Modified On October 19, 2005
Fishbowl provides a blow-by-blowhard account of a Sept. 30 appearance by Jon Stewart at the American Society of Magazine Editors (ASME) get together in New York. Billed as the Magazine Publishers of America Magazine panel “Laughing Matters: Magazines Celebrate Humor,” it sounds like a sweet gig for Stewart: We’ll assemble onstage the editors of Time, Cosmo, Vanity Fair and Men’s Health and have you come out and mercilessly berate them– to the unmitigated delight of the entire east coast (well, Manhattan) magazine publishing community. Oh, and we’ll hand over a giant bag of cash.
He recalls being approached to host the gig and asked if he wanted to interview four top editors. “I thought, wow, that’s great. Or – or – should I put a needle in my eye.” See? The crowd LOVES it! Then they mentioned the budget (and by the way, the budget! Lincoln Center! Open bar! Veggie spring rolls!). “And I remember thinking…mmm, it might be interesting. (Faux-mulling) Editors are interesting, they go to parties, they write “stet” in the margins…they go to parties….fuck it, let’s do it.”
Fishbowl, from what we can tell, is the rakish blogging arm of Mediabistro.com, which is a portal for all the people who toil in publishing in NY and LA. Lots of job openings, gossip, trendspotting, etc. (We’re not sure, but we think there might be a mildly headache-inducing registration/password process but, if you’re interested in dirty media laundry, it’s worth it. And it’s a lot less pompous, paranoid and catty than Romenesko’s site has become of late.)