JOHN MAYER’S CONTROVERSIAL ‘N-WORD’ INTERVIEW BOOSTS PLAYBOY MAGAZINE’S CIRCULATION
February 21st 2010 07:36
Obviously there is some credence in the theory that some people read Playboy magazine for the articles.
During an earnings conference call on Thursday Feb 18 with analysts, Playboy president Alex Vaickus thanked musician John Mayer for the comments he made in the magazine’s March issue last year, as it’s now been picked up by at least 1,500 media outlets, leading to 500 million media impressions.
Singer John Mayer ignited a media storm with the no-holds barred Playboy magazine interview in which he described former girlfriend Jessica Simpson as "sexual napalm" and confessed an aversion to sleeping with black women. Most outrage was caused by Mayer’s use of the word “nigger” in the interview.
In a way this episode is a sort of a back to the future scenario for Playboy which in past decades has ridden high on the quality of its editorial, so much so that the old gag of reading Playboy just for the articles is universal.
In the not-so-distant past Playboy was also renowned for the quality of its interviews which were widely quoted and widely read.
Indeed, so important was the interview to Playboy’s editorial mix that during the 1980’s the magazines now-retired legendary editor Arthur Kretchmer told me that even if marketing experts told him the interviews were so long that nobody read them, he would still retain them because of their importance to the magazine’s credibility.
And now of course the Mayer interview shows that not only does the interview still get read, it also sells magazine copies despite any moral arguments about what may be said in the interview.
The offending passages in the Playboy interview were:
MAYER: Someone asked me the other day, "What does it feel like now to have a hood pass?" And by the way, it's sort of a contradiction in terms, because if you really had a hood pass, you could call it a nigger pass. Why are you pulling a punch and calling it a hood pass if you really have a hood pass? But I said, "I can’t really have a hood pass. I've never walked into a restaurant, asked for a table and been told, 'We're full.'"
PLAYBOY: It is true; a lot of rappers love you. You recorded with Common and Kanye West, played live with Jay-Z.
MAYER: What is being black? It’s making the most of your life, not taking a single moment for granted. Taking something that’s seen as a struggle and making it work for you, or you'll die inside. Not to say that my struggle is like the collective struggle of black America. But maybe my struggle is similar to one black dude's.
PLAYBOY: Do black women throw themselves at you?
MAYER: I don't think I open myself to it. My dick is sort of like a white supremacist. I've got a Benetton heart and a fuckin' David Duke cock. I'm going to start dating separately from my dick.”
During an earnings conference call on Thursday Feb 18 with analysts, Playboy president Alex Vaickus thanked musician John Mayer for the comments he made in the magazine’s March issue last year, as it’s now been picked up by at least 1,500 media outlets, leading to 500 million media impressions.
Singer John Mayer ignited a media storm with the no-holds barred Playboy magazine interview in which he described former girlfriend Jessica Simpson as "sexual napalm" and confessed an aversion to sleeping with black women. Most outrage was caused by Mayer’s use of the word “nigger” in the interview.
In the not-so-distant past Playboy was also renowned for the quality of its interviews which were widely quoted and widely read.
Indeed, so important was the interview to Playboy’s editorial mix that during the 1980’s the magazines now-retired legendary editor Arthur Kretchmer told me that even if marketing experts told him the interviews were so long that nobody read them, he would still retain them because of their importance to the magazine’s credibility.
And now of course the Mayer interview shows that not only does the interview still get read, it also sells magazine copies despite any moral arguments about what may be said in the interview.
The offending passages in the Playboy interview were:
MAYER: Someone asked me the other day, "What does it feel like now to have a hood pass?" And by the way, it's sort of a contradiction in terms, because if you really had a hood pass, you could call it a nigger pass. Why are you pulling a punch and calling it a hood pass if you really have a hood pass? But I said, "I can’t really have a hood pass. I've never walked into a restaurant, asked for a table and been told, 'We're full.'"
MAYER: What is being black? It’s making the most of your life, not taking a single moment for granted. Taking something that’s seen as a struggle and making it work for you, or you'll die inside. Not to say that my struggle is like the collective struggle of black America. But maybe my struggle is similar to one black dude's.
PLAYBOY: Do black women throw themselves at you?
MAYER: I don't think I open myself to it. My dick is sort of like a white supremacist. I've got a Benetton heart and a fuckin' David Duke cock. I'm going to start dating separately from my dick.”
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