National Magazine Awards Finalists

I remember that Trib story. It was right around Christmas that year, I believe. When I read it, I thought it would win a Pulitzer Prize. Might have even posted that on here somewhere, about it being Pulitzer time the same way all the Oscar hopefuls get released in December.

I'd have to go back and compare the two pieces to see the differences, but I'm definitely one of the people who read both.

But the larger point stands that, yes, the Chicago Tribune basically broke the story.

 

Garden and Gun won; I'm very pleased, although I see the May edition was left out of the nominations. I presume it's because of that controversial "I'm going wabbittttt hunting" cover that was so vocally protested by the Anti-Stuttering Defamation League.

 

No nominations for Outside, again.

That magazine won three consecutive general excellence awards in the late 1990s. Now it hasn't even gotten a single nomination in any category since 2007.

Good gosh, I used to love that magazine. I still subscribe. But there's no denying it's a shell of what it was.

 

I agree. I think of that mag as nothing but lists and nuggets now. New(ish) young editor thinks that's what sells. Maybe it does temporarily, but the content is enirely disposable. Different priorities, I guess.

 

inky and i have had this discussion before, but backpacker has replaced outside as my go-to mag for the kinds of stories outside used to do. too often in the past few years -- or at least when i was still flipping through it regularly -- outside ventured into men's health territory with six-pack abs workouts, too much gear review and celebrity-type profiles.

though i just looked at the contents of the most recent basw and a story from backpacker and outside are in it. both stories are good, by the way, the backpacker one a chilling story of a woman confronting her step-dad about sexual abuse from her childhood.

 

should have added that some of the abuse happened on camping trips during her youth, and and as an adult, she confronted him about it on a hiking/camping trip.

 

Matt Taibbi's continuing series in Rolling Stone on the bailouts was the best reporting last year (and into this year).

 

Really? I don't feel like I can trust a word that comes from his pen. Plus, it's a little distracting to try to read a supposedly factual piece about Goldman Sachs or AGI that calls people "cock suckers" and "douche bags."

 

It plays better as commentary than "reporting." Taibbi is good at understanding the incestuous daisy chain the government, Wall Street and the big banks are engaged in, and good at applying the proper amount of rage, but I don't know that I'd call it reporting.