Some events come as a shock to the system, even as they don’t especially surprise. (Wait, that’s how I began yesterday’s post. Well, this one also mentions Josh Treviño, and here at Blog P.I. we are all about serendipity.) The shuttering of Culture11, billed as kind of a center-right Slate, is one of them.
The website debuted in late summer 2008 and mostly featured writers about my age and no more than one or two degrees of Kevin Bacon away, writing mostly about whatever they wanted. I thought the project had merit: as someone of a center-right disposition who listens to college music, watches art films and reads literary fiction, I wanted it to succeed. The best explanation for why Culture11 was important, I thought, was delivered last November by features editor Conor Friedersdorf on Bloggingheads.tv. However, just because I wanted it to succeed did not mean that I thought that it did, or even that I read it very much.
Likewise, the name was a definite stumbling block.* I’m not sure what Culture11 was supposed to mean, but it had the unfortunate connotation for me of 9/11, which in turn made me think the site was supposed to be or comment upon something like “a cultural 9/11″ and I just didn’t understand. At least something like “Slate” or “Salon” conjures something: a place for writing and a place for talking, respectively. And while “culture” is interesting, it always seems less so when one calls it that. I don’t know why, but let me know if you do.
While it’s hardly the only journalism concern cutting back or going under this week, it is probably attracting the most discussion of any right now. Which means it’s high time for a roundup:
First off, Culture11 founder David Kuo, in his farewell post:
We raised a certain amount of money last year predicated on the assumption we would raise more money last year. Then the Fall’s fall occurred and we stretched money as long and far as we could without incurring any debts. With no new money in the door the board decided the most prudent thing to do was suspend business operations.
From NYC-based Patrol Magazine:
There were “signs,” says one source who spoke to a Culture11 editor yesterday, but the announcement was a shock. The financial backers lost money in the downturn, and suddenly decided the expensive Culture11 needed to be profitable. (The site has, in its five months of operation, only occasionally displayed small ads.) How things proceeded to an overnight shutdown, we don’t know. If you worked at C11 or know more, feel free to share.
One-off contributor and Culture11 fan Will Collins:
Culture11 was a pretty special publication. The editors gave new writers a shot, published authors from across the ideological spectrum, and provided something of a one-stop shop for great blogging. But beyond all that, I felt close to the writers, who always did their level best to respond to interesting comments, reply to our emails, and even solicit reader submissions. So much of this new media bullshit is hype and snake oil salesmanship, but at Culture11, technology actually enhanced the relationship between publication and audience.
Another dedicated reader, blogging under the name Freddie:
If you Google “Culture11″ you’ll find a ton of entries that say “My article at Culture11″. That’s because, in addition to tons of content from established (and David Brooks approved!) writers, the editors went out of their way to find young or undiscovered talent and give them a forum to write in. It made for a much livelier and more complete discussion, and was a real credit to the imagination of the architects of the site and to the willingness of the editors to let quality rule and give whoever was honest and well-spoken a shot.
The man who defies political categorization, Andrew Sullivan:
I have a feeling that Culture 11 will one be remembered in the same way that Seven Days, the briefly brilliant New York City magazine that Adam Moss edited in the late 80s, is now remembered. One day, a conservative journal will emerge that is able to break from the stifling, clammy orthodoxy of today’s post-Buckley National Review and the often unhinged neocon catechism of the Weekly Standard. When it does, its editors will be able to look back and say that Culture 11 opened up the frontier.
And the aforementioned Josh Treviño:
Culture11’s subject matter was perfect for, say, summer 2000: heavy on pop and principles, light on policy and prescriptions. But it launched in summer 2008, when the national conversation was focused on war and economics. In that sense, it was marginalized from the start, and stayed that way: today, for example, the single largest item on its front page concerns the Culture11 “American Idol Watch Party.” This may be good fun, but it’s not particularly in touch with the national zeigeist — nor even the zeitgeist of those who read online publications like Culture11. All this said, it’s reasonable to assume that in the fullness of time, those zeigeists would come around: perhaps in spring 2010, the national mood will be ready to reflect upon the conservatism of reality television.
This probably explains a lot why I didn’t read the site much. And there are bigger problems with the project as undertaken, which Mike Riggs at the City Paper explains at some length.
It’s always seemed to me that a center-right pop culture website would have to be incidentally so, just as Slate doesn’t usually make a point of being center-left. Which brings me back to my old lament about the state of conservative journalism.
A change of culture, ironically, will have to take place for that to happen, and I don’t see that just yet.
P.S. In a post at the still slightly active Culture11 blog, Joe Carter graciously notes my comment on the name of the site and explains to my satisfaction just what the name was all about.
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*Prior to launch, I had suggested an alternate name to an editor I didn’t know too well. The original name was originally titled “Liberty Wire”, which sounds like an Associated Press for Ron Paul voters; my idea was “Redhead”, a nod to its espoused conservative, intellectual and cultural inclinations. Someone later pointed out the dot com for that name went to a porn site (a claim I cannot verify this morning, although I promise I have tried).
