In summary: Anna Wintour turned oddly sweet at the event; Backpacker.com was a sleeper hit; Field & Stream won a shock upset over the New Yorker; Si Newhouse is a mensch; Reader's Digest the big winner; and everyone loves Annie Leibovitz.

Further highlights from the tweets of Folio, Fishbowl NY, media blogger Rachel Sklar, and media blogger Glynnis MacNicol and NonSociety "lifestreamer" Julia Allison, who took the picture up top, of Jann Wenner, Tina Brown, Anna Wintour and Graydon Carter).

Winners:

· Reader's Digest for General Excellence (over 2,000,000 circulation)

· Field & Stream for General Excellence (1,000,000 to 2,000,000 circulation)

· Wired for General Excellence (500,000 to 1,000,000 circulation)

· Texas Monthly for General Excellence (250,000 to 500,000 circulation)

· Foreign Policy for General Excellence (100,000 to 250,000 circulation)

· Print for General Excellence (under 100,000 circulation)

· Saveur for Single-topic Issue

· Wired for Magazine Section

· The New York Times Magazine for Reporting

· Bicycling for Public Interest

· Esquire for Feature Writing

· Rolling Stone for Profile Writing

· Backpacker for Essays

· Automobile for Columns and Commentary

· The New Yorker for Reviews and Criticism

· The New Yorker for Fiction

· Esquire for Personal Service

· Esquire for Leisure Interests

· Wired for Design

· GQ for Photography

· National Geographic for Photojournalism

· The New Yorker for Photo Portfolio

· Backpacker.com for General Excellence Online (less than 1 million uniques)

· nymag.com for General Excellence Online (1 million uniques and above)

· Backpacker.com for Personal Service Online

· AARP The Magazine Online for Interactive Feature

Get excited, because tonight are the National Magazine Awards, the most glorious event in all of magazinedom! Thanks to the recession, "no chocolate fondue will bubble." What a ripoff. You can read a preview here if you care about the winners, or, if you're a media reporter from an outlet that will never win one of these awards, just hang out in the back row and talk shit, per usual.


The Newspaper Association of America is laying off half of its staff and ending print publication of its magazine Presstime. Plenty of remarks about irony could follow that statement, if one were so inclined, but the way things stand today, that would make one a callous jerk.

Ballplayer turned magazine publisher turned failed magazine publisher Lenny Dykstra has now been canned as a columnist for TheStreet.com. But he reportedly made "close to $1 million a year" selling his stock picks for them, so don't cry for Lenny. If you do, he'll slide into you spikes-first and spit a big stream of tobacco juice on your nuts.


Yusuf Bey, the owner of Oakland's Your Black Muslim Bakery, has been indicted on charges he ordered the killing of journalist Chauncey Bailey, because he feared what Bailey would report about his shady bakery's finances.

Advertising execs are encouraging cable news stations to keep the news crawl at the bottom of the screen going even during the ads, as a way to keep people from changing channels. Instead, how about put an "ad crawl" at the bottom of the screen at all times?

ASME can't really do much to renegade publications, as explained earlier this month in the New York Times. The disciplinary steps are:

• A warning letter.
  
• Withholding a National Magazine Award.
  
• Forbidding a title's participation in the National Magazine Awards.
  
• Suspending an editor's membership.
  
• A really nasty look.
  
• Saying "stop!" a second time.
  
• Brazen taunting.
  
• Jann Wenner critiques the state of your desk each week.
• An internship with Bonnie Fuller.

Obviously, in an advertising depression, certain publications are willing to give up hope of a National Magazine Award in exchange for some much-needed cash. Especially if they never had much hope of getting such an award in the first place.

Us Weekly had every reason to know it was over the line. The celebrity magazine ran a mock cover pimping HBO's Grey Gardens, albeit with a different title font and the word "advertising" across the top. ASME told MediaWeek "advertising cannot obscure the cover in any manner whatsoever," which seems pretty clear.

Entertainment Weekly, part of the esteemed, ethically-concerned Time Inc. empire, got a spanking for turning its cover into "a pocket that contained a pull-out ad for the ABC show The Unusuals," in the words of the Times.

ESPN had a fold-out cover flap touting a pitch on the other side for Powerade.

All three got an ASME reprimand, which is just a warning.

The question now is how long it takes before highbrow titles follow in the footsteps of the celebrity titles. They tend to look to the National Magazine Awards to burnish their upscale positioning. And will ASME will hold to its standards when they do, or just capitulate in the name "economic reality?"

