Found this book called “Butt Book” at a supermarket and thought it was pretty funny. So I picked up the book and flipped through it, turns out there is a gay magazine called Butt Magazine and this book was a collection of the “best” stuff. Not very pretty…

Bazaar Magazine have a new website (finally no more hotmail emails) which you can access by going to bazaar-magazine.com. Sadly the WHOLE site is flash based which is a disaster. Who still does a fully flashed based website nowadays yet alone a magazine?

As K.thekuwaiti put it, Flash is dead. Bazaar should have done a proper online magazine which would archive all their articles so they could at least be search able. They need to start building a database of all their previous issues and their current ones because old fashioned print magazines are quickly becoming extinct. Digital is the future and a perfect example of an excellent magazines online presence is WIRED.

Finally, where is the Bazaar blog? Majority of companies and corporations are adding blogs to their website so its surprising to see that a popular, young and trendy publication like Bazaar still hasn’t jumped on board the blogging wagon knowing for a fact that the editor of the magazine and majority of their writers read blogs themselves.

Currently the website barely has anything to make it worthy of a second visit. Unless they revamp it I don’t think I would ever bother checking it again. [Link]

I have posted about Campaign ME numerous times before since its my favorite regional advertising publication. Last week the Campaign ME advertising awards got canceled and no explanation was given which sucked since my agency was tipped as being “Creative Agency of the Year”. Rumors then started flying around that the publication was going to close down and it seems the rumors are true.

I just read an article on mediaME which shed more light into this story. It seems Haymarket, a UK based firm that holds the license for Campaign ME, has pulled the license from IITP the current publishing house of Campaign ME.

It really sucks that they did that. Campaign ME, you will be missed.

Seems the local magazine Student-Talk doesn’t think too highly of us bloggers. K.TheKuwaiti has a couple of interesting posts regarding Student-Talk including the emails they sent him in reply to his original post. After reading their emails it kinda makes me appreciate Bazaar just a bit more.

Here are links to his posts:
Student-Talk Magazine is a joke
Student-Talk responds
Dima Al-Damen from Student-Talks, Talks

If you can’t wait till the movie 300 gets released next year then you could buy the comic to keep you occupied till then. How close is the comic to the movie? I took two pictures from the comic and two screen shots from the movie trailer and you can see for yourself below.

If you are interested you can buy the hardcover version of the comic for only $18 from Amazon.com [Link]

My favorite publisher is Phaidon, their books are of extremely high standard and their design and typography is unmatched. I just found out they are publishing the Wallpaper* City Guides and I really want to have the full collection. Sadly the first guide I want is for Montreal but that comes out October 2007 so the first city guide I will have to get is Amsterdam. One guide sells for $8.95 but you can buy the first set of 20 for $143 which isn’t bad at all. [Link]

The official puzzle book of the movie. [Link]

When I was in high school the scariest word to me was maba7es. Ten years later and the scariest word to me is still maba7es. I just sent in my article to KTM magazine yesterday and a few minutes ago I get a phone call from them telling me that my article is illegal and if they go ahead and print it I might get a visit from the maba7es. They wanted to know if I was OK with the risk. I told them I would think about it and give them a call back tomorrow with my answer. A very nice start to my journalistic career.

KTM magazine is looking for outspoken individuals of diverse backgrounds and differing opinions to write articles for the Kuwaiti community. You may be based in kuwait or outside of kuwait. Being already established here in Kuwait we intend to expand regionally through-out the Middle East. Among all the Arab world Kuwaiti media has been rated top in freedom of expression. We at KTM would like to see how far the envelope can be pressed as far as opinionated writing. Writers fee starts from $100. If this interests you please contact editor@ktm-mag.com

So after work today I went and met with KTM magazine who are located near my office. I wasn’t nervous or anything just really curious to what was in store for me. I met with 2 guys and we sat down and spoke a bit about their magazine. We also spoke about the digital versus print thing and I told them how I don’t find magazine interesting anymore. After that debate we spoke about me and how I would contribute to their magazine. They recently re-branded and with the re-branding they are also restructuring and they are getting new writers and they want me to write for them.

We spoke about what kind of writing I would do and we brainstormed some subjects I could write about and the result turned out to be very interesting. I can’t say what kind of writing I will do or what the subject is but I can say its like nothing I have written before and I am really excited in doing it. I took a risky direction but its more fun this way (for me and you) and its something completely new to me so don’t expect any food reviews or anything predictable like that.

Finally we spoke about the financial end of the deal which is always an awkward and uncomfortable subject for me. We spoke about what Bazaar had previously offered me and then they asked me how much I wanted and I told them. They agreed and my first article is now due August 15th.

Thats it basically, it should be fun.