Blog Magazine

Best-Selling People Magazine Celebrity Baby Cover

Last week Sandra Bullock's People magazine cover featuring the actress and her secretly-adopted newborn son took everyone--fans and Hollywood--by surprise. But as celebrity news blog Popeater reports, though the Sandra Bullock baby cover has been a huge seller, it hasn't yet topped sales of the exclusive photos of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie's newborn twins, Knox Leon and Vivienne from 2008, the celebrity magazine's highest-selling baby cover of all time.

But it's close. The Sandra Bullock People magazine baby cover has sold more than 2.7 million copies, only 100,000 copies shy of the Jolie-Pitt record of 2.8 million.

Time Magazine Picks 'Most Influential People'

People magazine isn't the only magazine putting out an annual list this week. Time magazine's 2010 edition of its "100 Most Influential People" was published yesterday.

Among the predictable picks, which are divided into leaders, thinkers, artists and heroes, President Obama, former President Bill Clinton, Apple Chief Executive Steve Jobs and Oprah Winfrey. This is Oprah Winfrey's seventh consecutive appearance on the list.

While pop star Lady Gaga, former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin and Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi were among the record 31 women on this year's list, Hillary Clinton, was not.

Time magazine's picks are based on staff suggestions and are decided by senior Time magazine editors.This year's list also includes a record 47 international figures from 23 countries.

Interestingly, Time magazine also separately ranked the 100 most influential people based on the number of followers and connections they have on Twitter and Facebook. At the top of the list, President Obama, followed by Lady Gaga and Ashton Kutcher.

People Magazine Names 'World's Most Beautiful People'

People magazine's 21st annual special double issue that features the celebrity magazine's picks for 'World's Most Beautiful People' list is out tomorrow. The issue also includes exclusive coverage of actress Sandra Bullock's divorce and adoption announcement.

At the top of the list--and deemed the 'Most Beautiful Person'--is actress Julia Roberts, who stars in the upcoming movie Eat Pray Love, based on the wildly popular memoir by Elizabeth Gilbert. This is Julia Roberts' 12th time to be featured in the special double issue. She is joined by fellow "Most Beautiful" regulars actress Halle Berry (14 times),  pop star Jennifer Lopez (nine times) and actress Angelina Jolie (eight times.) Actress Ashley Greene, who starred in the movie Twilight, is a newcomer to the iconic list.

Special categories in the 'Most Beautiful People' issue include women with ties to New Jersey, celebrity daughters, women named Jessica, a hot list and guys including Adam Lambert, who shares tips on wearing eyeliner.

Magazine Makeover: BusinessWeek

Last week BusinessWeek magazine relaunched with a new name, a new design and a new editorial vision. The magazine makeover comes four months after financial information giant Bloomberg LP bought the struggling 80-year-old business magazine. Under the new ownership, the magazine's title is now Bloomberg BusinessWeek.

Along with increasing its readers and making the Bloomberg brand a household to people outside the financial world, Fortune magazine recently reported that Bloomberg LP's ambition for the revamped BusinessWeek magazine is to make it "the American version of the Economist."

To accomplish this, Bloomberg LP has added 20% more editorial content including five new magazine sections: economics, companies, politics and policy, technology and markets written with on-the-go readers in mind. The sections are color-coded and many articles include summaries.

So how is the Bloomberg/BusinessWeek integration going internally? According to a recent New York Times article titled "An Uneasy Marriage of the Cultish and the Rumpled," the merger is at best challenging for magazine journalists, who have to adapt to the metrics-driven expectations of Bloomberg LP.

Barely-Covered Buzz: Allure Magazine

The latest magazine to feature strategically-covered celebrity photos: the women's magazine Allure, which released photos from its upcoming annual "nude issue" yesterday. Allure, a beauty magazine, declared "The clothes came off; the courage came out" of the issue out April 20. The magazine features tasteful nude (certain areas covered, of course) photos and "revealing" interviews with 5 female celebrities including actress Catherine Zeta-Jones and American Idol judge Kara DioGuardi. In the interviews the women talk about their bodies, body image and workouts.

