Now we are 10

The world’s changing. Idealog’s changing. And New Zealand?

Changes at Idealog To celebrate turning 10 we’re making some changes.

Idealog will now be published quarterly, will be fatter (more pages) and include a fancy executive lifestyle section covering cars, fashion, food, and culture. Plus there will be a free digital app for all subscribers. And of course we’re online daily! Talk to us If you have any thoughts on anything in the magazine, write to: editor@idealog. co.nz, tweet at @idealogmag, or comment on our stories online.

THIS IS IDEALOG’S 60th edition. That makes us 10 years old.

A decade in publishing is an achievement worth celebrating and we’ll certainly stop to smell the rosé.

There’s lots to be proud of. We were the first to bring to the mainstream such cool people as Sir Ray Avery (Medicine Mondiale), Rod Drury (Xero), Peter Beck (Rocket Lab), Tanya Thompson (Misery) and Vaughan Rowsell (Vend). We’ve poked the borax at plenty of sub-par performers, often before they became familiar targets: Callaghan Innovation (for cutting back on scientists); the architectural industry (for leaky homes); and the dairy industry (for its pollution). I recall once getting an angry letter from Lion Breweries about our story “Who killed Steinlager?” only to be told later that photocopies had been passed around the office and that it formed part of the rationale behind the launch of Steinglager Pure. They even advertised.

We’ve developed a cutting- edge website, social media presence and we’ve run popular events, believing a print magazine is not enough in a multichannel world.

I’m incredibly proud of our writers and photographers, that we survived the GFC and that we’ve maintained and renewed our partnership with AUT, an organisation that’s similarly defied the odds to find its place in the world.

But a successful publishing business is only a means to an end. The big hairy audacious goal was, and still is, to shift New Zealand from low-margin industries such as dairy, tourism and forestry to high margin industries: software, design, high-tech manufacturing and professional services. In that regard, I must admit to a sense of failure.

We see pockets of excellence and this magazine is chock full of them. But as I write, the airwaves are full of discussions about milk powder prices, El Nino growing conditions and Auckland property prices. Our economy has become more reliant, not less, on the same old, same old.

You can’t shift an economy in just 10 years. But let’s not forget what can be done. The rise of global giants like Facebook, Twitter, Uber, Airbnb occurred in the last decade. As have drones, iPhones and the Internet of Things. Ten years ago we didn’t even know what ISIS was and we thought Xero was a spelling mistake. The world is changing faster than we acknowledge. Despite our much vaunted creativity and resourcefulness, New Zealand simply does not commercialise its ideas at a scale and speed that makes us competitive.

If there is a vision for the next 10 years, it’s that we never see a cow on the cover again. Vincent Heeringa Publisher