write about men's magazines from time to time, when one appears in the news. Despite being a man, I find such magazines utter garbage, and aside from a year of Penthouse shortly after I first moved out into my own apartment when I was about 20, I've never read any of them regularly; especially not Playboy.  My reasons are elaborated in the blog bits you'll see on this page, so there's no point in me going into it now.

There are also general news items about Playboy that aren't directly related to the suckage it exhibits, and news about other men's magazines that stop short of actual pornography.

New additions to this page are added on top.

August 12, 2003

Article today discussing the apparently-imminent demise of Penthouse magazine.  The article also makes much about Penthouse publisher Bob Guccione, and the fact that he's about to lose his penthouse apartment in NYC.

Guccione, who is originally from Bergenfield, N.J., bought his 45-room, 20,000-square-foot mansion back in Penthouse’s 1970s heyday. Located on East 67th Street between Central Park and Madison Avenue, its décor includes a swimming pool modeled on a Roman bath and a collection of paintings by the likes of Picasso and Matisse. Guccione studied art before taking up porn publishing in London  in the late '60s.

As the buzz goes, and I've blogged about in the past, print porn seems to be dead or dying. The Internet is a far better porn-delivery system, with thousands of sites offering stuff as good or better than any magazine, for free.  I assume there are even more "good" pay porn sites, but I've never looked on any of them, so I really couldn't tell you.  In fact I've hardly glanced at any porn at all during the past month, but I'm assuming nothing has really changed during my absence.  Damn my actual sex life for ruining my surfing experience!

An article says that Playboy models have grown more "boyish" over the years.

"Playboy" models have become more boyish over the years as smaller breasts and hips replace their stereotypical hourglass figures, according to a new study.

The classic Playmate look typified by 1950s Playboy pin-up Marilyn Monroe has given way to a trend for slimmer models, according to the study published in the British Medical Journal on Friday.

How did they obtain the data for this revelation?

Researchers from Austria and Canada selflessly analyzed the bodies of centerfold models in 577 consecutive issues of Playboy, from the magazine's launch in 1953 to December 2001.

They found that models' weight had remained steady, but their bust and hip measurements had decreased and their waists had thickened.

The study offered no explanation for why Playmates are getting slimmer, but the trend appears to mirror the success of thinner models such as Kate Moss in the fashion world.

The article is accompanied by this photo, showing Hef with his wives or girlfriends or harem or young women he pays to stand next to him in public and pretend not to be repulsed by his aged, reptilian appearance.  Who are, of course, all hugely busty and blonde and empty-eyed. 

I think this is bullshit, personally. The reason so many men, myself included, don't ever look at Playboy is because all of the models look the same.  They're all like a poor man's Pamela Anderson, with huge implants and blank stares.  Yes they have tiny little waists and asses, but that's the modern taste in female appearance.

Look at any old shot of Marilyn Monroe and the other famous pin up girls from the 50's and 60's.  They're goddamned fat!  At least by today's standards. I read somewhere that Marilyn weighed 160-180 in her prime.  I'd bet the average Playboy centerfold today weighs 120 tops.  Most lighter than that, at least in their reported weights. Which are lies, just like those 36-24-36 type measurements that Playboy puts on their centerfold info sheets.  I guarantee you that those figures are cooked to skew towards what Playboy thinks the readers want.

Back when "hourglass" figures were the rage, men wanted that literally.  As big in the hips and bust as possible, compared to the waist.  Women back then didn't have implants to pump up their bust measurement, and they still had larger reported busts than most modern models.  They certainly had bigger hips.  Playboy knew that men wanted hourglass, so they said every 35-30-36 woman was 37-28-37, hypothetically speaking.  Plus she weighed 140 or 150 pounds.

Today the trend is towards thinner women, with tiny little asses, and big boobies (at least so Playboy seems to think).  So the models are a lot smaller and they put in an hour a day on the Stairmaster and in their Tai-Bo class, and diet like Ethiopian refugees, and add a cup size and 4 or 6 inches to their bust with implants.  And they're still smaller in the bust than the heifers were back in the 50's.  Plus I figure they lie about their measurements now, since men want smaller asses.  So the 35-29-35 figure becomes a 35-28-33.

Also, Playboy models are sort of a throwback in body type.  They are far bigger and heavier in the hips and more hourglassy than the models you see in other such "publications".  A few years ago I saw a Hustler that someone left on a plane, and every woman in it looked like Kate Moss's ugly sister. With implants.  Very skinny and clearly sub-Playboy quality in looks, and all about 19 or so, with still very boyish asses.

...the trend appears to mirror the success of thinner models such as Kate Moss in the fashion world.

