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joanne lipman
Posts Tagged “Joanne Lipman”
joanne lipman
portfolio magazine
Power: Jacob Lewis Has It, Joanne Lipman Doesn't
Portfolio's Joanne Lipman must be chafing at the New York Observer's flattering profile of her managing editor, Jacob Lewis. For sure, John Koblin's piece is the first positive coverage of the business magazine in a while. But almost every passage, while praising the new managing editor's calming influence on the troubled Conde Nast title, is an implied criticism of Lipman's management style. More »
portfolio
It's Always The Cover-Up That Gets You
Portfolio editor Joanne Lipman should learn rule number 63 or web publishing: by deleting a blog post, one only draws greater attention to it. On Friday, the Conde Nast magazine's media industry terrier, Jeff Bercovici, wrote a typically niggling piece for Portfolio's website about best-selling fabulist, Malcolm Gladwell (displayed after the jump). According to Bercovici, the Tipping Point author is the bane of the fact-checking department at his day job, as a writer for the New Yorker, another title owned by Conde Nast boss Si Newhouse. There was nothing that controversial about Bercovici's item: Gladwell has himself drawn attention to his mockery of orthodox journalistic practice. But the post disappeared from Bercovici's Portfolio blog over the weekend. More »
from the mailbag
Portfolio Editor Taken To Point Of Ecstasy By Boss
An online staffer has written in with a fairly lengthy account of the continuing discontent inside Condé Nast business magazine Portfolio. The anonymous tipster said that "every last person at the magazine" except new managing editor Jacob Lewis is lined up against editor Joanna Lipman, deputy editor Amy Stevens and senior editor Kyle Pope. (And the ungrateful hacks wonder why they are being pushed out the door!) But the anger may only be strengthening Lipman's position. Condé Nast patriarch Si Newhouse has a big fan in Lipman, who recently told staff her initial meeting with the Advance Publications CEO left her "so happy she could have been hit by a truck." Now Newhouse is said to have embattled Lipman's back. Email from the Portfolio.com insider after the jump. More »
rumors
Contracts For 'Portfolio'?
WE HEAR that Portfolio is pushing its staff writers into contracts. As it stands, writers at the magazine are considered full-time and get appropriate benefits. That would change if they became independent contractors who regularly write for the magazine. [Boy would it ever!–day ed] Rumor has it that senior writers Sheelah Kolhatkar and Kevin Gray have already been talked to and the magazine is trying to get rid of office space. Jesse Eisinger probably won't get screwed because he's a real financial writer and also subject to Joanne Lipman's adoration. Update: a tipster writes in with more details, after the jump. More »
magazines
The Evolution of Portfolio's Covers
Portfolio magazine's highly conceptual covers were commercially foolish, but rather brave. The cityscapes and factory floors of the Conde Nast title's first four issues paid homage to an earlier, more confident era of magazine publishing, in which editors could survive a bad month on the newsstand. And then, spooked by low sell-through numbers, Joanne Lipman panicked. January's Spy vs Spy cover could have been borrowed from the defunct Business 2.0; February's How Fat Won, illustrated by an overloaded burger, is a bogus trend story more often found in Newsweek. The latest shows a man's black shoe treading on a woman's red stiletto reminiscent of nothing more than a classy fetish magazine. Provocative? Pathetic? Discuss.
joanne lipman
Look Who's Toxic Now
Congratulations, Portfolio, on that lovely advertising spread for Apple's ultra-thin laptop on pages 2 and 3 of last month's issue. Whatever anybody's said about the magazine's editorial leadership, nobody doubts the Conde Nast title's appeal to advertisers. Ah, but then, again, there's that editorial leadership. Flick forward to Portfolio's feature on corporate polluters: Apple is among the magazine's 'Toxic Ten'. First of all, the magazine was ridiculously unthinking to include any computer company along with industrial giants such as Alcoa. More damning: Portfolio editor Joanne Lipman also forgot one of Conde Nast's golden rules: give an advertiser the opportunity to pull out of an issue containing a critical article. It's both polite, and politic. Apple is said by insiders to be furious, as is Portfolio's outgoing publisher, the normally unflappable David Carey, a rising star on Conde Nast's business side, and someone the embattled Lipman needs on her side. ENLARGE»
portfolio
When In Doubt, Attack!
Well, this is one way for Conde Nast to display its determination to make Portfolio a success. The business magazine's editor, Joanne Lipman, may have lost the confidence of her staff; and the title sells well under a fifth of the copies sent to newsstands. But conglomerate Conde Nast, which has committed $100m in one of the biggest magazine launches in recent years, is launching Portfolio in the UK. Lipman may be sacrificed, but too much money and prestige is invested for Conde Nast to allow the magazine to fail.
