Original Webzine remakes itself
After all, it can no longer really be called a "magazine." In fact, Editor-in-Chief Gabrielle Shannon is adamant on that point: "It will not have issues and articles. It will not cover beats or review products," she wrote in a letter to readers announcing the makeover.
"We will create a venue for the distribution of new-school new media: highly visual pieces, not so linear storytelling, interactive explorations, short films, animations, games, experiments, media hoaxes... and who knows what else."
| `It's time to move on.' -- Urban Desires co-founder Kyle Shannon |
The idea behind the original UD, launched in December 1994, concurrently with the first release of Netscape's Navigator Web browser, was to bring the format of a hipster magazine to the Internet.
But like for many of its contemporaries (including Charged, Word and Total New York), UD's idea lost steam as the medium evolved, and as underwriter Agency.com, a New York City Web design firm, looked for ways to justify the expense.
In the beginning
Urban Desires was started by Shannon and Agency.com principals Kyle Shannon (Gabrielle's husband) and Chan Suh, and was originally run as a promotional tool for the design firm. But now that Agency.com is well-established -- having built award-winning sites for Nike and British Airways -- the Webzine might seem to have fulfilled its purpose.
"It's time to move on," Shannon wrote.
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| Why Word lost its voice. | |
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But instead of killing the site off outright, the UD team decided to reinvent it on more occasional, experimental lines.
The first piece presents several clips from Sandye Wilson's short film "So Many Things to Consider," which won a prize at the Sundance film festival last year, couched in an interface that mimics the film's grainy, monochrome style.
Aaron Sugarman joins the new site as creative director.
UD will also offer archives of the site's last three years of articles.