Celebrating our sameness
Sign of the times: The Atlantic Monthly, the celebrated 148-year-old magazine of ideas, is moving out of Boston as Boston Common, one of the hot, new breed of luxury ad catalogs, is moving in.
Boston Common makes for an uncomfortable metaphor for the New Boston. Our franchise town will soon have a new franchise magazine aimed at that vast underserved market, the rich and the pretenders -- 300 pages, three full pounds, of gorgeous glossy ads for Bvlgari, Bloomingdale's, Hermes, and many more. The content: acres of party pictures and articles written by local faux celebrities. (Look for a regular column by Back Bay council cutie Michael Ross on things people ask him about the most. Southie's cranky Jimmy Kelly didn't get invited to write -- I don't know why.) The magazine will be free to the chosen; even the rich ultimately get what they pay for.
Once we promoted ideas, now we promote spending. Around the country, high-end advertisers are piling into magazines like Boston Common. Niche Media, which will publish Boston Common five times a year, starting in September, also has magazines in New York, Los Angeles, Aspen, and the Hamptons, and soon in Washington. Competitors like Modern Luxury Publishing are expanding fast, too. In our two-tiered society franchised operations like Niche Media and
Locally, Boston magazine has long owned the luxury turf, but the field is getting crowded. Last year, the Globe redesigned its Sunday magazine and put a former Boston magazine editor in charge; the Globe has also considered starting its own luxury magazine. The Improper Bostonian, which lost money for years, has flourished. A magazine called Industry, produced in Florida, started a Boston edition in February. In September, the Boston Herald is launching a magazine that will be distributed four times a year through the weekly newspapers it owns in the high-end suburbs.
Jason Binn, the man behind Niche Media, has come into Boston like a bull in a china shop. Within a matter of months Niche was sued by MassINC, the Boston think tank, for appropriating the name of its magazine, CommonWealth, and by Boston magazine for allegedly pirating its ad list. Binn folded on both, surrendering the name and the ad list. On Monday night, Boston Common threw a party for several hundred atop 60 State Street. When it came time for Binn to address the crowd, he had nothing to say, just like his magazines.
Boston magazine -- which even with ice cream cones on the current cover comes off like The New York Times, compared to Binn's titles -- will answer back with its own summer party Monday at Fenway Park.
How will a magazine based on celebrities play in a town with no celebrities? Ben Affleck, Matt Damon, and who? Unlike in Aspen and the Hamptons, there are no A-tables in Boston restaurants and we are less obsessed with fashion and beauty. For all our faults, we don't tend to be nearly so self-conscious about status. We do, however, like to shop.
Like every boom, a bust is sure to follow. Some of these magazines will stick in some of the towns. In a few years guys like Binn will find some Europeans dumb enough to buy their companies at just the wrong time and price. It is a formula with a solid track record of success.
Steve Bailey is a Globe columnist. He can be reached at bailey@globe.com or at 617-929-2902. 
