There are new details on Regent Releasing's bid to buy The Advocate and Out.
San Francisco Business Times informs us that Regent, which owns gay network here!, gave PlanetOut an initial $500,000 to seal the deal, but the final sale will total $6 million in cash - far cheaper than we anticipated.
The deal now gives PlanetOut more time to focus on its websites, which have been underachieving over the past few years:
PlanetOut publishes magazines like Out and Advocate, but wants to return its focus to its web sites gay.com and planetout.com, which have been contributing a smaller percentage of its revenue recently.The company's online segment has been contributing less to its revenue for each of the last three years. In 2005 it accounted for 87 percent, in 2006 54 percent, and in 2007 51 percent. Magazine publishing's portion of total revenue rose in each of those years, from 13 percent in 2005 to 46 percent in 2006 and 49 percent in 2007.
No wonder rival Window Media wanted the titles so badly. We don't know what went wrong, but we know the company - publishers of Genre - made and lost its own bid for the gay glossies.
The rumors were true. We hear that Regent Entertainment's bid for PlanetOut's magazines will be finalized today. The Los Angeles-based company simply couldn't resist bringing Out and The Advocate into their fold, which includes gay cable network here! We'll keep you posted as we hear more of the details.
In even more war-ish news, the brutish Peter LaBarbera and his pals at Americans For "Truth" ain't gay about Out's list of the universe's most powerful homos:
We are intrigued by the fact that the same movement that once cried out for “privacy” and “to be left alone” feels free to publicly declare people’s homosexuality for them (Anderson Cooper, No. 2, and Jodie Foster, No. 43).On the other hand, if OUT is right, it might explain Cooper’s bias in his reporting on the homosexual issue: in a recent interview that the CNN host did with pro and con advocates on a ”gay parenting” story, he blatantly favored the “gay” side in his questioning.
Regardless of whether Cooper practices homosexuality, as a professional he should be completely even-handed in his treatment of this controversial moral question.
This from a man who uses his influence to spread blatantly biased spread gay panic and supports Sally Kern, the politician who called non-Christians "infidels" and equated gays with terrorists? Who's even-handed?
It's been a little over two months since gay media giant PlanetOut put itself on the auction block. So, what's happening with the company?
First and foremost, book wholesaler Bookazine snatched up a piece of the company's Publishers Distributing Company, which includes Bruno Gmunder Verlag and Starbooks Press.
Meanwhile, PlanetOut's magazines, including The Advocate and Out, remain the big mystery, with sources telling us more people were interested in a buy than executives anticipated.
While nothing's set in stone, there are murmurs that Regent Entertainment, which owns queer cable channel here!, has been circling the gay glossies. One speculator described a sale as "imminent".
Any one out there hearing more details on these developments?
The homos over at Out unveiled their new website. It's all shiny and gleaming and gay. [Out]
The kids over at Out get in touch with their trans side this month.
Guest editor T Cooper what seems to be a pretty well-rounded, informative and poppy issue. This display - adorned by David Armstrong shot Tilda Swinton cover - ain't a sing-song calls for activism, but a closer look at the trans subculture's ins, outs and in-betweens. (See a larger version of the cover at the end of this post.)
Cooper did well with the magazine's trans-limited, admittedly "clumsy" staffers. For example, they've of ten "essential" trans titles, while Candis Cayne talks about trans life in the spotlight and Cooper himself takes a look at NYC's trans fags, including a boy whose biological origins got him booted from popular hook-up site, Adam4Adam.
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There are big changes afoot at PlanetOut
Monthly gay glossy Out got a lot of attention when they featured ever-ambiguous singer Mika on their cover last year. The British-bred Lebanese-born stunner said that he refused to categorize his sexuality. So, what's he have to say now? More of the same, of course…
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Out isn't the only fag rag with summer on its mind. Instinct magazine's February issue gets wet and moderately wild with the first openly gay Chippendale's dancer, Brandon Pereyda.
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Remember Tom Ford's naughty cologne adverts? You know - the ones which Out adapted for its glossy pages (pictured)?
Well, now a web designer offered his own take - and it doesn't stink.
• Alright, we're willing to forgive The View's Sherri Shepard for not knowing whether the world's flat, but we're absolutely astonished that Shepard forgot that Patti LaBelle's black.
• Out's Shana Krochmal talks to Panic At The Disco. Note the lack of exclamation!
• Writer's strike be damned! AfterElton launches Gay People's Choice Awards:
We're asking you to vote on your favorites in the traditional movie, television, music, and internet categories, but at the end we've included several gay-specific categories that you won't find covered anywhere else this awards season!
Vote like your life depends on it!
• Gay panic strikes Kentucky after b-ballers partake in celebratory kiss.
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• Out's February issue proves what we already knew: Richard Simmons is the queen of all queens.
• Lauren Williams hung out with Phylicia Rashad and the rest of the cast from the Debbie Allen Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and all we got was this incredible post!
• Hummer inspired by NYC-based fag rag HX? Wouldn't be the first time…
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The American Family Association has some bald-eagle eyes! We never would have noticed the Volvo C-30's well-placed ad next to Tom Ford's Out-sponsored tush!
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• Japanese scientists have made a "humanoid robot" called Simroid, which can feel "pain".
• It's that time of the year again: Bid 2 Beat AIDS offers 1000s of collectibles on eBay. The eBay charity auction officially begins tomorrow, but they've already posted tickets for Mary J Blige's Tuesday show honoring BET's Stephen Hill.
• Popnography's Shana Naomi Krochmal and NPR "consider" bands who play queer.
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