Teen Vogue Breaks Dream Bubble With How-To Guide
According to the NY Times, today’s teenagers no longer aspire to be models like they did in a decade or two ago, now they’re looking to be the next Anna Wintour.
Teen Vogue has decided to honor requests from their readers on how to break into the fashion industry, and they’re not sugar coating it either. Next month, Teen Vogue will release “The Teen Vogue Handbook” for aspiring students who want to be designers, stylists, photographers or editors. Now that fashion has been democratized and covered with media spotlight to tan your pretty skin, the market is tougher than ever. Eric Wilson, the author of the NY Times’ article “Looking for a (Long) Leg Up,” notes that it seems odd that where fashion seems to be getting its prime time, the fashion magazine industry is suffering its largest cuts yet. Thus, the competition for a spot with big name in fashion is still fierce.
Getting into the fashion industry is much more than the glitz and glamour it seems to project, it’s back-breaking hard work.
NY Times Considering Monthly Subscription Fee
The New York Times Co. sent a survey asking their current print subscribers if they would pay $5/month to access their online content.
Now what does this have to do with fashion you ask? First of all, it’s well known in the fashion industry that The NY Times and the International Herald Tribune are some of the most influential news media in fashion journalism today. Cathy Horyn and Suzy Menkes are today’s star journalists who give amazing insights and write thoughtful articles on fashion. They’ve been banned from fashion shows before due to their no-nonsense approach to criticizing fashion collections, and thank god. We have too many suck ups in this industry as it is. And it’s not for the benefit of profits they are writing these reviews anyhow, it’s giving a justified opinion. Much more different than actual slandering of a brand with no basis of research, thus, we need more voices like them truly giving a good look at what these high end brands are offering on the table.
Back to the NY Times.
Quite frankly, I would have to say to them: “What took you so long?”
Honestly, if you’re paying X amount for a print version (it’s been so long since I’ve actually bought a newspaper) of the newspaper, it’s only logical that you should be paying for the online version as well. Who’s brilliant idea was it to share all this information for free online anyway? No wonder the publishing industry is back tracking now and charging users for content. They’re clearly going to lose readers because of this poorly planned transition online. And as so much news is spreading around the internet, it would be difficult for hackers to share news articles since RSS feeds and other types of aggregators will stop being able to access the content without a login access.
The problem lies that fashion is a niche news source, and since the NY Times and IHT only post a few fashion articles a week, paying subscribers could easily share these paid contents with others online for free, although that would technically run into copyright issues. However, I still think those devoted to quality news sources wouldn’t mind paying a mere $5/month. It’s a bargain, and we’re saving trees in the process. Plus, the online fashion world would be quite lost without these two voices in the industry.
I also believe that fashion bloggers are aware of the dwindling ad revenues that are affecting the print industry, and I’m quite confident that they themselves are willing to save their favorite print sources, even if they don’t realize it yet. By save, I mean by shutting down altogether, not specifically meaning saving the printed medium. As the online fashion community grows, a sort of sisterhood is starting to form among us. If they want to continue getting their fashion feed, they will definitely take the necessary steps to organically change the fashion publishing industry in ways they see fit. It’s no longer in the hands of Wall Street honchos that will determine the fate of fashion publishing industry, it will be the readers who will take matters into their own hands.
I’m also confident that the print industry will be reduced to a niche industry. I don’t really believe it will die out completely. The transition to online content will only reinforce how precious the printed version of a magazine truly is. If say Vogue moves all of their content online, from a readjusted budget, they will probably release special edition print versions of their online content and push the envelope of designing a stunning piece of product. Pricey but well worth it.
My vote goes for “pay for content” all the way from reputable news sources.
Fatal Move From Print to Internet
While ad sales continue to fall across many newspapers and magazines, it occurred to me that big media companies have made a fatal mistake when they tried to run both print and web version of their content simultaneously.
The internet is a source of infinite information made accessible only by those who have permitted themselves to make it accessible for free.
Newspapers and magazines have made their revenues from advertisers for over a century before the internet came along. Whether it used to be $0.10 or $0.50 for a printed newspaper, to a few dollars for a glossy magazine, media companies made their money through ads, this is a given.