[MediaWeek]

(Pic via MediaWeek)

A New York Times correction coming this weekend about an article from last December about a "vending machine for crows" in the Binghamton zoo says in part: "The Times has since learned that Klein was never at the Binghamton Zoo, and there were no crows on display there in June 2008. He performed these experiments with captive crows in a Brooklyn apartment; he told the reporter about the Brooklyn crows but implied that his work with them was preliminary to the work at the zoo...Corvid experts who have since been interviewed have said that Klein's machine is unlikely to work as intended." That's pretty bad.


The Newseum in DC had 714,000 paid visitors in its first year. That makes it just as popular as the Washington Post.


Toothless magazine group ASME is criticizing ESPN mag and EW for putting ads on their front covers. Here's what we imagine the mags' response is: "Give me one million dollars and then I won't do it."


A Fox employee has reportedly been arrested for stealing the personal information of other Fox employees. Actual quote from an internal Fox email: "The investigation suggests that the confidential data was used to annoy selected individuals." HAHAHAHA. ['Fox is annoying regardless joke']

[Newseum pic via Sonofgroucho]

On Monday we showed you a memo from XXL magazine to media buyers (which XXL's publisher denies came from his company) telling them that Giant magazine would fold soon. Hey check it out, Giant publisher Jeff Mazzacano left this in the comments: "GIANT is NOT shutting down and while all magazines are experiencing challenges due to the current economic climate, GIANT continues to grow. GIANT magazine is an integral part of Radio One's business and a valued contributor to their business as a whole. Under the editorial leadership of Emil Wilbekin, GIANT is well positioned for the ever-changing media landscape. We think it's unfortunate that someone would craft such a malicious post. Our May issue with Naomi Campbell is on newsstands April 14th, and our July/Power issue closes April 28th, reserve space now."


Public radio is a vicious dog-eat-dog world! NPR—which has had some serious budget cuts recently—is in a little feud with its member stations over how much money from local fundraising drives should stay with the local stations, and how much should be sent up to the mothership. But is money more important than a shared affinity for All Things Considered?


There's been quite a bit of ad creep in magazines lately—specifically, ads creeping onto the covers, which is a violation of ASME rules. So ASME is like "Hey guys, if you do that too many times, we might say you're not eligible for National Magazine Awards," and the magazines are like "Hmm, lemme see, award or going broke?" And then they keep putting ads on the covers.


Everybody is pissed about the black hole of money that is the Boston Globe. Bostonians are pissed because no one's stepped up to buy the paper, naturally. Globe employees are pissed at how the NYT Co. handled its communications about maybe shutting down the paper. And a former Globe writer is pissed at Pinch Sulzberger for being a pimp.


A college newspaper wrote a negative editorial about the school's baseball team, and then the editor "woke up Monday to a front porch littered with dead animals including rodents, a deer and a goat." This is the kind of passionate community engagement that will save newspapers.


To reiterate our earlier updated item on Nylon replacing print subscriptions with digital ones: that email "only went to a small number of readers who had picked up free subscriptions as a gift-with-purchase this past holiday at Urban Outfitters stores," okay?

Tipsters tell us that Budget Travel had some carnage this week. We hear that somewhere between two and twelve editors and staffers were laid off, and freelancers had their hours and pay cut. This prompted tears and panicked talk of having to sell apartments, we hear. If you know more, email us. [FBNY hears the same thing]


Dramatic drama at the Journal of the American Medical Association! A nonprofit group says that the Journal's two top editors "threatened a researcher who criticized a study published in the journal," and is calling on those editors to resign. No word from JAMA yet, but let's hope that everyone involved can resist the urge to settle this with a scalpel fight.


The editor of Southern Breeze theorizes: Shitty editors are to blame for magazines' demise.

ESPN Magazine has a god damn Powerade ad in this month's issue that folds out over half of the front cover, which, Jeff Bercovici points out, appears to be a violation of ASME guidelines. I imagine ESPN's response would be along the lines of: "Fuck ASME," followed by thirty minutes of fantalk about Manny Ramirez, until finally you pretend your cell phone is ringing just so you can get away.


And in the newspaper industry today, everything came to a grinding halt.

In her Chavez profile, Hall did eventually, if briefly and obliquely, reference the missile charges against Chavez. She also included two sentences, near the end of her article, about Chavez's suppression of opposition media. But the article's few skeptical notes were overshadowed by the warm overall tone and Hall's smile in the accompanying picture.

The Sentinel editor has near-complete autonomy at her newspaper, per orders from CEO Sam Zell and his insane radio henchmen, who have allowed leaders at other Tribune papers similar freedom. But some buttoned-down types in Orlando are not happy with what she's done with her power.

