• by Joe Mandese  @mp_joemandese, September 3, 2024

Iconoclastic Editor and Publisher Bob Guccione Jr. is going back to the lab to launch a new publication that will challenge -- and hopefully disrupt -- the conventional wisdom and the sanctity of science.

Guccione, best known as Founder of SPIN magazine, most recently has been publishing travel site Wonderlust, but he has long had a passion for science going back to his earliest days in publishing when he and his father -- Penthouse Founder Bob Guccione -- launched OMNI magazine. He also was editor and publisher of Discover magazine.

His new pub -- rflxt -- a joint venture with game and entertainment content publishing platform RFLXT Studios, will focus on all aspects of science, tech, the future, and wellness, but with a heavy emphasis on Guccione's trademark skepticism.

The new publication, which will operate independently of RFLXT Studios, will launch later this fall and already has assembled a Who's Who startup team including:

• Linda Marsa, book author and former Contributing Editor at OMNI and Discover.

• Eric Haseltine, neuroscientist, author, former Head Imagineer at Disney, and former Assistant Director of the NSA.

• Micah M. Murray, neuroscientist and full professor at the University of Lausanne and Scientific Director of The Sense Innovation and Research Center in Lausanne, Switzerland.

• Will Cady, author and former executive at Reddit, where he built its in-house global creative strategy agency, KarmaLab.

• Ellen Datlow, renowned fiction editor and anthologist.

Click on the video to hear Guccione discuss rflxt's thesis, why he'll be using non-science writers to cover science, and why he'll be challenging the often too-cozy relationship between media and science.