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Computerworld and CSO, two publications of IDG Group in Framingham, Mass., took honors as the Magazines of the Year in the 28th Annual Azbee Awards of Excellence presented by the American Society of Business Publication Editors (ASBPE).
The group’s 2006 Stephen Barr Award for feature writing went to Shabnam Mogharabi, a Los Angeles-based business editor, for a series of articles in Aquatics International explaining why American minority youths account for a disproportionate percentage of drowning deaths.
Stan Modic, senior editorial advisor and columnist at Nelson Publishing, accepted the organization’s Lifetime Achievement Award at ASBPE’s ceremony, held in Chicago Thursday night, July 20, as part of the organization’s National Editorial Conference.
Modic exhorted business-to-business editors to give more attention to reader needs, noting that it is the “editor’s responsibility to insure that business magazines serve the reader first—for only in that way can we serve the advertiser best.”
He added, “The ASBPE has updated its code of ethics [“Guide To Preferred Editorial Practices”]. Now we have to insure that we live by it.”
Magazines of the Year
For its work in 2005, Computerworld was recognized as the top magazine among those of 80,000 circulation or larger, while CSO, a publication for security executives of companies, was honored in the under-80,000-circulation category.
Large circulation magazines given honorable mention in the Magazine of the Year category were CFO, a publication for finance executives, and CIO, which targets information executives. Boston-based CFO is part of The Economist Group, while CIO also is an IDG publication in Framingham.
In the under-80,000-circulation category, ASBPE gave honorable mentions to Information Security, a Tech Target publication based in Needham, Mass., and Meetings & Conventions, which belongs to Secaucus, N.J.-based Northstar Travel Media.
Judges Comments
Judges said of Computerworld that it was “packed with useful information with never a fluffy issue—difficult for any monthly magazine, and they do it weekly.”
About CSO, judges noted that it “takes risks with subject matter," and that “design and copy complement each other extraordinarily well,” with covers that “have attitude.”
Computerworld and CSO also were among the largest winners of individual national Azbee Gold Awards from ASBPE, garnering five each. Each had also won the Magazine of the Year award previously, in 2004.
Azbees are given in 40 categories. Fifteen magazines won Golds in editorial categories; 23 in graphics, and six in digital.
Barr Winner Writes With Sensitivity About Drownings
Mogharabi, the Barr Award winner, is the business editor of Aquatics International’s Hanley Wood sister publication, Pool & Spa News. She had only recently received her masters degree from Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism when she began exploring the high percentage of drownings involving blacks and Hispanics in America.
Her sensitive yet dispassionate handling of the complex, emotional issue appeared in the October and November 2005 issues of Aquatics International. ASBPE’s third annual Stephen Barr Award, accompanied by a $500 cash prize, is named in memory of a CFO magazine contributing editor who died in 2002 at the age of 43.
Mogharabi was also a winner of one of ASBPE’s Young Leader Scholarships that provides free registration to the Society’s National Editorial Conference.
“Last year was a great one for business-to-business publications,” said Roy Harris, ASBPE’s national president and a senior editor of CFO. “Winning entries helped readers understand everything from the continuing surge in Chinese markets to the latest shocks from information technology, to new ways in which computers are used in making animated movies.”
ASBPE’s annual National Editorial Conference was held at the Embassy Suites Chicago Downtown Lakefront Hotel on July 20 and 21.
Founded in 1964, the 750-member ASBPE is the only professional association in the United States exclusively for full-time and freelance editors and writers employed by business, professional, association, and trade magazines, newsletters, and digital publications. Its headquarters are located at 214 N. Hale St., Wheaton, Ill. Executive director Janet Svazas is reachable at 630-510-4588.
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