When the internet came along, though it was neat to be able to share information in one common world wide web, advertising on the web was, right from the get-go, very cheap. Pennies were made based on impressions, clicks, and leads. Then, when content was reproduced on the web, the print media followed. However, the fatal mistake from print media was to reproduce their content for free.
If I were a business person, who made their fortune by offering a service for a price in person, and then offering the same service for free on the internet, of course my client base will grow on the internet. But my internet clients aren’t paying for my services, they’re getting it for free. And everybody, and I mean everybody, loves the word “free”. So it’s only logical that you would attract more people online than you would in person. By the end of if, I wouldn’t be making any money at all since my in-person clients will flock to me indirectly and get my services for free rather than in person.
Thus, my question to the big print companies such as the New York Times, The Globe and Mail, and the thousands of other newspapers…why did they make their content online free? It’s like shooting yourself in the foot. The Wall Street Journal was smart, they limit their free content and still rely on paid subscriptions to generate some revenue and it isn’t free falling into a black hole like other newspapers. Women’s Wear Daily is also able to stay alive with their subscription base model, while offering just a trickle of free content. It’s content is still linked to from numerous websites despite it being mostly off limits to casual browsers. Newspapers could have still been afloat if they would’ve offered their news for the same subscription price online as their print version. The only foreseeable problem with that is having their content reproduced by users - however, with hundreds of articles being printed each week, I doubt all of the content would be made public.
Fashion magazines however are not entirely at fault. Fashion brands have established their own sites and thus can propagate their ad campaigns from their home base without the need to pay for space in a physical world. The internet allows them to reach a much wider audience than their print (and costly) versions ever could. Combine that with viral marketing from blogs, and cheap web space, there’s little need for fashion magazines except for the fashion gurus to cherry pick the cream of the crop of products. I suppose a temporary solution for fashion magazines is to also privatize their content online and have users pay to read their fashion experts’ opinions.
If print media companies would’ve started out with privatized paid subscriptions online, then I doubt there would’ve been such a global meltdown in the print world, perhaps saving thousands of jobs. Of course, there are hundreds of thousands of sophisticated users who can pirate content, but quality content as the big medias were known for, wouldn’t have disintegrated so quickly if they did some planning and foreshadowing.
If print work does indeed die out in the next decade (and reduced to an art form), I expect online advertising prices to go up. With no ulterior source of income, I think coveted online fashion websites will have the opportunity to break out a new standard for online advertising. Of course, online fashion magazines will have to compete for attention with the very brands who are buying their ad space.
The China Price by Alexandra Harney
Though I’m only 50 pages in, The China Price by former Financial Times writer Alexandra Harney, is a fascinating read. Among the myriads of articles about recalls due to toxic chemicals found within toothpaste to plastic toys, this book rather delves upon the inner workings of the Chinese manufacturing industry, more particularly in the booming southern region of Guangzhou.
The duality of keeping demands high and prices low have cost many Chinese manufacturing companies to break laws with little supervision, extend working hours, and create shadow (non-monitored) factories with the “five star” factory (for show for auditors). The irony of the name “The China Price” has a double connotation that we know China’s price for goods are very low and also the price that Chinese workers, mostly migrants from other provinces, pay in order to earn more money.
See today’s article in the NY Times about Chinese economy slowing down
When it comes to Chinese mentality, I perfectly understand their work ethic as to why they would be willing to work 80-90hr work weeks and get paid for very little. Chinese mentality is nothing like North American mentality where we fear of being taken advantage of if we work really long hours and are not compensated for our extra work. Instead, many migrant Chinese workers come from the country in poorer districts thus they have no choice but to work and care about money. According to the book, one factory manager says that if they do not give more hours to their workers, they complain. They would ask him what are they to do with their extra time? Sit on their bum? They’d rather work. Much of the money they earn is sent back to their families, which isn’t much different from many foreign students or workers who work in North America and send a good chunk of it to the families they’ve left behind.
