One of our tipsters subscribes to different magazines under different names, in order to smoke out those that are selling his name to various marketers. He's a Details subscriber. And lo and behold, which other magazine just sent him a discount voucher? The Advocate—the oldest LGBT magazine in America:

Why does The Advocate seek the same subscribers as Details? Because Details is so gay.

It's the kind of place where the neighborhood's aggressively coupled recent transplants can forget about astronomical housing prices and in vitro fertilization for a few hours while nibbling on chocolates from Dean & DeLuca or watching a mixologist squeeze fresh juice for a Blackberry Caipirinha. The sole beer is Grimbergen, served in a snifter. On this night, a student with a messenger bag peeked inside, then promptly left.

"I want to attract an international crowd," said Asio Highsmith, a model and one of the owners, adding, "This bar could be anywhere."

Like... HELL.

Not Ben's Words [Page Six]

Is it Ok to Demand Anal Sex? [Details]

A former Fairchild title, Details is a smallish magazine within the Conde Nast stable (not as small as Jane, though), so it's not surprising that its 2006 revenues were $65 million vs. GQ's 2006 comparatively whopping $190 million. That $65 million was a 13.5% increase over 2005. Its ad pages were also up 5.5 percent. And in the first three months of 2007, revenues were up a nice 24.4% and ad pages 9.7% compared to the previous year's period.

Hey, that's great! But let's remember the staff of ElleGirl, who were shocked when Hachette Filipacchi closed the magazine in May 2006 despite its strong numbers—they were showing better growth than Details. Your theories and speculation welcome!

Earlier: Dan Peres Okay With Being A Douchebag

Paying to have sex with soccer moms, one of whom is described as a "pudding of cellulite?" We think someone got confused amidst all the hot action. Anyway, in that particular instance, an "inner attraction" was cited (riiight), but the real appeal for "Mandingos" seems to be that these events enable them to forge connections to rich white people: "the way [one "Mandingo"] sees it, interracial orgies are the new golf."

Wow, there is so much information here for anyone who might be looking either to be a Mandingo or to have his wife boned by one. The only conclusion possible, maybe, is that the Details is looking to totally own the "leisure interests" category at next year's ASMEs. Seriously, take that, Golf Digest! —Emily

Meet the Mandingos [Details]

I used to work for a now-defunct delivery service in Manhattan in the early years of the millenium. Runners would be dispatched by pager all over the city (from 96th street down, naturally). The going price was $60 for a 2 gram box of hydroponic ( Cannabis Cup winning varieties like Juicy Fruit, White Widow, White Rhino, Blueberry, AK47, Humboldt Harvest, Bulldozer, G13). At $30 a gram, the price per ounce would be $810, so certainly $560 is nowhere close to the most expensive weed that exists, unless there were a volume discount. A funny blind item anecdote: Among many other low-grade celebs, I once delivered to the editor-in-chief of a certain magazine that rhymes with "Retails". Apropos of wide speculation as to the sexual proclivities of its readership, this editor chose a box of the cannabis varietal named "Closet Queen".

Earlier: 'Post': $560 Per Oz. Pot "Most Expensive In City History?"

Oh, come on.

IS STRAIGHT THE NEW SQUARE? [Details]

But anyhow: Last night we made our last trip to the newsstand for magazine-weighing purposes; naturally, it was our most grueling burden. But, for the sake of research, we lugged 13.5 pounds of aspirational luxury back to HQ and added them to the monstrous pile. Our back could be feeling better, thanks.

After the jump, the final weigh-in, featuring heavyweight champ Vogue and the other fatties.

Notes:
• Good to see Bazaar hanging in there with the African queen.
• Fuck you, Vogue.
• You know exactly why we included Details.

Earlier: September Issues: The First Fall Fashion Weigh-In
September Issues: Fall Fashion Weigh-In #2

Details is a men's magazine and it's clearly pretty proud of itself for its enlightened celebration of flesh over sinew. And so it illustrates its story with a pig — a pig's ass, no less. And, in doing so, suggests that all the beautiful women name-checked in the story for being healthy and sexy are actually farm animals. But wait! The pig photo isn't enough. No, click on the accompanying feature, the "Curves Ahead" slide show, featuring "a visual smorgasbord of the sexiest plate-scrapers ever." Notice that the slug for the slide show includes the word "Fatties."

And, to drive the point home, they included Miss Piggy in the slide show.

