Just because Forbes Traveler didn't end up folding on Friday doesn't mean the company is doing okay. In fact, Forbes laid off 43 employees and shut down Forbesauto.com, as well as their conference division.
And even more cuts may be along the way, as Steve Forbes sent a memo out to staff today announcing the merger of the sales division of Forbes and Forbes.com. And that's just the business side!
Hidden in all the pleasant office jargon of Forbes' memo was a scary prediction:
CONTINUED »
Update: Forbes Traveler is not closing down, as the rumor mill suggested on Friday. And as much as we loathe being wrong, it's awesome that the last couple of magazine shutterings have all turned out to be false.
Now you can go on your expensive Maui vacation you found out about in Forbes and bring a couple stacks of Nylon along for the ride, secure in the knowledge that both will still be around for at least another week or so. Which is more than you can probably say for your 401k and health benefits.
Forbes, the magazine that continues to be published so it can put things in listicle format, released its annual Celebrity 100 ranking, a run down of the most important famous types whose wealth and power far surpass your own special skills, like cutting in line at Shake Shack. In what should come as a surprise to absolutely nobody, Oprah Winfrey reigns atop the list, followed by Tiger Woods, Angelina Jolie, Beyonce Knowles, and David Beckham — which means of the top five are three black people and one transvestite. How progressive..
Bill Gates has been knocked off the top of Forbes' billionaires list after a 13-year run. In his place? Warren Buffett. (Mexican telecom mogul Carlos Slim Helú is No. 2.) For what it's worth, Mark Zuckerberg, who founded Facebook, the social network that Gates recently removed his profile from, is No. 785.
• The children of Nicaragua celebrate the victory of the children Boston missed out on.
• Just another reminder of our media bubble: The number one emailed article on the New York Times is still about golf.
• Both being black females, Vivica A. Fox and Raven Symone are easily confused.
• Apparently there is such a thing as too much Facebook.
• More lesbian hands, this time with less jokes about why lesbian hands are wrinkly.
• The class acts at CJR are also tired of Forbes lists.
Have someone dunk their head in cow’s blood once for a small prize, and it’s a ratings bonanza. Have someone dunk their head in cow’s blood twice, and no one cares.
Apparently that’s the predicament networks are in: Reality TV is boring. There’s no shock factor any more—the people have been shocked enough already.
Breaking from its usual list format, Forbes argues that reality TV is so last season: CONTINUED »
For a long time, we had trouble distinguishing between Forbes and Fortune. They both start with “For,” both cover business and are both kind of boring.
But over time, we learned that Forbes is the one that puts out web hit generating lists and Fortune is the other one. Forbes love of lists has extended to a partnership with E!. Forbes 20 Richest Women in Entertainment wasn’t exactly the Frontline quality TV journalism.
If Forbes wants to let E! siphon off its gravitas, so be it. Until now.
Forbes put New York as the fourth most miserable American city to live in. Have their editors even visited the rest of the country? CONTINUED »
In honor of Halloween, Forbes has compiled a somewhat macabre list of the Top-Earning Dead Celebrities. The artist formerly known as Elvis Presley snags the coveted number one spot (Quelle surprise!) edging out worthy competitors such as John Lennon's corpse and the ghost of Marilyn Monroe.
Meanwhile, the deceased Tupac Shakur snagged eight place, despite reportedly initiating an East Coast/West Coast rivalry "thing" with the now-soulless Godfather of Soul. [via Stereohyped]
Useless list month continues at Forbes.
This week, it’s top selling faces, not in terms of plastic surgery requests, but by magazine sales. According to Forbes, Jennifer Aniston has the best selling mug.
But in the past year, Jennifer Aniston has not found love, lost love, become addicted to drugs and/or alcohol, overcome addiction to drug and/or alcohol, gained weight, lost weight, given birth to a child or adopted a child.
