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Masthead News Archives
August 2001
August 2001
| August 30, 2001 Too little, too late for Write TORONTO-Chris Garbutt, publisher of Write magazine, announced the indefinite suspension of the magazine's publication, effective Aug. 17. "Towards the end, I was pretty much paying for the privilege to have done this magazine," says Garbutt, adding that he's incurred approximately $20,000 in personal debt since the book's launch as The Lazy Writer in 1997 (it was relaunched as Write in 2000). As for the $13,647 Write received in Canada Magazine Fund subsidies for fiscal 2000-2001, Garbutt says he applied for the money last fall to fund publication of Write offspring The Canadian Writer's Yearbook, a writer's resource guide published in Jan. 2001. Garbutt says he received the CMF cheque in April and paid outstanding printing and newsstand promotion expenses for the yearbook. Barring a last-minute buyout, Garbutt says he has no plans to revive Write. A note to MastheadOnline.com readers MastheadOnline editor Bill Shields is on holiday until early September, so we apologize to addicts who aren't getting their daily fix of magazine industry news. The rest of the crew here will be posting news stories occasionally until Bill returns, so please continue to check in. The Job Board remains fully functional. Readers in Atlantic Canada should be on the lookout for a sleek black-and-silver Yamaha motorcycle with Ontario plates and a yellow-jacketed man astride. That's Bill. |
| August 20, 2001 Small magazines receive $500,000 OTTAWA—The Department of Canadian Heritage announced today that 15 magazines received at total of $503,059 Canada Magazine Fund subsidies for fiscal 2000-2001. Interestingly, Write magazine—which announced three days ago that was folding due to “financial problems too great to surmount”—received $13,647. Publisher/editor Chris Garbutt could not be reached for comment.The full list of recipients can be viewed at www.pch.gc.ca/culture/cult_ind/cmf/mag-e-00-01.htm |
| August 15, 2001 Eatons offers Oasis to cardholders TORONTO—About 300,000 Eatons cardholders will be mailed a glossy new lifestyle magazine this month. Oasis is an oversized quarterly published by Toronto-based custom publisher Multi-Vision Publishing. Eatons parent company Sears Canada accorded the contract to produce the title last fall. It fills a yawning void in Eatons print-product portfolio following a decrease in flyer output and the discontinuation of the barely revived Eatons catalogue, which relaunched last October after a 24-year absence only to be officially discontinued this past spring. |
| August 14, 2001 Annex purchases two Alberta mags CALGARY—Delhi, Ont.-based Annex Publishing & Printing has acquired two glossy aviation magazines published by Calgary’s Corvus Publishing Group Ltd.—the quarterly Helicopters and the bimonthly Wings. With this deal, which closed Aug. 2, Annex now publishes 22 magazines. |
| August 13, 2001 Rogers outsources list-rental business TORONTO–Canada’s largest magazine publisher has deepened its relationship with the country’s largest list broker. A late-July deal between Rogers Media and Cornerstone List Management will see the latter manage a set of consumer-magazine lists representing roughly 1 million unique addresses, says Rogers Media consumer marketing vice-president Tracey McKinley. Those magazines are: the French and English editions of Chatelaine, Flare, Maclean’s, L’actualité, Canadian Business, Profit and MoneySense. Cornerstone already manages the Today’s Parent Group database. |
| August 10, 2001 Damage control at Transcon MONTREAL—In the wake of news that Coup de Pouce editor France Lefebvre fabricated Francophone names in place of English ones in articles borrowed from sister title Canadian Living, Transcontinental Media promised today that it will draft a set of rules governing future content-sharing arrangements by year’s end. Canadian Living editor-in-chief Charlotte Empey says the forthcoming guidelines “will stand not just as a model for the family of Transcontinental magazines, but as a model for the magazine profession.” Of the transgression itself, Empey said: “A mistake was made by the editor of Coup de Pouce ... Obviously, changing peoples’ names holus-bolus is not appropriate.” Periodical Writers Association of Canada president Ann Douglas denounced the name-changing as unethical. “[Journalists] already get a bad rap from Joe Public. This isn’t going to help things.” Lefebvre did not return calls. The material in question is contained in the Spring 2001 issue of Coup de Pouce Santé/Vitalité, the French version of Canadian Living Health for Life. |
