Blokes are generally an easily pleased bunch when it comes to magazines – just shove in loads of high tech gadgets, big cars, some football, lots of wobbling booby babes, video game reviews, pics of dangerous sports and perhaps a page or two on cooking to show off their sensitive side – and they’re as happy as a pig in dirt.
Of course, now that they can get most of the above (and more) all over t’internet, mens print magazines have had to set up their own web presences to keep the ol’brand loyalty going and new figures from Nielsen//NetRatings show that the blokes are digging the concept.
Their stats show that Maxim is currently most popular UK online men’s lifestyle mag, Bizarre the fastest growing with Monkey enjoying the most loyal audience.
The phwoaar-tastic Loaded site apparently has the “greatest affinity” with men, with 88% of visitors to their site being of the geezer persuasion, followed by Nuts (83%) and Zoo (81%).
GQ is almost a girly mag in comparison with more than half (55%) of their online audience being laydees (or ‘foxy chicks’ as Loaded might put it).
Market leaders Maxim managed to notch up 479,000 Unique Visitors in January 2007, putting it 27% ahead of second-placed FHM (378,000), although visitor loyalties seem to easily switch: FHM was the most popular site in October 2006, while Monkey ruled supreme in November and December 2006
“The last quarter has seen the big three online men’s lifestyle magazines – Maxim, FHM and Monkey – vying for top spot. On its official launch in November 2006, Monkey climbed straight to the top of the tree but the last two months have seen a slight, if steady, drop in popularity to fall behind Maxim and FHM,” commented Alex Burmaster, European Internet Analyst, Nielsen//NetRatings, commented:
Dennis Publishing were responsible for the three fastest growing online men’s magazines, with Bizarre scoring a 255% UA growth, Maxim (124%) and Monkey (99%) between October 2006 and January 2007.
The soaring online figures are in contrast to tumbling print figures, reflecting the importance of the online space to traditional publishers.
Major news agencies made great use of public camera phone footage after the London 7/7 bombings, with several images 
With Getty’s well established media network, amateur snappers should expect increased prospects of shifting their work, although Getty hasn’t commented if the payment share is to remain the same.
Although some may already feel that walking around Brixton is akin to taking a stroll around another planet, we began to think we might have been transported to a parallel universe when we spotted bright garish yellow billboards appearing all around town exclaiming, “THEY WANT YOUR POD!”
In smaller text underneath the screaming headline, “BEWARE” the sign goes on, “Street robbers are targeting persons using mp3 music players in this street!”
Although the sign doesn’t actually tell you what to do to prevent being ‘jacked’ (
Fresh outta hi-tech Fat Farm, the new Zen Vision M and W models have managed to reduce their bulk by 15% on previous versions while wedging in a bigger hard disk.
The rather desirable little fella weighs in at a light as heck 170g (and that includes the battery) and comes with a 2.5 inch colour screen.
Vision W
When?
BT is under a legal obligation to provide phone boxes up and down the length of the UK, which they claim numbers 63,795. BT say that 40,500 of these phone boxes are unprofitable.
In the interview with German weekly magazine Focus, published today, she poses the following question, “”Do you think it’s fine that a CD plays in all CD players but that an iTunes song only plays in an iPod?” It’s followed by a couple of words that are going to make uncomfortable reading for Apple, “I don’t. Something has to change.”
This just feels wrong on just about every level we can think of, but in an attempt to reach out to Da Yoot, the US Army have created a slick and highly polished MySpace recruitment site.
A warning next to the psychopathic-looking Sgt Star warns, “The information you enter is to be used only for recruiting Soldiers into the U.S. Army and the Army Reserve.”
We apologised: “OK. Sorry. We want to go to Iraq and bomb some soft Johnny Foreigners back into the Stone Age in the name of peace.”
Clearly a sizeable wad of defence budget has been thrown at the slick game, which purports to offer realistic battlefield scenes (although we couldn’t find any options to rain friendly fire on Brit troops and then try and cover up the investigation afterwards.)
Of course, there’s sound business reasoning behind the US Army shoving its shiny size nines onto a social networking site like MySpace, with the site able to interact with the community, make friends and receive comments and – possibly – make the Army look vaguely cool and enticing.
Gordon Brown has announced that a new labelling system for media content is in the works, designed to help parents protect their children from dodgy digital content.
As part of the scheme, Ofcom will introduce common labelling standards covering cinema, TV, radio, computer games and the internet.
Mobile games are starting to rake in big revenues in the States as perambulating punters warm to the idea of downloading games for their phones.
Although you might imagine that mobile gaming would be the near-exclusive preserve of socially challenged males aged 25 to 36, Telephia says that it’s the ladies who are the hottest to trot, with 65 percent of U.S. mobile game buyers being of the female persuasion.
Two deals have been done, one with the BBC, the other BBC Worldwide, the commercial arm of the BBC. Financial terms of the deal aren’t being discussed at all.