Snappy newsletters. Simple Facebook sharing. Spirited comments. Sweet features are waiting… GET THEM NOW!

Gone With Gourmet: a Taste for Expertise

There is no 'hard-won blood-on-the-floor kind' of editorial experience on the Web

By Harry Kimball,  Newser Staff

Posted Oct 8, 2009 10:02 AM CDT
Email

(Newser) – When Gourmet magazine absorbed his Cook’s in 1990, Christopher Kimball discovered the hard way that the publishing business is “a top-down, winner-take-all proposition, an oligarchy of sorts.” But the frazzling encounter also afforded him a meeting with Conde Nast chairman Si Newshouse, who “poured his fortune into his magazine properties and his editors, even when the prospect of return seemed dim.” Newhouse—and Gourmet—had “respect for those who had earned the chops.”

With the closing of Gourmet and the coming media apocalypse, Kimball writes in the New York Times, those days of “philanthropic publishing” and esteem for the “good breeding” necessary to “stand at the cultural helm” is on the wane. Those who oppose the “democratic economics of the Internet” must “ask to be paid,” Kimball suggests, “and refuse to climb aboard this ship of fools, the one where everyone has an equal voice.” Julia Child’s first question to a young chef? "And where did you train, dear?”

Gourmet magazine.
"Gourmet" magazine.   (AP Photo)
Julia Child.
Julia Child.   (AP Photo)
Gourmet editor Ruth Reichl exemplified the chops Newhouse was looking for.
Gourmet editor Ruth Reichl exemplified the chops Newhouse was looking for.   (AP Photo)
« Prev« Prev | Next »Next » Slideshow

Refuse to climb aboard this ship of fools, the one where everyone has an equal voice. Google “broccoli casserole” and make the first recipe you find. I guarantee it will be disappointing. - Christopher Kimball

« Prev« Prev | Next »Next » Slideshow
To report an error on this story, notify our editors.
A snapshot of the day's best news stories.
 
COMMENTS
Showing 3 of 3 comments
pitiful_pulp
Oct 8, 2009 8:31 AM CDT
"hyper expensive elitist magazine" what spoiled fish are you cooking' ? $20 for a year subscription is hardly expensive. What is gone is a large number of good paying jobs and an editorial budget that included many writers, photographers, stylists, editors, etc.... and what exactly is collosal - sp is colossal btw - overhead? the advertising dollars in the publishing industry have dried up. There are small independent magazine with low overhead dropping print versions as well. Try and have a little empathy for the content providers instead of expecting every thing for free on the internet. and demonizing a hardworking industry.
Timinator2K
Oct 8, 2009 3:50 AM CDT
Re-emerge on the web like everything else...or, via Kindle....they sure didn't see this media revolution coming...with their heads stuck in the sand.
phil
Oct 8, 2009 3:38 AM CDT
No, what's gone is a hyper expensive elitist magazine run by a daft magazine company with a collosal overhead.

 
Internet • blogging • cuisine • eating • Conde Nast • magazine publishing • Gourmet • Julia Child • Si Newhouse • S.I. Newhouse

More Newser Stories

Condé Nast Axing Gourmet , 3 Other Titles
NEWS FROM OUR PARTNERS
Other Sites We Like:   24/7 Wall St.   |   Betty Confidential   |   BuzzFeed   |   Cracked   |   Fark   |   Timelines   |   The Frisky   |   Geek Sugar   |   NewsOne