fort polio
For Big Spenders, By Big Spenders
Dana Thomas' gig at Portfolio sounds wonderfully cushy. The former Newsweek writer, now European editor at Conde Nast's business title (she asked for the title because it sounded "very grand"), went on a "couple-thousand" shopping spree after she signed her contract, according to the New York Observer. We suspect, however, that Joanne Lipman's extravagant magazine, which is funded to the tune of $100m, will waste more on the forthcoming opus by Jay McInerney. More »
fort polio
When Even The Contributors Are Critics
Joanne Lipman may be deaf to warnings from her colleagues. (The embattled Portfolio editor ran a poorly-sourced rehash of a 21-year-old story in the latest issue of the Conde Nast business magazine, despite protests from fact checkers and editors.) But that doesn't stop others from volunteering advice. The brittle editrix approached Michael Kinsley, editor of The New Republic in its heyday, about a freelance piece. She got something else. Says Kinsley: "I was talking to Joanne Lipman—who I'd never met—and she talked to me about writing a piece and I said I’ll write you a memo about what I think of the first few issues and what problems you have; I could just be another voice. I’m sure more criticism is just what’s she's in the mood for." And I'm sure that Lipman even more delighted by Kinsley's willingness to share their private conversation with the New York Observer.
fort polio
The February issue of Portfolio, which just hit newsstands, has a superficially fascinating account of fugitive fraudster Robert Vesco, who ran Bernie Cornfeld's bogus mutual fund in the early 1970s, and then escaped to Cuba. Except the profile, based on a poorly-sourced book by a Fox News correspondent called James Rosen, is as hollow as the investment empire Vesco ran. For Conde Nast's embattled business magazine, which staffers jokingly call Fort Polio, the article is an embarrassment; for the title's wobbly editor, Joanne Lipman, who forced through the piece against the objections of her colleagues, the publication is an indictment. How flawed is the piece? Here's how.
More »
Why Joanne Lipman Should Go
The February issue of Portfolio, which just hit newsstands, has a superficially fascinating account of fugitive fraudster Robert Vesco, who ran Bernie Cornfeld's bogus mutual fund in the early 1970s, and then escaped to Cuba. Except the profile, based on a poorly-sourced book by a Fox News correspondent called James Rosen, is as hollow as the investment empire Vesco ran. For Conde Nast's embattled business magazine, which staffers jokingly call Fort Polio, the article is an embarrassment; for the title's wobbly editor, Joanne Lipman, who forced through the piece against the objections of her colleagues, the publication is an indictment. How flawed is the piece? Here's how.
More »
magazines
Fort Polio
Joanne Lipman's Portfolio has not had the impact it hoped on the business conversation, but the unhappy Conde Nast magazine is certainly making a contribution to the journalistic lexicon. When the editor's not in earshot, staffers have been known to deliberately mangle the name of the embattled magazine: referring not to 'Portfolio', but to 'Fort Polio'. If only such wit made it into the magazine. But Portfolio's editor is notorious for shooting down ideas before she understands them. More »
armchair magazine management
Joanne Lipman's Replacement At Portfolio
Let's be generous and accept Memo Pad's word that Portfolio is selling 15-18% of the copies it ships to newsstands. (We'd heard some issues had registered as low as 12%). That's still deeply embarrassing for Conde Nast, which has committed $100m to the new business title, the biggest magazine launch in years — and maybe one of the last before print enters its final decline. One Portfolio writer says of the magazine's numbers: "Well, that's not that much lower than Cargo." Yes, but Cargo's dead. More »
herogram
Conde Nast's David Carey
The bespectacled magazine publisher, who ran the New Yorker's marketing and ad sales before being roped in to help Joanne Lipman launch Portfolio, has done better than merely surviving the new year's massacre at Conde Nast. He's now the leading candidate to replace Chuck Townsend as chief executive of the elite magazine group. Nobody wins corporate infighting without making critics but, if Carey has them, we can't find them. "Everyone wishes there was some dirt on David Carey, but there ain't," says one Conde exec. The Portfolio publisher doesn't even get the blame for the business magazine's troubled launch. More »
journalisms
'Portfolio' Editor Thinks Media Reporters Are Full Of "Nonsense"
At midnight, Conde Nast Portfolio editor Joanne Lipman sent out an email about the editor of their website leaving. Her message? Don't believe the things media reporters write! Isn't it cute when journalists go management and turn on the press? More »
crisis at 4xs
Will Portfolio.com Free Itself From Joanne Lipman?
It's apparently been the best-kept secret in town that Chris Jones, the managing editor of Portfolio.com, gave notice a full month ago—the staff were supposedly only told yesterday. And now, says WWD: "high-level discussion is said to be under way about divesting [Portfolio editor Joanne] Lipman of oversight of the Web site, with a possible new reporting structure to Portfolio.com's general manager, Ari Brandt, on the business side. (Like Jones, Brandt came from Yahoo!, where such reporting structures are in place.)" Well sure—we hear that meetings with Lipman can be so trying that people stomp out of the building for a breath of fresh air afterward. Plus! Bonus blind item for ya! What Portfolio editorial employee was spotted hanging around outside an old boss's office last week, eagerly waiting for a chance to talk privately?
Keith Kelly: "CONDÉ Nast Chairman S.I. Newhouse Jr. sat down Wednesday with Portfolio Editor-in-Chief Joanne Lipman to take a very serious look at every page in the upcoming November issue of Portfolio, his $100 million pet project. When the meeting was over, a flurry of Newhouse-dictated changes ensued, and that had some staffers concluding that Si was not happy with the original incarnation of Portfolio issue No. 4." Shockingly, Condé spokesfolk deny it. [NYP]
The third issue of Portfolio—on newsstands this week!—will not feature an editor's letter from Joanne Lipman. Someone tell Graydon Carter that this is a really good idea. [WWD]