The reality is that large companies place ridiculously large orders, expect factories to abide by labor laws, limit working hours between 8-10hrs, and expect the goods to be delivered in a timely fashion. Thus many manufacturers create “shadow factories” which aren’t monitored by their clients in order to meet their demands. The worst is that if these manufacturers only abide by the rules, they would lose business to other competitors and thus will be force to close and fire thousands of workers.
It’s come to the point as to what possible solution can there be to solve the large orders, keeping prices relatively low and still make a profit legally? If migrant workers are put out of a job, how will they be able to earn money? Let’s not even talk about work conditions as we all know the majority are held in poor conditions.
Low pricing affects our daily lives. Our Dollarama’s and IKEAs wouldn’t exist without the China Price. If the world would suddenly just buy locally (which probably will never happen), that means millions of jobs in the Chinese market will be lost. The economic turmoil will be beyond our wildest imagination. So how can foreign and local Chinese governments find a solution and common ground? And how can they prevent other third world countries from following the same disastrous footsteps? Keep in mind that even countries like Africa face the same dilemma, only their end is more on agriculture (see Stuffed and Starved by Raj Patel).
It is indeed a race to the price of zero.
Can we really survive without our cheap goods? Made in China just took on a whole new dimension.
e-Magazines Still Archaic?
The Wall Street Journal was rather cocky about the release of their new lifestyle magazine, WSJ. (with the period) last week, taking slight swipes at their competitions like T Magazine from The New York Times.
After some reflections and analyzing e-magazines, I’m starting to wonder if e-magazines really offer you a different web experience or are they really just spruced up versions of their printed counterparts? We’re now expecting more and more from fashion websites, we want them to be updated daily, we want RSS feeds, we want comment capabilities, forums, and tons of pictures and videos to look at.
Unfortunately, I don’t understand why big reputable newspaper companies such as the WSJ and NY Times cannot afford to give its magazines the same web usability as their newspapers. Granted, these magazines only publish monthly or quarterly, but I believe the extra online features should be added.
Here are some of things lacking from WSJ.
- No comment feature - Are we not allowed to have dialogue in the luxury world?
- Only one RSS Feed of a blog-ish type of daily update called “WSJ. Magazine Today”, of which a couple of the articles don’t show up in the feed, or a few appear in the feed but not on the same page of the site? Where are you pulling your posts WSJ.?
- Videos - Ok. I’m going to rip this apart. What is up with their videos?? I really like Roland Mouret and his interview “The Shape of Things To Come” is a good read. But the videos on this site are little more than decorative and have little to say. I usually like WSJ’s reporting videos on the newspaper’s site, even if they do lack pizzazz. These videos’ intros sound off to the beat of something coming off of MTV’s Cribs. On top of that, you can’t even share the video, not that they’d be worth it… Is this really luxury? I’m not even rich but I know crap when I see it.
I’ve revisited T Magazine’s site and also found a few gripes.
- No comment feature - except for their blog “In The Moment” which I’m starting to believe is really a blog post overload of anything fashion related. Hardly anybody comments.
- RSS only for “In The Moment”, so you’d have to scroll through a maze of articles on the site itself.
- Videos are non-linkable, non-adjustable, and a tad too small for my taste (make it YouTube size at least). I like their “Screen Test” series, and can find a few gems in “Exclusive Films”, but I would do away with “T Takes” of short films, they don’t belong on this site.
I’m split between what e-magazines today should represent. As a print publication, it’s obvious we’re only doing the reading and there’s no interaction whatsoever between the content and yourself. But as a web experience, especially seeing how interaction is now possible between the content and the user, I’ve come to expect this extra feature to be available for online publications (whether they have printed counterparts or not). I suppose magazines don’t want to lose their authority on fashion, and open the gates to dialogue will expose them to direct, unfiltered critique of their content. But so far I think being able to comment and share content has only heightened the interest in fashion and we could get some very insightful opinions from individuals you wouldn’t never hear about. Cathy Horyn’s “On The Runway” blog is a prime example of being able to voice her opinions, and still be respected and receive both favorable or unfavorable opinions from different users. This interaction shouldn’t be ignored and for the fashion industry, reknown as a tough skin industry, to shrivel up so easily to opinionated consumers is sort of an oxymoron.
