst, editor of our sister blog FishbowlNY, decided to check in via Skype to see how things are going. Earlier this week she chatted with Time magazine correspondent Steven Gray, who lives in the Motor City house the news magazine is using as its Detroit bureau.

Here's one segment of their Skype interview below. You can find more at FishbowlNY.

LIFE.com will use technology from video-creation platform Animoto to create animated video galleries of some of its classic photography.

This initiative marks LIFE.com's video debut, and the galleries will be accompanied by specially selected music.

Videos that debuted on LIFE.com Friday include Being There: VJ Day, Classic NY Yankees, Steve McQueen: King of Cool, Grace Kelly's Wedding, LIFE Goes to France and Martin Luther King Jr.'s 1963 March on Washington, with others to be added throughout the year.

LIFE.com president Andrew Blau said:

The mission of LIFE.com has always been to share great photography and allow users to "see their world" through these images. We are thrilled to expand on this mission by partnering with Animoto and allowing users to view these galleries in video format, giving an added layer to the user experience with music and motion.

And Animoto CEO and co-founder Brad Jefferson added:

The LIFE brand is known for iconic photography and we're honored that LIFE.com is trusting Animoto's video-creation platform to communicate the stories of their beautiful photo galleries in video format. We're equally excited that LIFE.com is making LIFE photos available on Animoto.com to enhance users' ability to tell stories through their Animoto videos.

Fortune magazine's just published (online) list of "Business's Hottest Rising Stars" under age 40 features several familiar names in the world of social media.

Coming in at No. 2, trailing only Google co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page, is Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, whose early business card title was "I'm CEO, bitch." I'm sure Dave Chappelle would have been honored.

(A digressive complaint: Just once, couldn't the creators of these lists separate Brin and Page? It's not like they're Siamese twins, though apparently they still share an office. Plus, in a realistic world, isn't one at least slightly more hot/smart/important/cool than the other? Google workers, feel free to use our anonymous tip line to choose the more valuable co-founder, or post a comment below. Another thing, this is supposed to be a list of "rising" stars. Wouldn't you agree that two guys whose company is now the subject of anti-trust investigations have, you know, already risen?)

At No. 5 are (here we go again with the pairs) Biz Stone and Evan Williams, co-founders of Twitter. I think Biz is more important than Ev. (Actually, I have no idea; I'm just trying to get the ball of controversy rolling.)

Marc Andreessen grabbed the No. 10 slot. Another anachronistic choice, in my view. The Netscape founder has been around forever, it seems. But he did start social networking platform Ning, so he qualifies as a socnet player. In his profile, Andreessen says his "stress reliever" is "hard alcohol." Uh-oh. That can't be good.

No. 18 on the Fortune list is "Pony" Ma Huateng, founder and CEO of Tencent, an instant messaging service based in Shanghai, China. Fortune tells us that "ma" is the Chinese word for "horse." Hmm. Lucky guy.

For the full list, click here.

The Economist is trying to economize, as it will launch a new pay wall Oct. 13, with the major difference from its current structure being that the current week's print edition will only be available to subscribers.

Non-subscribers will only have access to all content more than 90 days old, rather than all content from the past 12 months.

The Economist Website publisher Ben Edwards said:

The Economist brand has innovated and expanded online, moving beyond making the magazine available via the Internet to become a hub for intelligent discussion and debate. Our intention is to continue to develop intelligent discussion as a free, advertising-supported experience, but to charge for the weekly magazine online.

Through "This week's print edition," we offer readers an online experience of reading the magazine. We consider this to be a premium reading experience and plan to develop the online edition of our magazine for our most loyal and engaged readers: subscribers. We will continue to encourage both subscribers and non-subscribers to participate in the extraordinary discussions we host on www.economist.com, Facebook and elsewhere, catalyzed by our breaking news commentary, our blogs and audio-visual content and by our award-winning debates.

Wal-Mart best symbolizes America today, President Barack Obama won't set a timetable for removing U.S. troops from Afghanistan, people wouldn't take health care services from Wal-Mart if the retailing giant offered them, the use of food stamps for high-fat food should be banned, the Obama administration should propose a tax of 50% or higher on the wealthiest millionaires, dining out has been the most difficult thing to cut back expenses on during the recession, affairs and bribes are both bad for politicians, Twitter is a fad that will fade, the likeness of Albert Einstein will be used to endorse products, men would like to trade places with George Clooney for a week and women would like to trade places with Michelle Obama for a week.

Are those the ramblings of an over-caffeinated blogger? Actually, they're the results of the first online poll conducted by 60 Minutes and Vanity Fair, and the two parties announced their joint venture to produce monthly polls, with the results to be made public on the TV show, in the magazine and on their respective Websites, 60Minutes.com and VF.com.

The two parties' goal is to create a national survey that will cover a broad range of questions, versus a more typical poll, which tends to focus narrowly on one subject.

60 Minutes executive producer Jeff Fager said:

It's a collaboration between two outstanding organizations and already, in its maiden effort, the results are fascinating.

And Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter added:

We very much liked the notion of taking polling to a more diverse place. This can serve as a monthly check up on the American condition, and it will lend itself to humor, as well as more serious topics. The combination of Vanity Fair and 60 Minutes—both of them wide-ranging in their interests, expertise and format—was a natural one.

More than 1,860 issues of LIFE magazine from 1936-72 are now available online via Google Books, giving users access to the issues in their entirety: stories, photographs, advertisements, covers, letters to the editor.

This announcement follows a previous partnership between the two parties, announced in November, under which LIFE made the contents of its image collection available through Google Image Search.

Life Inc. president Andrew Blau said:

LIFE magazine was there for every historical event, cultural shift and pop-culture occurrence. From our first issue in 1936 featuring President Franklin Roosevelt's work-relief project to coverage of Apollo 11, Marilyn Monroe, World War II, the Civil Rights Movement, The Beatles, the beehive and everything in between. Every day we receive requests from readers looking for these issues for research purposes and to find photos and articles featuring family members, hometowns and other memories. Now with these full issues available online, readers will be able to browse through history as it was being recorded.

And Google strategic-partner-development manager Andrew Madden added:

We're tremendously excited to partner with Life Inc. Our partnership will enable millions of people around the world to discover and access LIFE magazine's iconic archive online.