It’s a mystery to us that she even gets on the cover of tabloids, let alone sells them. But the list is kind of funny: Britney Spears and Lindsay Lohan, who’ve done nearly all of those things, didn’t even make it.
CONTINUED »
Forbes breaks the news that Oprah is rich. Really, really rich. Last year, she earned $260 million. To give that some perspective, Jerry Seinfeld, the second highest paid person in television, made less than a fourth of Oprah's income.
What’s the deal with that?
[Forbes]
The most famous pundit in America is Roger Ebert. At least that’s what Forbes's new list says.
We thought pundit referred to a political commentator, but we checked Merriam-Webster, and the official definition is a person who gives opinions in an authoritative manner usually through the mass media.
Roger Ebert is a pundit, in the same way that Rosie O’Donnell (6), Leonard Maltin (7) and Bill Walton (10) are.
With apologies to our favorite movie “pundit” A.O. Scott, but Roger Ebert really is the best known film critic in the world. Even his trademarked thumbs make news. Since Ebert was diagnosed with jaw cancer, the only topic Romenesko posts more about is job cuts.
Still, what kind of list is this? Rosie O’Donnell isn't even an authority on her own book.
Last year, Bono decided saving the world wasn’t enough of a fruitless venture and got involved in publishing. With Elevation Partners, Bono bought into the Forbes family empire last year.
It turns out, Bono is a shrewd investor. Elevation Partners has been cutting expenses at Forbes, like getting rid of its Greenwich Village HQ, selling its helicopters and downgrading its yachts. It’s likely that Bono and Elevation will cash out in a few years after raising Forbes’s value.
One insider said that Steve Forbes financed his 1996 and 2000 runs for the Republican nomination with money he took out of Forbes. Even Bono could have told him that a narcissistic presidential run would have been a bad investment.
Breaking: "Meredith Vieira's shift to co-anchor of "The Today Show" was a smarter career move than Katie Couric's arrival at CBS Nightly News!" according to Forbes' annual ranking of the World's Most Powerful Women everyone in media.
And while Vieira pulled in at number 55, Couric ranked at a paltry 63, which was just good enough to place her three spots behind First Lady Laura Bush and just behind her arch nemesis, Diane Sawyer, who clocked in at 62.
Absent from the list was Vieira's former View co-host, Rosie O'Donnell, though it should be noted that Barbara Walters ranked 75th overall (and 12th in pay) on Forbes' "Celebrity 100" earlier this year.
Meanwhile, despite being able to bounce a quarter off her derrière, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice saw herself get "bounced" down to 4th place, losing the top spot to German chancellor Angela Merkel.
• Still recovering from a car accident earlier this month, Times' managing editor Jill Abramson has finally checked out of Bellevue hospital. During her stay, Abramson kept herself busy cooking up frivolous lawsuits working on a top-secret investigative project for Bill Keller.
• Despite failing to "shiver me timbers," Pirates breaks box office records over the weekend. Or does it?
• Dennis publishing announces plans to open Maxim Bungalows hotel in the Dominican Republic, presumably catering to those conservative types.
• Forbes encourages NBC to "save the peacock" by adding more reality tv programming. Which is so funny, because we were just talking about the dearth of shitty reality television nowadays.
• Lou Dobbs continues to blur the line between truth and fiction with his controversial reporting. Related: Janice Min to target Dobbs in Us Weekly's next 'Fake News' roundup.
• ABC's fall schedule to include "Geico cavemen" sitcom; Unimaginative tv critics poised, ready to blast the show as being "too commercial."
• Only Ron Burkle can explain how owning Radar fits into his plans of total world domination.
• Forbes.com chief executive Jim Spanfeller admits to running a "page-view sweatshop."
• XM Radio DJ's are suspended after admitting that "a homeless guy wanting to f—k Condoleezza Rice" was kinda hilarious.
