(Malicious) Mischief
I found out it was actually Successful Alpha Male. (I am stifling laughter.) I thought it was an interesting concept--I read Maxim from time to time. Scantily clad hotties on the cover of any magazine will fly off the newsstands, that's for sure. But what really bothered me is thinking how scantily clad, hot Asian babes on the cover of a magazine is such a lucrative thing to push--especially for those with the Asian Persuasion.
The thought made me sick to my stomach. I'm not being a "hater" or a hardcore femi-nazi, or anything. I'm just being honest.
The other day one of my best friends, S, emailed me the Friendster [1] profile of a new South Asian male magazine, Masti magazine [2]. Apparently February was the month to "make masti" ("masti" means mischief), as they had various East Coast launch parties to inaugurate their publication.
As someone who has an Asian American women's fashion magazine named after her (hahahaha!) and who has been involved with various independent publications, I am not knocking anyone who enters the field of publishing. It's a hard industry, especially since people seem to read less and less, or online is where it's at. I'm a firm believer in grassroots media, because there's always an audience, and we (those of us who don't see ourselves represented on the newsstands) need to create masti on the newsstands, malicious or not.