There were the near-topless photos she ran of Ashley Dupre, call girl to former Gov. Eliot Spitzer. All well and good on, say, Gawker, but, to one disgruntled email tipster, the photos were "newsless ... but hey, digital pasties covered her nipples, so its okay, right?"

Hall also stirred local controversy by running Annie Leibovitz's semi-nude photos of Miley Cyrus alongside a front-page story about the teen star's scandalous spread in Vanity Fair.

There is, at least, a certain logic to running the Dupre and Cyrus photos. American newspapers could use more sizzle, and Hall seems intent on providing it. All well and good.

But if she's going to be the hard-charing tabloid editor, Hall should have made sure she lived up to that persona in the interveiwed she scored with Chavez, a controversial world leader especially visible to readers in South Florida. At the very least, she should not have done a complete 180 and soft-pedalled the guy.

Next time, Charlotte, consider sending your pushy photographer and cussing boss for the big sit-down. They'd undoubtedly make a feisty interview team — just the thing for a would-be controversial newspaper.

• When The Atlantic wins, will new editor James Bennet accept the award, or will since-replaced managing editor Cullen Murphy, who actually edited the magazine when the nominated piece were published, get to do it?
• (Related: Will Murphy even be attending as part of the Atlantic crew?)
• How many people will be fired at The New Yorker for fucking up the submissions and therefore bringing the mag its fewest Ellie finalists in years?
• Would New York prefer a medal or a monument for getting five finalist nods? We know it's your record, guys, and bully for you. Now shush until you see if you actually, you know, win any.
• Why has the ceremony been shifted from a luncheon at the Waldorf to an evening event at Jazz at Lincoln Center? (And, more important, will there still be food?)
• Three finalist spots for Time and none for Newsweek, except for excellence online? A lot of good that ASME presidency is doing you, eh, Mark Whitaker?
• And, finally: What the fuck is The Virginia Quarterly Review? How did it end up with six finalists? Have any of you ever read it? Have any of you ever heard of it?

If anyone is familiar with this alleged Virgina Review and wants to provide a few grafs of description, we'd be much indebted. And we imagine not a few of our readers would be, too.

Please?

(After the jump, New York pats itself on the back.)

Atlantic Wins Big at ASME [NYP]
Memo Pad [WWD]
'Atlantic Monthly,' 'VQR' (Huh?) Lead National Mag Award Noms [FBNY]
Earlier: It's Ellie Time

For Immediate Release
March 15, 2006
Contacts: Serena Torrey and Betsy Burton
212-508-XXXX

New York magazine Receives a Record Five National Magazine Awards Nominations

ASME Recognizes Weekly for General Excellence, Design, Photography, Criticism and "Strategist" Section

New York, NY The American Society of Magazine Editors (ASME) today honored New York magazine with five nominations for its prestigious National Magazine Awards.

New York magazine was nominated for general excellence, design, criticism, photography and for its 18-month-old "Strategist" section.

This is the first time in New York's 38-year history that the magazine has garnered as many as five nominations in one year. The magazine's prior record was three nominations, which it received in 1984, 1986 and 2005, the magazine's first year under editor-in-chief Adam Moss, when it was nominated for general excellence, photography and the "Strategist" section.

Luke Hayman, New York's design director, joined the magazine in May of 2004 after an award-winning 2 _ year stay at Travel and Leisure and before that at Brill Media Holdings and I.D. Magazine. After completing a major redesign of New York magazine in November 2004, Hayman's team gained immediate recognition by the Society of Publication Designers, winning seven merit awards and one silver medal in 2004 and a gold medal award and nomination for best magazine design of the year in 2005.

New York's "Celebrity Psychos" cover was also selected as the best cover of 2005 by Advertising Age.

Photography director Jody Quon joined the New York magazine staff in April 2004 and has already received numerous honors for her team's work, including 13 American Photography 21 awards, and two awards from Photo District News (PDN).

The "Strategist" section was launched in October of 2004 and is overseen by editor Janet Ozzard. Named for New York magazine's longstanding "Urban Strategist" column, the "Strategist" includes the magazine's popular Look Book, its extensive food and restaurant coverage, a new incarnation of the Best Bets column, and numerous other features meant to make the magazine an indispensable guide to living in New York.

Mark Stevens, New York magazine's art critic since April 2004, won the 2004 Pulitzer prize and the National Book Award for the biography De Kooning: An American Master, which he co-wrote with his wife, Annalyn Swan.

# # #

The quick rundown: Atlantic Monthly leads with 8 nominations. The Virginia Quarterly Review comes in second with six nods, while GQ, Harper's, National Geographic, New York, The New Yorker all racked up 5 nominations apiece.

