• Domino's Web Site
    As an old-fashioned girl who grew up in the last century reading shiny, not virtual pages, I don't think the Internet can ever fully replace magazines. Still, I've been discovering how the Web can enrich the print experience with those online virtues of community, interactivity, and immediacy. Case in point: Domino's site. A graphic-oriented shelter book majoring in gorgeous photos and captions, Domino is particularly well-suited to the Web. So how does Dominomag.com stack up?
  • Every Day with Rachael Ray
    Food snobs love to write off (or let's face it, spit on) Rachael Ray, with her chunky, unappetizing-looking-and-sounding concoctions, (''figure-friendly sausage'') her too-cutesy phrases, (''yum-o!'') and her tendency toward booming self-congratulation (''smells awesome already!'') I understand where they're coming from, but I have to admit that in a too-too-perfect Martha Stewart world, I find some of Ray's generally goofy, loosey-goosiness endearing.
  • Wine Spectator
    I'm told that Wine Spectator has bulked up its staff in recent months, but mostly it seems to have bulked up its repertoire of adjectives. Words used to describe new wines in the June 30 issue include "ultraripe," "superripe," "ultrajammy" and "superjammy" -- somebody get those crazy kids some new prefixes. Still, the mag is the best at what it does by a wide margin, mostly owing to the staggering volume of information it conveys. I can mock the dippily worded reviews all I want, but they do a fine, if verbally redundant, job of describing a particular wine's appeal …
  • Rise
    A few years after I graduated, my North Jersey high school became a state football power. In my day, the team played its games on green mud and started a nose tackle with the lateral dexterity of a keg. Today, it plies its trade on quick-draining artificial turf and trots out a swarm of broad-shouldered thoroughbreds on both sides of the ball. It is these behemoths of Bergen County, these Jer-Z jumbos, that Rise hopes to ensnare in its well-intentioned web. The mag, née School Sports, takes a big-picture view of high-school sports, highlighting a few of the hyped jocks …
  • Food Fight: Food & Wine Vs. Gourmet
    Let's say you're a foodie -- somebody who knew, even before it was explained on "Top Chef," that an amuse bouche was a bite-sized appetizer, not a command to make the President laugh. Should you turn to Food & Wine or Gourmet for help in planning your blow-out summer party?
  • Nylon Guys
    For the life of me, I can't figure out why a solid 15% of the magazines I'm sent appear to be aimed exclusively at New York and L.A. hipsters/scenemakers/whatevers. These people aren't inclined to spend their money on magazines and the products advertised therein. They have navels to pierce, tattoos to etch, clubgoers' shoes upon which to barf. Perhaps realizing this, Nylon Guys tries to play it both ways -- hipster and mainstream. The message this sends? "We're not secure enough in our editorial premise to shout it from the mountaintops; we'd rather entice you with people and stuff you've …
  • Bloomberg Markets
    Bloomberg Markets distinguishes itself with its features, which provide more kick, grit and nuance than those in competing publications. The July issue is headlined by a three-article examination of "Toxic Debt," specifically how the sub-prime debacle is having a pebble-in-a-pond effect on everything from public pensions to Stock-Market Sally's portfolio. I won't betray my ignorance on such matters by attempting to parse the stories any further than that, but I'll say this: after you've read 'em, you walk away much smarter. And more nervous.
  • Eldr
    This mag, which just published its premiere issue, has a motto: celebrate aging. We might start with celebrating something more basic: spelling. The editor's column tells readers to go to the window and yell: "I'm mad as hell, and I'm not going to take this any more!" If they have time to scare the neighbors, he can find the time to add an "e."
  • Scientific American Mind
    The four-year-old Scientific American Mind focuses squarely on the ol' noggin: how it processes information, where its limitations may be, why it doesn't take too kindly to repeated collisions with cinder-block walls, etc. It goes deep, discussing the neuroscience behind teamwork and the recognition of good advice. This is not a magazine for halfwits.
  • Vogue
    There are several reasons why I haven't taken a look at Vogue during the two-plus years this column has been around. To begin with, each issue is very long. Too, I'm not attracted to women shaped like twigs. But mostly it's because I can't abide Vogue's subtle, practiced nastiness. The mag's default tonality isn't "you might look good in this Ashley Paige tunic -- give it a try." Rather, it's "if you don't wear the singularly appropriate Balenciaga maillot, you will expose yourself as a woman of limited taste and social cachet, and embarrass yourself every time you journey out …
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