Good planning: V Magazine editor in chief Stephen Gan had 50,000 “Obama’s in the House” red, white and blue stickers printed and affixed to magazine covers at the last minute for its Beyonce cover. (WWD)

Starbucks wins big with Election day free coffee promotion (AdAge)

Conde Nast employees fear further layoffs. (NY Post)

In other Condé Nast news, the publisher announced a partnership with video platform Brightcove to manage its video initiatives on Glamour.com, Wired.com, Portfolio.com, Parade.com and Self.com. (Folio)

MGM to post full films on YouTube. (NY Times)

Publishers Making Integrated U-Turn:As clients trim budgets, publishers put brakes on elaborate, beyond-the-page ad packages. (Mediaweek)

Google Signs a Deal to e-Publish Out-of-Print Books. (NY Times)

Financial Times website gets a facelift. (Portfolio)

The New York Times released on Sunday its first-ever “green issue”— an offering a variety of ideas for environmentally-conscious living featuring a variety of new advertisers.

But, in what’s becoming the hottest trend is for magazines to publish “green issues” that are not printed on recycled paper, reports Folio.

Isn’t this hypocritical?

Well, it looks like we’ll continue to see covers like this one of Gwyneth Paltrow (I mean look at her FACE!).

“Photoshop abuse is out of control at magazines, partly because celebrities demand protection from exposure to reality and partly because editors live and die by newsstand sales,” reports AdAge. 

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“The only perspective I have on the cover is it has got to work on the newsstand,” says Penny Garrett, c0-head of graphics at The Economist in the March issue of Folio.  ” We do them as mini posters to stand out in the crowd, but occasionally we do go for quite a complicated one.”

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In case you missed it!

Mark Pasetsky, who served as Life & Style’s general manager and, later, its editor-in-chief, today announced a launch of a Web site that will cover, at least in part, his old magazine.  The blog, CoverAwards.com, will feature content focused on magazine covers, newspaper covers and Web Site home pages.  Click here for the complete article.

Folio is reporting that the consumer magazine segment was the only non-digital category to see an increase in advertising revenue share in 2007, the Magazine Publishers of American announced today.

In 2007, consumer magazine ad share reached nearly 18.5 percent, up only slightly from 17.5 percent in 2006, according to TNS Media Intelligence. U.S. Internet online display advertising (not including search) also saw a share growth of one point—from 6.4 percent in 2006 to 7.4 percent in 2007.

Mark Newman, editor of Southern Breeze,  blogs on Folio about the often tense relationship between the editor-in-chief and the art director.

Apparently he upset a bunch of art directors saying that in the end the failure of a magazine falls on the head of the editor, while the success is attributed to the art director.

I spoke to a few editors and here’s their wish list for their art directors.  They are looking for a person who:

• Provides endless ideas and constantly challenges the editor to new heights.
• Doesn’t complain about having to try different covers with different photos until you get the right cover.  
• Is upbeat and doesn’t gossip all day long.

Is that so much to ask???

Check out Mark Newman’s blog at folio for the ongoing Editor vs. Art Director debate.

IT’S LIKE THAT TREE IN THE FOREST ANALOGY!

BREAKING NEWS:  Guthrie Inc., the parent company of Silver Spring, Maryland-based rock music magazine Harp is filing for Chapter 7 bankruptcy. Harp’s March/April issue will be its last, according to Folio.  Oh well!

A redesign for Radar?  According to Folio, Radar is welcoming new talent to it design staff. Kate Elazegui, art director at New York magazine, has been named design director.  Luke Hayman, from New York magazine and head of Time’s redesign, is now Radar’s creative consultant and will continue working with Pentagram Design.  (Folio)