CONTINUED »
Since leaving Seventeen magazine, former EIC Atoosa Rubenstein's path has not been entirely clear. The curly-haired editrix has been plugging her new, psychedelic website, blogging about her repressive youth and maintaining her throngs of adoring teenage fans by diligently updating her MySpace.
And now come reports that Rubenstein has been named as the latest Forbes.com columnist. 'But wait,' you wonder. 'Have Atoosa's encyclopedic knowledge of leggings, adolescent slang, and underage heartthrobs prepared her for this milestone?'
Fortunately, WWD has the answer!
CONTINUED »
• ABC confirms what we already knew by publicly admitting that Amanda Congdon's not really a "journalist."
• Forbes to start their own version of "Business Vogue." Experts predict it will be a lot like Portfolio, except for frumpier women. With spectacles!
• Conrad Black evidently sent out emails bitching about having to work pro bono. Then he embezzled $60 million.
• The L.A. Times opinion editor quits over some sort of embarrassing sex scandal, and Brian Grazer is (probably) to blame.
• Page Six trumpets the romance between Katie Coric and not-exactly-starving musician, Chris Botti. (Rumor has it, he's got "jazz-hands!")
• Teen Vogue sales soar because of Lauren Conrad's tv internship. Or else maybe it's because all the other teen mags have folded. Like, literally, all of them.
• Dave Zinczenko makes the CEO of Joseph Abboud look foolish and is forced to choose between Elaine's and the Waverly Inn. (What would Details do??)
• News Corp., NBC challenge YouTube by creating their own video site. Which is kind of like suing YouTube, except much smarter!
• Everyone likes the brand new Time except the editor in chief of In Touch weekly.
• The creator of the "Orwellian" YouTube ad against Hillary Clinton is anticlimactically revealed to be…some random Democrat who works for a digital consulting firm.
• Brian Grazer's personal life gets in the way of his professional ambitions. And for once, we're not resorting to low-brow "pee" humor.
• The EIC of the Russian edition of Forbes was found guilty of defamation yesterday, in news that's probably "much, much more relevant" in Russia.
The results of this week's Jossip Poll: "Is Michael Noer a Sexist, a Fair Journalist, or a Total Douche?" are in. (If you haven't heard over all your vacuuming, he wrote the Forbe's article on why marrying a gal with a career is the worst thing a guy could possibly do.)
39% of you think Noer's a total sexist asshole, while a crazy 7% of you agree with Jack Shafer. (We think that's likely his usual mark, though.) However, the majority of you don't really give a shit what Noer has to say. (Either that or you just really like the word douche. It's ok. We do, too.)
Thanks to all who voted and chose to participate in this extremely important discussion. Also, thanks to all the guys out there who take pity on the evil career women of the world, and still go through the awful process of marrying them.
Earlier: Vote on Michael Noer: Sexist Prick, Balanced Journalist, or Useless Douche?
We are trying to avoid the existence of Michael Noer's "Don't Marry a Career Girl" article, mostly because we don't think it's worth the effort to try and explain to guys like Noer that he's a total moron.
(Can you imagine someone printing an article about how every guy cheats, doesn't help around the house, considers playing videogames with their kids child rearing, and are unhappy no matter how much money they make? Oh, yeah. Nobody would read it, actually, because it would have been written by a woman.)
Anyways … Jack Shafer takes the stand that this article is not actually sexist. He says that it's gender neutral to say things like "marrying these women is asking for trouble" and "career girl." This is also the same Shafer who, while defending sexism as not sexist writes
Before my female readers break their nails pounding out angry e-mails to me, they should consider the piece's fundamental weakness.
Fuck. Well, we don't care too much about what Noer thinks, or what Jack Shafer thinks, but we do care what you think. So take our "What Do You Think of Michael Noer's Forbes article Don't Marry a Carrer Woman?" poll.
Forbes' Female Trouble [Jack Shafer, Slate]
Point: Don't Marry a Career Woman [Michael Noer, Forbes]
Editorial Director
