I don’t recall exactly how the idea of doing a “night” issue came about. It was prompted, most likely, by our marketing and sales departments – the business side of our operation. (The ones who keep this ship afloat while us editors deal with life’s larger questions, such as, “Do we use a colon or an m-dash in that sentence? Let’s debate it for an hour!”) The conversation would have gone something like this.
Business side: We need to develop an editorial calendar for 2008.
Editorial team: Dudes, relax. It’s still 2007 for, like, a couple of months.
BS: No, we need to develop an editorial lineup now, please, so we can finalize the media kit and tell potential advertisers our plans for next year. By being proactive, we’ll leverage some synergies and maximize buy-in. [1]
ET: Uh?
BS: So we can sell ads! So you’ll have jobs! [2]
ET: Oh.
A few days later, there was a meeting. A brainstorming session, during which we made as many random suggestions for issue themes as possible. The love issue? The hate issue? The love and hate issue? The blank issue? Somewhere in this barrage, the themes that unlimited has explored throughout 2008 emerged. One of them was night.
We figured – without doing much long-range figurin’ – that it’d be fun to focus on work and business that’s nocturnal in nature. We thought about sleep strategies for people who do shift work, about folks who reverse their circadian rhythms because they need to stay on top of the Tokyo stock market. Admittedly, we didn’t dig too deeply into the subject. We had our editorial lineup, and plenty of time to map out a night issue.
Turns out, fortunately, there was a wealth of material to mine for stories. The security industry, for instance, which Peter Norman investigates in “Private Eyes Are Watching You,” on page 44. It’s a booming business, what with our culture of fear and all, but also one in transition. Speaking of booming, we dispatched Toronto writer Christopher Frey to Fort McMurray and asked him to stay up really late to see if Canada’s globally-integrated oil capital really runs all night and all day (“Burning The Midnight Oil,” page 26). And as with previous theme issues, patterns emerged. Alcohol, for instance. We’ve got stories on a bar owner and young craft brewers. Sex, too. Susan Hagan flirts with office romance in “Your Cubicle Or Mine?” (page 50); Scott Messenger takes a trip down mammary lane with a strip club impresario (page 74); and Lindsey Norris asks a sex researcher intimate questions (page 17).
This windfall proves two things. You never know what you’re going to find until you look. And it’s good to peer into the shadows.
In the 1976 sci-fi film Logan’s Run, it’s the 23rd century and the earth as we know it has been destroyed. All remaining humans live inside a domed city. Until they turn 30, that is. Then they are killed.
When we initially conceived of unlimited, we imagined a business and work culture magazine for readers in the 20- to 35-year-old demographic. Our reach has widened over the past year and a half – people in their 40s, 50s and even, gasp, 60s have told us they like the magazine. But I turned 35 this past summer and, like the characters in Logan’s Run, my time has come. I’m moving on to another magazine and new challenges, but still passionately believe that 20- and 30-something entrepreneurs and employees have an opportunity to change the world by taking thoughtful, holistic approaches to their working lives. Readers, you’re in good hands with unlimited’s new senior editor, Craille Maguire Gillies, who comes to us from enRoute magazine in Montreal (and, I’m happy to report, has a few years left in the demographic).
I’m grateful to so many people for sharing their stories in the pages of unlimited – stories that inform and inspire. I’m grateful to our readers, especially those who’ve taken the time to comment on what they like – and don’t like – in the magazine. I’m grateful to our contributors, for the perspectives they’ve offered and for being dedicated to their craft. And lastly, I’m grateful to my colleagues, who have abided my strange habits (and frequent lack of footwear in the office) and helped make a magazine that shows anything is possible.
Dan Rubinstein
[1] OK, I might have made up that “proactive, synergies” thing. My memory is a little fuzzy.
[2] This part, too. But it’s true. U
issue 8
Category: Articles
