Jezebel (website)

Jezebel is a blog aimed at women's interests, under the tagline "Celebrity, Sex, Fashion. Without Airbrushing." It is one of several blogs owned by Gawker Media.

Jezebel was launched on May 21, 2007, as the fourteenth Gawker blog.Stephanie D. Smith, Irin Carmon. "Memo Pad." "Women's Wear Daily", 2007-05-21.] According to managing editor Anna Holmes, the site stemmed from the desire to better serve Gawker.com's female readers, who made up 70% of the site's readership at the time."Journalist Q&A - Anna Holmes, Jezebel." "PR Week" (US), 2007-06-04.] The Jezebel manifesto states that the site "will attempt to take all the essentially meaningless but sweet stuff directed our way and give it a little more meaning, while taking more the serious stuff and making it more fun, or more personal, or at the very least the subject of our highly sophisticated brand of sex joke. Basically, we wanted to make the sort of women's magazine we'd want to read." [ [http://jezebel.com/gossip/jezebel-manifesto/the-five-great-lies-of-womens-magazines-262130.php "Jezebel Manifesto: The Five Great Lies of Women's Magazines"] . Jezebel.com, 2007-11-01.] One of the site's guiding principles, according to Holmes, is to avoid saying "misogynist things about women's weight."Johnson, Steve. "Steve Johnson column." "The Chicago Tribune", 2007-07-25.]

At launch, the editorial staff included Holmes, who previously worked at "Star" and "In Style"; assistant editor Moe Tkacik, a former "The Wall Street Journal" reporter; and associate editor Jennifer Gerson, a former assistant to "Elle" editor-in-chief Roberta Myers. Gerson left the site in May 2008 to become the Women's Editor for the Polo Ralph Lauren website [Holmes, Anna. [http://jezebel.com/387150/you-can-take-the-girl-out-of-jezebel-but-you-cant-take-the-jezebel-out-of-the-girl "You Can Take the Girl Out of Jezebel, But You Can't Take The Jezebel Out of the Girl"] . Jezebel.com, 2005-05-05.] ; Tkacik departed in August 2008 to work at Gawker.com, after briefly accepting and then rescinding a job offer from "Radar". [Holmes, Anna. [http://jezebel.com/5027642/announcements "Announcements"] . Jezebel.com, 2008-07-23.] Tkacik was subsequently laid off in a company-wide restructuring the following October. [Koblin, John. [http://www.observer.com/2008/media/denton-shuffles-deck-hires-snyder-m-e-gawker-moe-tkacik-let-go "Denton Shuffles Deck: Hires Snyder as M.E. of Gawker; Moe Tkacik Let Go."] "The New York Observer", 2008-10-03.] Current Jezebel editors include Dodai Stewart, Tracie Eagan and Jessica Grose.

On its first day of operation, Jezebel offered a $10,000 reward for the best example of a magazine cover photo prior to being retouched for publication.Stephanie D. Smith, Irin Carmon, Amy Wicks. "Memo Pad." "Women's Wear Daily", 2007-07-17.] The site received between five and ten submissions.Stephanie D. Smith, Irin Carmon, Amy Wicks. "Memo Pad." WWD, 2007-07-17.] The winning entry, announced in July 2007, was a photo of Faith Hill that was used on the July cover of "Redbook".Stephanie D. Smith, Irin Carmon, Amy Wicks. "Memo Pad." WWD, 2007-07-17.] Jezebel pointed out eleven different ways the photo had been drastically altered, including radically distorting Hill's left arm. [Tkacik, Moe. [http://jezebel.com/gossip/top/the-annotated-guide-to-making-faith-hill-hot-278978.php "The Annotated Guide to Making Faith Hill 'Hot'"] . Jezebel.com, 2007-07-16.] "Redbook" editor-in-chief Stacy Morrison said that their retouching of Hill's photo was in line with industry standards, and that Redbook was investigating how the unretouched image had been released. Media coverage of the controversy included discussion and interviews on NBC's "Today" show as well as several publications. [Armstrong, Jenice. "Not fair to Faith." "Philadelphia Daily News", 2007-07-25.] [Ives, Nat. "Keeping people from blowing their covers; How magazines protect exclusive content in age of web, celeb obsession." "Advertising Age", 2007-10-01.]

In December 2007, Jezebel reached 10 million monthly views. Gawker owner Nick Denton pointed to Jezebel's soaring popularity as one reason for a drop-off in traffic at the company's main site Gawker.com, which fell from over 11 million page views in October 2007 to about eight million in December. [Salkin, Allen. "Has Gawker Jumped the Snark?" "The New York Times", 2008-01-13.]

A July 2008 article in the Ottawa Citizen included Jezebel as one of several sites launched as part of the "online estrogen revolution," referring to a comScore Media Metrix finding that community-based women's websites were tied with political sites as the Internet's fastest-growing category. The article also cited "Ad Age"'s research showing that Internet use by women is outpacing that of men. [Harris, Misty. "The 'Online estrogen revolution.'" "Ottawa Citizen", 2008-07-29.]

References

External links

* [http://www.jezebel.com/ Jezebel]