Kurt Andersen: There Is 'Absolute Uncertainty About the Media Landscape in Five Years'
The co-founder of Inside.com and Spy magazine says that new business models in media are emerging "that nobody seems to really understand yet."

I Want Media, 11/27/01

Kurt Andersen is host of "Studio 360," a pop-culture show heard on more than 100 radio stations across the country. He is also a novelist, co-founder of the high-profile media properties Inside.com and Spy magazine, and former editor-in-chief of both Spy and New York magazines. Andersen has been a columnist for The New Yorker and created and produced programs for network television.

The media maven shared with I Want Media his thoughts on a wide variety of topics, from the future of the Internet and lessons learned from Inside.com to media consolidation and "the decline of print magazines."

I Want Media: Tell us about your radio show, "Studio 360." What's it about?

Kurt Andersen: It's a weekly hour-long show about high and low art and culture. It's produced by Public Radio International in Minneapolis and WNYC in New York. It was being developed for a long time before they asked me to host it two years ago, and then we went on the air in New York and Los Angeles [KCRW] a year ago. We went national last spring.

Each show consists of 15-minute "front of the book" topical and formatted pieces and then a 40-minute "cover story" revolving around a theme -- like Art & Politics, the 1940s, or the Culture of Devotion. Generally there are three pre-produced pieces concerning that theme, which a guest co-host and I listen to and discuss. The guest co-hosts have included Ren Weschler, Adam Gopnick, Campbell Scott, Michael Pollan, Barbara Kruger, Ricky Jay, Nora Ephron and Woody Allen.

IWM: You began your career in journalism at Time magazine. Some newsmagazines today are on somewhat shaky ground. U.S. News & World Report recently announced layoffs and salary cuts. Are newsmagazines still relevant?

Andersen: People have been saying they're irrelevant and on shaky ground for 20 years. I think newsmagazines are particularly relevant as formats right now for the 98 percent of Americans who don't read The New York Times. On the other hand, I can't imagine that U.S. News will, in anything like its current incarnation, exist a few years from now.

IWM: Are any news outlets doing exceptional reporting on the Sept. 11 attacks and their aftermath?

Andersen: I think The New York Times is utterly earning its reputation as the best news organization in the world. The Wall Street Journal is doing a great job too. TV news is doing O.K., but just O.K., in my opinion. As soon as there's no significant breaking news to report, which is most of the time, I'm afraid that a great deal of TV news strikes me as simplistic and shallow chatter.

IWM: What's the biggest story in media right now?

Andersen: Oh, I don't know. I'll give two, one specific and one general: the decline of print magazines both as businesses and cultural epicenters, and the absolute uncertainty about what the media landscape will look like five years from now.

IWM: What caused print magazines to decline, in your view?

Andersen: One [cause] is the risk-averse corporate magazine culture that seemed to descend in the last 10 to 15 years -- the triumph of nervous prudence over roll-the-dice, stay-the-course vision, a trend probably exacerbated by the consolidation of media companies in which magazine businesses came to seem increasingly pipsqueaky and not worth the trouble.

The digital revolution -- Internet mania, if you will -- is another cause: the excitement and promise of online media sucked lots of creative energy and resources away from magazines. Nothing has really replaced magazines in this sense -- there is no white-hot intellectual/creative center of the Net, media-wise, and there wasn't even during the late '90s.

IWM: What should magazines do to recover?

Andersen: Behave more like Martha Stewart Living and Maxim, I guess -- take chances and put passionate, damn-the-torpedoes visionary geniuses in charge who are obsessed with giving readers what they want.

IWM: Why do you have so much uncertainty about the media landscape in five years from now?

Andersen: Lots of reasons. Because for magazines, delivery costs and traditional circulation-generation models were collapsing even before the postal service became anthraxized. And yet some people, like Martha Stewart and Felix Dennis, still understand how to invent successful magazines. Because newspapers, except for the three national papers, seemed to be gasping and dying -- until Sept. 11.

Because I think this moment is the last glorious hurrah for the traditional network news anchors. Because the 300-channel TV universe is here, and the proliferating digital-tier cable channels represent a whole new scale of business and business and programming models that nobody seems to really understand yet.

Because for many forms of information, online delivery really does make more sense than printed paper -- even though the last few years provided ample evidence that that slam-dunk utility of the new medium doesn't mean it's the basis for much of a business yet. Because I think there's a long-term "unbundling" of advertising and marketing from news media going on. And because we're in a war that will probably be transformative in ways none of us can imagine.

IWM: What did you learn from your experiences with Inside.com?

Andersen: The capital markets suffer from bipolar disorder. And talented journalists and creative people hunger for the rare chance to create something good and original.

IWM: What would you do different?

Andersen: Nothing major.

IWM: Do you ever visit Inside.com nowadays?

Andersen: Sure, sometimes.

IWM: What is your opinion of Inside.com now?

Andersen: I don't look at it that often.

IWM: Michael Wolff, New York Magazine's media columnist, told I Want Media that the Internet works more as a "facilitating technology" than as a platform for media business. Would you agree?

Andersen: I'm afraid I don't understand the difference between a "facilitating technology" and a "platform." But I probably agree.

IWM: Brill's Content recently folded. Is it possible that the market for news about media is just not very big?

Andersen: I never thought that a magazine about journalism for a civilian audience, like Brill's, made much sense. But how big is "very big"? There are scores of trade publications serving the market. Alas, most of them aren't nearly as good as they could or should be.

IWM: What are your favorite bookmarks?

Andersen: All the obvious news and information sites. Plus Netflix.com and Alibris.com.

IWM: Would you pay for online content?

Andersen: I would and I do, happily.

IWM: Which sites do you pay for? And why are they worth your dollar?

Andersen: Salon, The Wall Street Journal and Variety. And I pay because I want to read them and they charge. I paid for Slate when it charged. And I'd pay for The New York Times if it charged.

IWM: Is content still king?

Andersen: As opposed to what? The distribution channels? Yeah, I suppose, barely. Although maybe a better analogy is: content is the pope, and the pipes are king.

IWM: What does the future hold for the Internet?

Andersen: Well, it ain't going away. I think it's more or less as huge and transformative as everyone said it was five years ago. And this war will, if anything, increase the general dependence on networked digital communication -- for instant news, for e-mail instead of toxic paper mail, for teleconferencing instead of flying, for telecommuting instead of gathering in downtowns, maybe even for video-on-demand instead of going to movie theaters.

IWM: Nearly every media company has announced layoffs in the past year or so. How much longer can this go on? Do you see any long-term repercussions?

Andersen: Yes, it can go on. I can't predict what the long-term repercussions will be across the board. The hopeful view would be that the third rate people in those professions will leave or be discouraged from entering.

IWM: Your 1999 novel "Turn of the Century" explored the go-go media world of the millennium. How has the media world changed since then?

Andersen: Not as much as you might think. For thoughtful people in the "media world," the pre-recession, pre-war years tended to be frequently anxious and confusing times. The sense of uncertainty and flux were intense, not always giddy and fun. On the other hand, since Sept. 11, I think it is or ought to be a little easier for people to achieve clarity in their lives, to know -- as my characters were perpetually asking themselves -- whether something was a good thing or a bad thing.

IWM: If you were to write a sequel to "Turn of the Century," what would your protagonists, media professionals George and Lizzie, be doing now?

Andersen: If I ever decide to write a sequel, I'll let you know. Although, for the record, at the end of the book George was on his way overseas to make a documentary about a guerrilla war.

IWM: What's the Next Big Thing in media?

Andersen: Plastic?



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