| August 9, 2001 Rogers acquires association titles TORONTO—Rogers Media recently announced that it has acquired publishing rights to the two association quarterlies produced by the Canadian Diabetes Association—Diabetes Dialogue (for patients) and The Canadian Journal of Diabetes Care for association members. Ad sales for the two titles was formerly carried out by Keith Healthcare. |
| August 08, 2001 McAuley resigns from Key Media TORONTO—Quill & Quire publisher Sharon McAuley will join Transcontinental Media as a group publisher, a source reveals. Montreal-based Transcontinental is expected to announce today that McAuley will head up the Investment Group of titles (IE:Money magazine, Investment Executive newspaper and the Web site investmentexecutive.com). She replaces Liz Martin who resigned earlier this year after being diagnosed with an unidentified auto-immune disease. Key Media executive chairman William Duron confirmed yesterday that McAuley submitted her resignation Aug. 3; her last day at Key will be Aug. 24. McAuley, who is also the immediate past chair of the Canadian Magazine Publishers Association, declined to comment. Transcontinental spokespeople were not available for comment. |
| August 07, 2001 Editorial elite “essence of mediocrity” TORONTO—A National Post article published on the weekend quotes prominent Canadian freelancer Guy Lawson as having said that the Canadian magazine industry is ruled by commonplace minds. In a feature entitled “Our cultured exiles,” Lawson is said to have moved to New York because Canadian editors didn’t have the good sense to purchase his articles. “The people who hold the keys to the culture of Canada in the magazine and media industry are the essence of mediocrity. There are exceptions, but it seems that the exceptions are always suppressed,” quoth Lawson to the Post. |
| August 03, 2001 Business magazine hires Ryerson prof TORONTO—Journalism professor David Hayes, who teaches magazine writing at Ryerson University and is a frequent contributor to Toronto Life, will take an unpaid leave from his academic post Aug. 6 to commence a renewable one-year contract with National Post Business magazine, the glossy monthly insert to the National Post newspaper. As senior correspondent, Hayes will assist in fleshing out feature articles as well as penning a few himself. His first piece will appear in next month’s issue. Sources indicate National Post Business editor Tony Keller is prospecting for a thick vein of National Magazine Award gold. |
| August 02, 2001 Zdorov! ceases publication TORONTO—If there is a Bermuda Triangle in Canadian periodical publishing, it’s in the vicinity of ethnic media. The genre has swallowed many a title. Magazines such as eyetalian, and Chinese-language editions of Maclean’s, Toronto Life and enRoute have all vanished. The latest casualty is Zdorov!, “The Magazine of Ukrainian Things,” a glossy quarterly launched in December 1996 by Nestor Gula and Yuriy Diakunchak. “We ran out of money,” says Gula, citing a lack of advertiser support. The 17th and final issue was Winter 2001. Gula says advertisers were reluctant to purchase space in his English-language magazine as they felt they could reach the same demographic using the mainstream press. |
| August 01, 2001 Maclean’s picks business columnist TORONTO—Former Maclean’s business columnist Deirdre McMurdy, who stepped down after hubby Anthony Wilson-Smith was appointed editor in March, has been replaced by Donald Coxe, who manages about $1 billion in investments owned by a unit of the Bank of Montreal. His first column appears in the Aug. 6 issue. |
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| Jaded says: | |
Wow, Torstar really seems to be on a mission to bankrupt one magazine after another.... |
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| Lorene Shyba says: | |
Full of terrific information, Thanks!... |
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