Hollywood and Swine [Broadsheet]
Why Fat Is Back in Hollywood [Details]

Win a Trip to the Set of Prison Break and Meet Wentworth Miller [Details]

Details [Style.com]

From: Peres, Dan
Sent: Mon Apr 03 18:17:00 2006
To: FP Details Edit
Subject:

Please join me in congratulating Brian Farnham, who has just been named the new Editor-in-chief of Time Out New York. Clearly, this is a bittersweet moment for me —- as I would imagine it is for all of you, as well. Brian will be greatly missed, as his contributions to Details these last 5 years have been instrumental to our success. For as much as this is a blow to the magazine, I couldn't be happier for — not to mention — more proud of Brian.

D.

You've all been seeing the black smoke coming out of my office these past months, but I've just officially changed it to white... we have an Editor-in-Chief!

Our new EIC is Brian Farnham. He resigned today from his position as Deputy Editor at Details magazine to accept our offer. His first day at TONY will be May 1st.
Brian came up through the ranks at Details, and previously held the titles Senior Associate Editor and Senior Editor. His focus was on the front of the book, developing writers, and conceiving new packages such as the annual Power issue.

He has worked freelance for the NY Times, New York, (where he also worked as a reporter early on), Harpers Bazaar, Newsday and Nerve, and he wrote a book about the creation of iWon.com, a $100 million CBS-backed web venture for which he followed the site's two founders for eight months. He was also a producing editor for Sidewalk.com.

Brian graduated from Bowdoin, and has an M.F.A from the Graduate Writing Program at Columbia. He was born and raised on the East side of NYC.

He is smart, funny, articulate, hungry, web-savvy, and an information junkie like the rest of us. I think he'll make a fantastic addition to the mix and take Time Out exactly where we want to go next. Of the many, many, MANY candidates interviewed, Brian stood out for his ability to articulate a vision for TONY and to generate package and front-of-book ideas that screamed TONY in a most refreshing way.

Brian's arrival also coincides nicely with the May 3 launch of our redesign. Get those binoculars ready, it's time for a new look!

I know you'll make Brian welcome, and I look forward to announcing an all staff soiree the week of May 1st to officially say hello.

Alison Tocci
President/Group Publisher
Time Out New York
475 Tenth Ave., 12th floor
NY NY 10018

And the gayest magazine is — tasteful drumroll, please — GQ, where 10.39 percent of male readers are gay or bisexual. EW comes in a very close second, with 10.35 percent of its male readers identifying itself as gay or bi, and then there's a big drop to third place.

Details, shockingly, is nowhere on the list. We were all set to apologize to Dan Peres and crew for years of jokes, but then we read the small print:

The study only includes titles with certain circulation levels (eliminating Details), and does not include gay-interest titles like Out.

So Details is both faggy and unpopular. It's like high school all over again.

After the jump, the full top-ten list — plus the top ten straightest pubs, which features a tough contest for first place among the likes of North American Hunter, Four Wheeler, and Guns and Ammo.

Click to enlarge. Or read the lists below:

Gayest
1. GQ, 10.39% of male readers are gay/bi
2. Entertainment Weekly, 10.35%
3. TV Guide, 5.46%
4. People, 5.1%
5. Newsweek, 4.74% (tie)
6. Time, 4.74% (tie)
7. Men's Health, 4.68%
8. National Geographic, 4.1%
9. Consumer Reports, 3.96%
10. U.S. News, 3.9%

Straightest
1. North American Hunter, 99.9% of male readers are straight
2. North American Fisherman, 99.5%
3. Four Wheeler, 99.45%
4. Guns & Ammo, 99.43%
5. Sporting News, 99.41%
6. American Rifleman, 99.37%
7. Cycle World, 99.25%
8. Stuff, 99.23% (tie)
9. Field & Stream, 99.23 (tie)
10. Midwest Living, 99.23 (tie)

Not that there's anything wrong with that.

Details [men.style.com]

(* By which, of course, we mean the Nationals. Yeah, that's it. Because he's a New Yorker, not a Washingtonian. So he's gotta be a Yankees fan. That's all we're saying.)

Herewith, Wonk's attempt to steal our man:

The Many Moods of Anderson Cooper

Who among us does not delight in Anderson Cooper's breezy-yet-caring columns for not-gay-at-all Details magazine, thoughtfully reprinted on CNN.com? He writes on Katrina, on going gray, on his brother's suicide and on being a Jeopardy champion — each month we are reminded the multitudes that Anderson contains. Multitudes of experiences and emotions but only two facial expressions:



Of course, around here, "Talking sex with Mom" would also have the sad face. If not the run-screaming-from-the-room face.

Or even the why-are-you-talking-to-our-sister-about-this-instead-of-us face.

