James Bennet

The Atlantic's press reps just sent out a release announcing the hiring of Bob Cohn as editorial director of the 151-year-old magazine's Web site. Mr. Cohn, most recently Executive Editor of Wired, will be filling the newly-created job in The Atlantic's Washington, D.C. offices.

In a statement, Atlantic editor James Bennet said:

'Bob brings to The Atlantic a superb record as an editor and writer, and a deep understanding of the relationship between print and online brands. With his stewardship, we look forward to further engaging our readers with provocative and dynamic content while inspiring the national conversation.'

According to the release, theatlantic.com had 36.8 million page views in October.

 

With nearly every headline about the future of print media a grim one, last evening seemed like bad timing for the re-branding of a 150-year-old thought-leader magazine often seen as stodgy and behind the times.

But it was an unseasonably warm autumn night, the moon was full, the Dow had recovered a historic 936 points the day before--and The Atlantic was super-excited about their new brand.

The re-branding campaign and redesign of the magazine and website had been six months and a $1.5 million campaign budget in the making, with the help of EuroRSCG and Michael Bierut of Pentagram. The result? Serious is hip! Thinking is cool! Headlines from the magazine's last two years were wrought in aggressive neon throughout Chelsea's Exit gallery, looming like Orwellian aphorisms: "THINK AGAIN."  read more »

For the last few months, The Atlantic's Web site has featured a call for readers to submit questions for a new advice columnist. James Bennet, the magazine's editor, has been mum about the writer his magazine had enlisted as its answer to Ask Amy.

A post on Pentagram's blog reveals all: The Atlantic's new advice column will be called "What's Your Problem?" and be written by Jeffrey Goldberg. (Pentagram link comes via Kottke.)  read more »

The Atlantic's PR reps just sent out some PDFs of the magazine's new look, as overseen and conceived by editor James Bennet and Pentagram's Michael Bierut.

In an essay in the November issue of the 151-year-old magazine, Mr. Beirut writes:

I was both honored and daunted to receive the commission to create a new design for The Atlantic. I know the magazine well, having been a faithful reader for the past 20 years, and unlike many designers, I have a sometimes unhelpful suspicion of change. How could we make it new and better without threatening the things that readers like me enjoy so much? It's a hard problem.

One possible solution: Andrew Sullivan. A lot of Andrew Sullivan. Like, full-page spreads of Andrew Sullivan's face, as the above layout shows.

 

The Atlantic's Jeffrey Goldberg is reporting on his blog that photographer Jill Greenberg has been dropped by her photo agency, Vaughan Hannigan Artists. A call to the agency by Media Mob confirmed the news.

As you may have already read elsewhere, Ms. Greenberg created controversy by posting unflattering and grotesquely retouched outtakes from her John McCain cover shoot for The Atlantic on her site, The Manipulator. Among the retouched photos is one showing the Republican Presidential nominee with bloody shark teeth beneath the headline "I Am A Bloodthirsty Warmonger" and another showing a primate defecating on Mr. McCain's head. (As far as choice of target and sharpness of message goes, Ms. Greenberg's photos were far from Heartfield-level attacks on the candidate.)  read more »

What's the statute of limitations on being a young talent to watch? Next week, former prodigy Adam Moss, 48, will use New York magazine to anoint the newest Wunderkindergarten class of editors. According to sources with knowledge of the project, the photo spread, with accompanying text by Carl Swanson, will include The New Republic's Franklin Foer (age 31), The Atlantic's James Bennet (39), Harper's Roger Hodge (38), and the Paris Review's Philip Gourevitch (44).

--Gabriel Sherman

The piece that Judith Miller is working on for the Atlantic appears to be a profile of Libya's Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, according to sources familiar with the magazine or with Miller's activities. Earlier this week, Miller told the Media Mob she had recently returned from the Middle East.

According to one source, Miller's Atlantic piece was assigned months ago, before the March 1 appointment of James Bennet to be editor. It is unclear whether Bennet, who was the Times' Jerusalem bureau chief while Miller was reporting on Iraqi weapons of mass destruction for the paper, plans to run the piece. Bennet declined to comment yesterday on Miller's reporting assignment. --Gabriel Sherman

A source at the Atlantic confirms that former New York Times reporter/journalistic privilege test case Judith Miller is working on a piece for the magazine. The possibility of Miller's return to writing was first reported yesterday by Gawker. According to the Atlantic source, Miller is working on a reported piece--and not a first-person account of her crisis at the Times, like Howell Raines' 20,000-odd word Atlantic piece of May 2004.

Newly appointed Atlantic editor James Bennet does not yet have a working phone line. Reached by phone, Miller declined to comment on her Atlantic assignment. "I just got back from the Middle East," she said. "I can’t talk right now."

--Gabriel Sherman