For the heavy-hitters (circulation over 2,000,000), the general excellence (best picture) finalists are Glamour, National Geographic, O, The Oprah Magazine, Prevention, and Time. Oh, what we'd give to see Oprah and Cindi Leive in a cage match for the big prize. Broken nails and bloodshed — bring it, bitches!

Finally, and most touchingly, the late Legal Affairs has received an honorary post-mortem nomination. We can't wait for the weepy montage of its better days.

After the jump, the press release and full list of the finalists.

—————————————
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
www.magazine.org

THE AMERICAN SOCIETY OF MAGAZINE EDITORS ANNOUNCES NATIONAL MAGAZINE AWARD FINALISTS

***
The Atlantic Monthly leads magazines with eight nominations

***

40th anniversary of the Ellies — magazine industry s premiere editorial awards to be presented Tuesday, May 9, at Jazz at Lincoln Center

NEW YORK, NY (March 15, 2006) Marlene Kahan, Executive Director, American Society of Magazine Editors (ASME), today announced the slate of finalists for the 40th anniversary National Magazine Awards (known as The Ellies ), the magazine industry s highest honor.

Twenty-two finalists will receive the coveted Ellie (named after the Alexander Calder Stabile Elephant ) at an evening awards ceremony on Tuesday, May 9, at Jazz at Lincoln Center, Frederick P. Rose Hall, New York City.

The 2006 finalists offer examples of the best in magazine journalism written on an array of diverse topics. Emerging themes among the 2006 nominees include:

Health care: Nominated articles covered subjects from fighting sports injuries to navigating the options for breast cancer treatment.

The war in Iraq and the war on terror: Reports included a sobering analysis of why Iraq s attempts to build a viable Army have failed, to an investigation of the shadowy programs of brutal interrogation that the United States has embraced in its war against terrorism.

Global warming: Nominations included how Exxon Mobil may be secretly funding some of the fiercest critics of climate change, as well as how it may already be too late for us to stop the dramatic global warming changes in our environment.

This year s finalists showcase the tremendous pool of creative editorial talent that is the hallmark of our industry, said Ms. Kahan. Magazines endure because of their ability to serve the ever-changing needs of readers with world-class content that informs, entertains and delights.

An analysis of the 2006 finalists reveals:

* Twenty-five finalists are magazines based outside of New York: in Austin, Boston, Berkeley, Cambridge, Charlottesville, Chicago, Conway (AR), Emmaus, Los Angeles, New Haven, San Francisco, Santa Fe and Washington, DC.

* First-time finalists include: Legal Affairs (recently closed), Backpacker, Town & Country Travel, McSweeney s, CNET.com and Men.style.com.

* The Atlantic Monthly leads the list of 115 finalists, with a total of eight nominations in seven categories.

* Twenty-three other titles received multiple nominations: Aperture (2), Backpacker (2), Cond Nast Traveler (2), Esquire (2), Everyday Food (2), Field & Stream (3), GQ (5), Harper s Magazine (5), Legal Affairs (2), Martha Stewart Living (2), Men s Health (3), National Geographic (5), New York (5), The New Yorker (5), O, The Oprah Magazine (2), The Oxford American (2), Rolling Stone (3), Scientific American (2), Texas Monthly (3), Time (3), Vanity Fair (3), The Virginia Quarterly Review (6), W (2).

The awards honor print and online magazines for superior execution of stated editorial objectives, innovative editorial techniques, noteworthy journalistic enterprise, and imagination and vigor in layout and design. Established in 1966, the National Magazine Awards is the preeminent program in the magazine industry to honor editorial excellence. The awards program is sponsored by ASME in association with the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.

Finalists were chosen by a panel of 215 judges from among the 1,643 entries submitted by 356 print and online publications.

The categories and finalists are:

GENERAL EXCELLENCE: This category recognizes overall excellence in magazines. The award honors the effectiveness with which writing, reporting, editing and design all come together to command readers attention and fulfill the magazine s unique editorial mission.

Circulation under 100,000:

Aperture, The Believer, Legal Affairs, Ready Made, The Virginia Quarterly Review

Circulation of 100,000 to 250,000:

Chicago, Foreign Policy, Harper s Magazine, Harvard Business Review, Town & Country Travel

Circulation of 250,000 to 500,000:

The Atlantic Monthly, Backpacker, New York Magazine, Texas Monthly, Technology Review

Circulation of 500,000 to 1,000,000:

Esquire, Everyday Food, House & Garden, Marie Claire, Runner s World, Wired

Circulation of 1,000,000 to 2,000,000:

ESPN The Magazine, Fortune, Martha Stewart Living, The New Yorker, Vogue

Circulation over 2,000,000:

Glamour, National Geographic, O, The Oprah Magazine, Prevention, Time

PERSONAL SERVICE: This category recognizes excellence in service journalism. The advice or instruction presented should help readers improve the quality of their personal lives.