Anderson Cooper Commentary [CNN via Wonkette]

Over the last year or so, he notes, that fixation has encompassed examinations of "metrosexuals," "ubersexuals," "gay vague," and the "man date." It entailed an expose of closeted suburbanites who may make "A Sex Stop on the Way Home," as the B1 headline put it, and included a Style Magazine feature musing on a Soho brunch with a quarter of gay men, at which Cher — who else? — was discussed.

Dumenco writes, somewhat bitterly and entirely fairly:

[T]he paper's ongoing Kinsey-esque project of parsing moderning masculinity is a time-consuming journalistic undertaking — sort of like searching for weapons of mass destruction. Relentlessly defining, charting, and quantifying the mysterious modern condition known as masculinity, as the Times sees it, it serious work.

That said, men who appear in public in pairs would be well advised to avoid Italian restaurants, SoHo brunch spots, parks, and other wooded areas when Times reporters are in the vicinity. The Times has its eyes on you, guys. Don't try anything funny.

But, hey, feel free to say something funny — about Cher and whatnot.

So, how does Details coverline Dumenco's smart take on the Times's habit of, as he says, "[o]bsessing about The Gays ... while aiding and abetting gay panic?" Like this"

When Did The New York Times Come Out of the Closet?

Um, it didn't, at least not according to the article. But totally misconstruing the article is forgivable: We all know how much Details likes the closet cases.

Details [men.style.com]

I started a new tradition for CNN, although I'm not sure it's going to last.

In addition to the ball drop in Times Square, we had cameras covering the Drag Queen Drop in Key West, where, at the stroke of midnight more or less, a drag queen named Sushi, sitting inside a giant ladies' shoe, is lowered from the roof of a gay bar.

We'd interviewed Sushi live a couple of times throughout the night, and by midnight ... well, let's just say that Sushi was no longer too fresh.

When she started to descend, something malfunctioned, and the shoe stalled. The last we saw of Sushi, she was crawling on all fours along the roof of the bar.

I told the director to cut away. Seeing a drag queen actually drop off a roof is not how I wanted to kick off the new year.

Under the roof, however, and inside the gay bar — well, that's a whole different story.

Just Say No to New Year's Eve [CNN.com]

-I still refuse to admit I'm gay.
-In the TV news business, gay equals gravitas. In fact, in just about any line of work being prematurely gay is an advantage.
-I don't get it, but gay on guys drives a lot of folks wild.
-Translation: Gay is nature's way of whispering "You're dying."
-The other thing that happens when you start getting gay: You begin checking out every other gay-haired guy.
-This can deteriorate into something of an obsession. For a while, every time I saw Phil Donahue, I had to reassure myself: It's okay. I'm not as gay as he is.
-My advice? Give in to gay.

Ah, find/replace. The parodist's greatest friend.

Going Gray [CNN]

Could it really be five years ago that the mag was freshly arrived at Fairchild from Conde Nast, that Dan Peres was freshly arrived from Paris to edit it, and that Mark Golin and his laddiness was only recently shitcanned? Apparently it can.

At the same time, we can't escape the feeling that so much has changed. There's a permanence to the magazine now, a feeling of reliability and success. Five years ago, it seemed like Details could disappear at a moment's notice — it had, after all, gone through four editors in five years before Peres came on. Now it's a fixture.

But what makes it seem so much more, well, comfortable with itself?

First we went looking through the data, to find numerical evidence of this change. But we found something funny: Details's stats don't seem any better today than they did in that relaunch issue, in October 2000.

Circulation, fourth quarter of 2000: 445,996
Circulation, first half of 2005: 407,167

Ad pages, October 2000: 132.01
Ad pages, August 2005: 75.78

Ad revenue, October 2000: $4.41 million
Ad revenue, August 2005: $3.76 million

[Sources: Advertising Bureau of Circulations, Publishers Information Bureau. 2005 numbers cited are the most recent available.]

Hmm. So if that's out, what could it be that makes the mag seem so much more settled today than it did five years ago?

We started flipping through the issue, and we found the answer when we reached Peres's "Letter from the Editor":

"Is Details gay?"

Since becoming editor-in-chief of this magazine five years ago, no other question has been put to me, if you will, more often.

To be clear, from the beginning I have maintained that Details would be a magazine for intelligent, sophisticated men — both gay and straight. After all, I said at the time, the line between homo and hetero has become so undetectable, you can barely tell the difference anymore. Most men don't care anyway, I'd add.

I was, of course, lying.

Ah yes, that's it. Finally coming out can make anyone — or anything, apparently, including a magazine — seem so much more comfortable with itself.

Congrats, Details. We'll see you at Beige tonight.

Details [Official site]