product placement in monocle manga

I'm truly enjoying reading the Kita Koga manga that comes with Monocle magazine (story and art by Takanori Yasaka). Kita Koga is the story of Niels Watanabe, code name Koga, a cosmopolitan, kick-ass, modern agent, who works for a secret intelligence division in Japan's Defence Ministry. Niels is part Japanese, part Scandinavian, and jets around the globe in his missions. One of the interesting things about it is the product placement. Though they obviously promote the sponsors, the brands here help bring the story closer to reality, so to speak, it's something we recognize. Take a look at the collage below: Niels drives an Audi, drinks Carlsberg, and uses a Prada mobile phone (though perhaps a Sony-Ericsson would've been a better fit).Can't wait for the May edition to come out.

periodic table of blondness

Another quick note on the latest Monocle.
The "periodic table of blondness" (pages 110-111), about the increasing similarities of TV news anchors (they always tint their hair lighter, never darker), was based on a Slate article written by Jack Shafer, which in turn, was based on Grant McCracken's "Big Hair: A Journey Into The Transformation of Self". Mr. Shafer borrowed the book's different portraits of blondes to rank TV anchors: bombshell blonde (Laurie Dhue of Fox); sunny blonde (Katie Couric of CBS); brassy blonde (Fox's E D Hill); dangerous blonde (CNN's Nancy Grace); society blonde (Fox's Janice Dean); and cool blonde (CNN's resident populist republican, Lou Dobbs). Mr. McCracken seems to be everywhere these days. No wonder, he's excellent.

monocle in singapore

Just a quick note to say Monocle's no. 2 issue has hit the stands here in Singapore about one week after they came out in the UK. Not bad. The first issue arrived almost one month late.
You can find the magazine at Borders, Kinokuniya, and Page One in Vivo City.
The highlights: the cover-page story, an interesting article about Norway; a hilarious ranking of American TV anchors based on the "periodic table of blondness"; an article about the surging trend of mobile phone novels in Japan; plus the second chapter of the Kita Koga manga.

time's new design

The latest issue of Time magazine brings a new design developed by Pentagram's Luke Hayman, Time managing editor Richard Stengel and art director Arthur Hochstein.
Below is the table of contents page and the Briefing section. More pages and an overview of the new design project at Pentagram. There's also an interesting note at boingboing about the tear on Reagan's face.

time out singapore

Just because I said the other day that magazines are dwindling, we're witnessing a couple of interesting magazine launches recently.
First came Monocle. Now, the launching of Time Out Singapore, with the latest arts and entertainment listings, will give a boost to the city-state's plans to become a cool city.
Singapore now joins the likes of London, New York, Shanghai, Dubai and 13 other cities that have their own "Time Out" edition. This one though is a monthly edition, not weekly as the London one.

monocle magazine

I got my hands on Monocle magazine's premiere issue. Magazines all over the world are dwindling, many are folding (George, Talk, The Face, to name a few), and most are getting slimmer, with fewer and fewer advertising pages. So it is laudable that somebody is willing to launch a new magazine given this scenario.
Monocle was launched positioning itself as a new type of business magazine. Well, it is definitely not a business magazine in the traditional sense. With sections categorized from A to E (Affairs, Business, Culture, Design, Edits), the magazine's premier edition brings an eclectic mix of topics, such as the emergence of Japan's navy (the cover story), an interview with Lego's CEO, the semiotics of Iran's president wardrobe, and a fashion editorial set in Okinawa.
The most interesting piece for me is an article about Miura Golf Clubs, the maker of Tiger Woods' clubs (Nike puts the logo on them, but they're actually made by Miura). Hint: following on centuries of samurai sword forging tradition they see themselves as forging specialists, not club makers, which gives an idea about the craftsmanship involved.
Some other features of the magazine:
- At 242 pages it is surprisingly big
- There's a "manga" supplement, complete with instructions on how to read it (from right to left, obviously)
- It clearly intends to be an international edition. With a head office in London, the magazine has bureaux in New York, Zurich and Tokyo.