I don't see Playboy very often, only when some pics from it pop up online, or one of their models is in the news for whatever reason (like this stupid survey news article).  But I have never seen a Playboy "Bunny" who looked anything at all like Kate Moss.

Also, name another "supermodel" who does?  You hear a lot about models being painfully thin, but are they?  Look at the supermodels, the biggest names like Tyra Banks, Elle MacPherson, Cindi Crawford, Naomi Campbell, Gisele Bundchen, Christy Turlington, Claudia Schiffer, etc.  The only one there I can think of who doesn't have at least C cups is Cindi Crawford, and she's surprisingly flat-chested, very out of the ordinary for a supermodel. The rest are either implanted or just freaks of nature in their bodily proportions.

The skinny models are the international fashion models who you probably haven't heard of by name, at least not in the US, but who you see in those hideous fashion outfits on the runway.  Like these, or these.  But those body types don't show up in Playboy, as far as I know.  Well they do, but they have water balloon-sized implants.

I wouldn't have any objections to or surprise about the study results if not for this line.

They found that models' weight had remained steady, but their bust and hip measurements had decreased and their waists had thickened.

How in the hell can they say the women today have thicker waists?  Even given that the waist figures from long ago were lies to emphasize the hourglass?  Look at this page, which I just google'd up.  It lists info about tons of the top supermodels, including their measurements, preferred sexual positions, and how likely they are to swallow.  Well, maybe the first of those.

Kate Moss is said to be a ridiculous 33-23-35 and 105 pounds.  You're telling me that Playboy's trend is to get models like that, and they're bigger in the waist than the ones from 30 years ago?  What were the models then, 17 inch waists?  Twenty three inches is ridiculously thin, if that's really her measurement.  I just measured my left thigh near the hip, and it's 24". That's over a pair of pants, and my legs are bigger than most due to all the walking I do at work, but still, you're telling me a woman's entire torso above the hips is thinner than one of my legs?

• Stephanie Seymour is 34-23-34 and looks very busty, probably due to the wasp waist.
• Heidi Klum is 35-24-34, and has one of the worst supermodel names in human history.
• Tyra Banks is 36C-24-36, and obviously has much larger breasts than that due to her implants.
• Karen Mulder is 34-24-34. Which I find hard to believe since she's got big boobies.

Yes, this was probably gratuitous.

Through the magic of the Internet I have located the British Medical Journal's website and guess what?  They have the full article online.  Unfortunately it doesn't add much more, though there is this nifty graph. Their basis for saying women are more boyish now is based on a hip to waist measurement ratio.  First of all, I'd say this is more due to thinner hips now rather than fatter waists.  Men want very thin women now, thin hips and waist, with big boobies.  This is possible through the miracle of implants.

Whether a woman with narrower hips (since there's not 4 inches of meat over their pelvis as Marilyn and others had way back when, before they knew to exercise) and a narrower waist is more "boyish" than a woman with giant hips and a semi-narrow waist is certainly open to debate.

But just going by their figures, the average hip/waist ratio of a Playboy centerfold has gone from something like .64 to .7 in almost 50 years. That's not much of a change.  The old days of .64 works out to something like 23 waist/36 hips. The modern day of .7 works out to 25 waist/36 hips.  Alternately, 1960's could be 27/40, and today could be 24/34.  Which is very close to what Stephanie Seymour, Karen Mulder, and Heidi Klum all report, as you see on the little bullet list above.

Interestingly enough, Kate Moss is said to be 23/35, which is .66, or more at home in the 1950's than today. Did they pick her for an example without actually doing the math?  Lazy scientists!

You'll note that bust is left off of their measurements entirely.  I'd say with good reason, since 1) it's probably lied about even more than waist/hips, and 2) figures since about 1980 would be worthless due to the increasing prevalence of implants.

So anyway, a conclusion?  I think you could explain away 90% of the change by lies about the figures, as Playboy or the models themselves fudge an inch or two here or there.  A .66 ratio, not much below average today, is 24/36.  Cheat an inch or two each way and you're at 23/38, for a .6 ratio, which was low end in the 1950's, and what men wanted.  If that same 24/36 woman spent an hour a day kickboxing and jogging and doing sit ups, she'd probably go to 25/35, be in far better shape, and have a .71 ratio.  And be boyish, according to the scientists.  Bring me some young boys like that!

Oh wait, did that sound wrong?

November 20, 2002

I enjoyed this article about the difficulties Playboy magazine is having.  They're actually considering covering up the playmates, if you can imagine, since the new "lad's magazines" are eating up their subscription base in a suddenly very competitive magazine genre.

The "men's magazine" market is very lucrative, and newer non-nude mags like FHM and Details and Maxim are growing in sales very rapidly, while older, truly-adult mags like Penthouse and Playboy are dropping, and the sleazier titles like Hustler and High Society are about to go out of business.  Soft porn isn't selling on the printed page, with it all available for free on the internet.