Field & Stream, Men s Health, National Geographic, O, The Oprah Magazine, Self

LEISURE INTERESTS: This category recognizes excellent service journalism about leisure-time pursuits. The practical advice or instruction presented should help readers enjoy hobbies or other recreational interests.

Bicycling, Cond Nast Traveler, Golf, GQ, Men s Health

REPORTING: This category recognizes excellence in reporting. It honors the enterprise, exclusive reporting and intelligent analysis that a magazine exhibits in covering an event, a situation or a problem of contemporary interest and significance.

The Atlantic Monthly (two nominations), Harper s Magazine, The New Yorker, Rolling Stone

PUBLIC INTEREST: This category recognizes journalism that has the potential to affect national or local policy or lawmaking. It honors investigative reporting or groundbreaking analysis that sheds new light on an issue of public importance.

The Atlantic Monthly, Legal Affairs, Mother Jones, The New Yorker, Texas Monthly

FEATURE WRITING: This category recognizes excellence in feature writing. The award honors the stylishness and originality with which the author treats his or her subject.
The American Scholar, The Atlantic Monthly, GQ, Outside, The Oxford American

PROFILE WRITING: This category recognizes excellence in profile writing. The award honors the vividness and perceptiveness with which the writer brings his or her subject to life.

The Atlantic Monthly, Esquire, GQ, Los Angeles Magazine, The New Yorker, Rolling Stone

ESSAYS: This category recognizes excellence in essay writing on topics ranging from the personal to the political. Whatever the subject, the award honors the author s eloquence, perspective, fresh thinking and unique voice.

Harper s Magazine (two nominations), Vanity Fair, The Virginia Quarterly Review (two nominations)

COLUMNS and COMMENTARY: This category recognizes excellence in short-form political, social, economic or humorous commentary. The award honors the eloquence, force of argument and succinctness with which the writer presents his or her views.

Field & Stream, Inc., The New Yorker, Scientific American, Vanity Fair

REVIEWS and CRITICISM: This category recognizes excellence in criticism of art, books, movies, television, theater, music, dance, food, dining, fashion, products and the like. The award honors the knowledge, persuasiveness and original voice that critics bring to their reviews.

The Atlantic Monthly, GQ, Harper s Magazine, New York Magazine, The Virginia Quarterly Review

MAGAZINE SECTION: This category recognizes excellence of a regular department or editorial section of a magazine, either front- or back-of-book and composed of a variety of elements, both text and visual. The award honors the section s voice, originality, design and packaging.

Backpacker, Cond Nast Traveler, Entertainment Weekly, Men s Health, New York Magazine

SINGLE-TOPIC ISSUE: This category recognizes magazines that have devoted an issue to an in-depth examination of one topic. The award honors the ambition, comprehensiveness and imagination with which a magazine treats its subject.

National Geographic, The Oxford American, Saveur, Scientific American, Time

DESIGN: This category recognizes excellence in magazine design. The award honors the effectiveness of overall design, artwork, graphics and typography in enhancing a magazine s unique mission and personality.

Everyday Food, GQ, Kids: Fun Stuff to Do Together, Martha Stewart Living, New York Magazine, Nylon

PHOTOGRAPHY: This category recognizes excellence in magazine photography. The award honors the effectiveness of photography, photojournalism and photo illustration in enhancing a magazine s unique mission and personality.

Departures, Gourmet, New York Magazine, Texas Monthly, Time, W

PHOTO PORTFOLIO/PHOTO ESSAY: This category recognizes a distinctive portfolio or photographic essay. The award honors either photos that express an idea or concept, or documentary photojournalism shot in real time.

Aperture, Field & Stream, National Geographic, Rolling Stone, Vanity Fair, W

FICTION: This category recognizes excellence in magazine fiction writing. The award honors the quality of a publication s literary selections.

The Atlantic Monthly, McSweeney s, The Virginia Quarterly Review (two nominations), Zoetrope: All-Story

GENERAL EXCELLENCE ONLINE: This category recognizes outstanding magazine Internet sites, as well as online-only magazines and weblogs that have a significant amount of original content. The award honors sites that reflect an outstanding level of interactivity, journalistic integrity, service and innovative visual presentation.

Beliefnet, CNET.com, Men.style.com, National Geographic Online, Newsweek.com