April 2004 Maxim cover featuring Marge Simpson |
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| Editor-in-chief | Joe Levy (US) (April, 2008–present) |
|---|---|
| Categories | Men's |
| Frequency | Monthly |
| Total circulation (2011) |
2,530,440[1] |
| First issue | 1995 (UK) 1998 (US) |
| Final issue | 2009 (UK) Currently Published (US) |
| Company | Dennis Publishing (UK) Alpha Media Group (US) |
| Country | United Kingdom, Russia, United States, others |
| Language | English, many others |
| Website | maxim.com |
| ISSN | 1092-9789 |
Maxim is an international men's magazine based in the United Kingdom and known for its pictorials featuring popular actresses, singers, and female models, sometimes pictured dressed, often pictured scantily dressed but not fully nude.
In the United States, Maxim is an industry leader, reporting a circulation of 2.5 million readers which they claim is enough to outsell leading competitors GQ, Esquire, and Details combined. The magazine is now using the brand name to market a myriad other magazines and projects.
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Due to its success in its primary markets, Maxim has expanded into many other countries, including Argentina, Canada , India, Indonesia, Israel, Belgium, Romania, the Czech Republic, France (marketed under "Maximal"), Germany, Bulgaria, Brazil, Chile, Greece, Italy, Korea, Mexico, Netherlands, Poland, Russia (where it stands now as the most popular men's magazine), Serbia, the Philippines, Singapore, Spain, Thailand and Ukraine (in Portugal ended in May 2011). A wireless version of the magazine was launched in 2005 across cellular carriers in twenty European and Asian countries.
In 1999, MaximOnline.com was created. It contains content not included in the print version and focuses on the same general topics, along with exclusive sections such as the "Girls of Maxim" galleries and the "Joke of the Day". "Maxim Video" contains video clips of interviews, music videos, photo shoots, and original content. The success of this website inspired Dennis Digital to create sites for its sister publications, such as Blender.
In January 2002, Dennis Publishing established an online and retail video division, Dennis Media Group. In 2005, this division was disbanded and restructured to focus on creating video and multimedia content for the editorial branch of Dennis Digital.
On February 5, 2005, Maxim Radio, featuring male-oriented talk programming, debuted on Sirius Satellite Radio. Following the Sirius-XM merger in late 2008, the Maxim brand was dropped, and the channel is now known as Sirius XM Stars Too.
On June 5, 2006, the magazine announced plans to build a casino on the Las Vegas Strip north of Circus Circus, but the casino plan failed after local condominium owners complained that the proposed casino would ruin their view. The land was sold to MGM Mirage.[2]
On June 15, 2007, private equity firm Quadrangle Group, along with long-time media executive Kent Brownridge, announced the acquisition of the parent company of Maxim, Blender, Stuff and MaximOnline.com. As of April 23, 2009 Dennis Publishing has announced that it will no longer continue producing a print edition of Maxim in the UK, though the website for the UK version will remain.
Maxim in the United States is now published by Alpha Media Group.
In July 2009, Maxim partnered up with the UFC for the first-ever Maxim UFC Octagon Girl Search at the UFC Fan Expo.[3] There were 40 girls participating in the contest, and the winner was Natasha Wicks.[4]
Quadrangle Group gave up on its investment in Alpha Media Group in August 2009, making Cerberus Capital Management the majority partner.
Maxim has been criticized for encouraging excessive alcohol consumption and sexual objectification of women.[5] In 2004, Maxim was protested by the gender issues department of Thunder Bay, Ontario's Lakehead University during an on-campus "Maxim Coors Light Girl Search".[6] In 2002, the popular German football club FC St. Pauli removed Maxim magazine advertisements from the team's stadium in response to fan protests over the depictions of women in the ads.[7]
In June 2007, Israeli diplomat David Saranga invited Maxim to the country. In what came to be known as "beers and babes", the magazine did photo shoots of near-naked Israeli women who serve in the army. The campaign drew an angry reaction from lawmaker Colette Avital, a former diplomat who served as Israel's consul-general in New York City in the 1990s.[8] Prof. John H. Brown of Georgetown University described the spread as the first event in a new branch of public diplomacy.[9]
In February 2008, Maxim was criticized by the rock band The Black Crowes for a review of their upcoming CD, Warpaint, with the band claiming that the magazine reviewed the album without hearing it.[10] According to Black Crowes manager Pete Angelus, the magazine stated in an email that "Of course, we always prefer to [sic] hearing music, but sometimes there are big albums that we don’t want to ignore that aren’t available to hear, which is what happened with the Crowes. It’s either an educated guess preview or no coverage at all, so in this case we chose the former." The magazine's editorial director James Kaminsky later apologized, stating "It is Maxim's editorial policy to assign star ratings only to those albums that have been heard in their entirety. Unfortunately, that policy was not followed in the March 2008 issue of our magazine and we apologize to our readers."[11] Facing more criticism over rating albums without listening to them, Maxim magazine maintains it was previewing CDs in its March 2008 issue, not reviewing them, and the mistake was to include star ratings.[12]
Many celebrities (singers, actresses, models, etc.) have posed for Maxim over the years. Examples include:
Maxim has launched international editions of its magazines since 1995. Most recently it has launched its 26th and 27th international[13] editions in Serbia and Greece where it is published by Attica Media. Notably, the magazine has been circulating editions in South Korea, India, Japan, the United States, France, Russia,[14][15] Serbia, Greece,[16] Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Canada, Poland, Brazil, the Philippines and Germany.
Each year since 2000 Maxim Magazine releases the Maxim Hot 100. A list that features the 100 hottest women of that year. The winners and their corresponding ages and the year in which the magazine was released are listed below.
| Year | Choice | Age | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2000 | Estella Warren[17] | 22 | |
| 2001 | Jessica Alba[18] | 20 | Youngest winner |
| 2002 | Jennifer Garner[19] | 30 | |
| 2003 | Christina Aguilera[20] | 23 | |
| 2004 | Jessica Simpson[21] | 24 | |
| 2005 | Eva Longoria[22] | 30 | |
| 2006 | Eva Longoria[23] | 31 | First and only woman to win twice (in a row) / Oldest winner |
| 2007 | Lindsay Lohan[24] | 21 | |
| 2008 | Marisa Miller[25] | 30 | First time anyone has debuted on the list at number one |
| 2009 | Olivia Wilde[26] | 25 | |
| 2010 | Katy Perry[27] | 26 | |
| 2011 | Rosie Huntington-Whiteley[28] | 24 |
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