So what's Playboy's problem?

As Ralph editor Benjamin Long explains: "Before, there were magazines like Arena, GQ, Esquire and The Face, which were more strait-laced and stuffy. They created a very cultivated image and appealed to a high-end area of the market, pushing an image that is a bit unreal for most people, probably for everybody. Magazines like Loaded shook up that men's market. They were a breath of fresh air, with an irreverent approach and a sense of humour that appeals to men.

He's talking about the UK market, but the principle is the same.  Playboy was basically Esquire or GQ with nudity.  Stuffy, intellectual, scholarly type articles and reviews, along with expensive toys ALA The Sharper Image, and the very soft porn of their photos.  Sort of an odd combination, when you think about it.  Other mags came along later and went for the porno angle, but those are all dying now due to the Internet and porno tapes. 

The Internet has made pornography more accessible than ever. Last year alone, $5.7 billion was spent on online porn. According to Penthouse owner Bob Guccione, the boom in cyber porn means there is now "no future for adult mass market magazines".

This quote from the Australian FHM editor Jon Bastick is pretty naked.

"We try and pitch it at a single guy, aged 27, who's having the time of his life. At 27, invariably you're not married, you're chasing women, you're moving up the career ladder, you're making OK dough and all the money you make you spend on yourself. So it's probably his glory days. Younger readers aspire to be that. Then you've got older guys who might be in their 30s who are now married and maybe having kids and they can remember back to when they were 27 and didn't have a beer gut and a bald head."

Amazingly detailed stereotype he's assembled there, isn't it?  I like the part about the minute you hit 30 and get married you're fat and bald and it's all over.  Wonder how old he is?

The real revelation of the article is that Playboy might drop nudity.  In the US you don't see Playboy on supermarket shelves, but they all have FHM and Details and all the rest prominently-displayed.  Those magazines are full of sex talk and photos of semi-celebrity women who are all but naked, and they have similar fashion features and articles as Playboy, but it's all done with more humor and less maturity.

What it boils down to is that Playboy thinks their titties are holding them back, adding a stigma to the magazine that keeps men from leaving it lying around their apartment (since women will squawk if they see it) or reading it in public, not to mention hurting their shelf space.  No one is buying Playboy for the titties, and the titties are keeping them from a wider audience, so why have them?

Two months ago Hefner named James Kaminsky, a former executive director of Maxim, as Playboy's new editorial director, telling him to tone down the sexual content and overhaul the magazine.

In reconfiguring Playboy, Hefner's aim is to introduce "journalism of importance" to the mag. He told The New York Observer that he wanted Kaminsky to bring "better non-fiction. More must-read pieces. More humour. Probably some celebrity pieces that are not as explicit. Big-name writers, yes. But also good reportage".

Just as an ending disclaimer, I don't read any of these magazines, nor do I have any interest in doing so.  I view the "lad's mags" as immature and stupid, Entertainment Weekly with a boner, and feel they would be an insult to my intelligence with their "Frat Boy" mentality.  Literary equivalents of the teen sex comedies, none of which I've had any interest in viewing.  I've never done more than glance through any of them at a newsstand, and didn't feel enticed to read more than that.  And I will never buy a magazine to look at pictures of some woman in short shorts.

I did subscribe to a year of Penthouse long ago, before the Internet was doing much, but I got sick of it long before the year was up, and would never consider buying any sort of porn mag at this point.  Apparently I'm not alone, given their declining sales figures.

April 13, 2002

A friend sent me this link, which purports to be a free subscription to Playboy.  Sign up for it if you want; I turned it down w/o a thought.  Partially since that friend sends me nothing but free or cheap crap notices (I despise coupon-clipping and scrounging for discounts on crap I didn't want in the first place.), but mostly since I have no interest in Playboy.  Ironically enough, I was reading an article about Playboy, and its unchanging irrelevance in this modern age, a few minutes before he ICQ'ed me.  The article is from a few years ago, but I'm sure it's just as accurate today as it was back then.

I don't have any interest in Playboy.  Last time I was traveling a guy was reading the mag in the airport, and when his plane came he left it on his chair and boarded.  I took it and threw it in the trash without even looking at it.

"You are the only male in this country who would say no to playboy"

Anyway, I'm belaboring the point, and it's sort of a Howard Stern argument in the first place.  I'm just too depressed to do any real work, so I'm going on and on about nothing here.  Bed time.

After I posted the first portion of this article, I heard from two male readers who echoed my points almost exactly.  Said they couldn't stand the stupid softcore junk in Playboy and refused to look at it.  So I'm not alone.  At least not completely.

All site content copyright "Flux" (Eric Bruce), 2002-2007.