TV Guide Magazine Cover Buzz

This week the Internet is buzzing over TV Guide magazine's upcoming cover featuring the cast of the mega-popular Fox musical-drama "Glee," which returned to prime time last night.

This is much-needed buzz for TV Guide magazine; the aging magazine's redesigned issue hits stands this week. 

The magazine, as we mentioned a few weeks ago is looking for ways to stay relevant, has reorganized its content with a color-coded system corresponding to the days of the week and  highlights editors' viewing recommendations. In addition to the redesigned content, subscribers will receive a daily e-mail newsletter with links to the magazine Web site and more programming information.

Marie Claire Magazine Cover: No Retouching This Time

The Internet is buzzing again today over a fashion magazine cover. This time it isn't outrage over retouching a celebrity photo though. Instead, the buzz is about the cover of Marie Claire magazine's May issue, which features not just a photo of Jessica Simpson but a photo of "The Real Jessica." That is "No makeup, No retouching, No regrets" as a cover tagline boasts.

Why would the oft-ridiculed Jessica Simpson appear on Marie Claire sans make-up? Simple--to promote her VH1 show, "The Price of Beauty" and her upcoming campaign "A Beautiful Me," in which the singer-actress aims to encourage young women to love themselves and feel comfortable in their own skin.

What do you think of the magazine cover photo?

O Magazine Anniversary Cover Revealed

O, The Oprah magazine is celebrating its 10-year anniversary with a special May cover featuring the superstar media mogul posing with an immense four tiered cake decorated with flowers and wearing a shimmering custom gown designed by Isaac Mizrahi, People magazine reports.

Early Reviews of iPad Magazine Apps are Mixed

We're less than a week into the Apple iPad's release and already hearing mixed reviews and reports about the magazine apps. Here's a round-up of various viewpoints.

MediaWeek reports magazine customers are excited about the new format but balking over the prices. On the iPad, single magazine issues cost $4.99, the same as a single print issue. 

Engadget reviews various newspaper and magazine apps including Time magazine and Popular Science magazine and explains the current chaos of pricing and content. From Engadget: "It's plain to see that different publishers have radically different ideas about how you're supposed to buy and consume their content, and everything from pricing to UI is currently up in the air. But while the apps we've seen so far are definitely intriguing, we haven't seen any silver bullets yet -- and to be perfectly honest, in several cases we wondered why an app was preferable to an iPad-optimized web site, or even (gasp) a paper subscription."

Lastly, minonline reviews Time magazine's iPad app, calling the news magazine's approach "workmanlike and easily navigable."

What do you think? Have you bought or seen any iPad magazine apps?

People Magazine Tops Magazine Hot List 2010

Yesterday Adweek magazine announced its annual Magazine Hot List. This year the honorees on the list were considered for the usual, traditional print reasons like ad-page gains but also by analyzing what each magazine did to expand its brand beyond print in 2009. 

One thing didn't change: the revenue requirement; to qualify as "Hot", a magazine still had to take in at least $60 million in annual revenue. In addition to the Top 10 Hot List, Adweek also ranked  the 10 Under 60--magazines that had less than $60 million in revenue, which include Food Network magazine, People Stylewatch, The Atlantic, The Week and All You magazine.

"While we didn’t abandon ad pages, we put greater focus on other measures of success this year, including circulation quality, with particular attention to newsstand sales, strength of engagement, smart brand extensions, and ability to find new ways to engage consumers and charge them for content."

At the top of the Hot List--People magazine. Of the popular celebrity magazine, Adweek said, "From print spinoffs (People StyleWatch, People Country) to taxi TV to iPhones, People magazine’s brand seems to be everywhere. With high circ prices ($4.12 single copy, $102.73 subscription) and ad response, People magazine is called “the workhorse of the business” as unfaltering growth leads one buyer to say, “There’s something magical about the People franchise.”

Also in the top 10: Women's Health magazine, Cosmopolitan, Men's Health, The Economist, Sports Illustrated, Runner's World, Family Circle, More magazine and Parent & Child.

AdWeek magazine also honored National Geographic with "Website of the Year" and Esquire magazine's editor-in-chief, David Granger, with "Editor of the Year."