It all started so innocently -- we got a release telling us about the Defenestration Literary Journal Launch Party at the Rickshaw stop. Being accomodating folks, we added this event to our Wednesday event column, and, since their release didn't include a link, we googled "Defenestration Literary Journal", got a link to this publication, and used it in the post.
What's the point to this thrilling behind-the-scenes look at SFist's editorial process? Well, within hours of our post, we got an email from the editor of the Defenestration to which we linked.
You have a link for my magazine, "Defenestration", on your website. We are in no way affiliated with this new magazine, "Defenestration Journal". Please remove our website. Also, could you please provide me with some information on how our website was linked to a different 'zine?
Totally understandable response on their part -- if we read an article about some other site calling themselves "SFist" (though why they'd choose to is beyond us, as the constant questions on the pronunciation of our name and the subsequent explanation that "no, it's not a site about fisting" get old real fast) and then the article linked to this site, we'd be pissed. We've worked pretty hard to "build the brand" or whatever marketingspeak terms you wanna use. We sympathized, corrected our post and went on with our lives.
But there's more to this story -- after the jump.
Yet another Defenestration, this one about the 1997 art installation at 6th and Howard in good old PJ-partying SF
About a week later we get an email from the folks at the the pub that had the party, saying, in part:
There is another publication named Defenestration. They are an online humor site; we are a print journal by San Francisco women. Our editors did a Web and legal search before settling on the name Defenestration that turned up nothing, but things may have changed in the year since our journal went into production.I submitted our listing to you without a URL because the site for our journal (defenestrationlit.com) was down and our Web person was vacationing in Vietnam. You guessed (as noted in your post) that our website was the online zine's (defenestrationmag.net). The online Defenestration has voiced their displeasure in detail on their home page. We contacted them and explained the mistake, but they have not responded.
OK, not too clever to send out a release without a link, especially when your publication has a name that's clearly confusable with other, non-you, things. But the part about how the other site had "voiced their displeasure in detail on their home page" intrigued us, so we took a look.
Upon hearing of a groundbreaking 'all-girl' magazine, Defenestration Journal, that is apparently launching out of San Francisco this week, we were surprised.This surprise only increased when we found out that apparently this new magazine is actually us, as promotional links for their launch party lead back here.
Bemusement crested when we here at the Defenestration offices came to the inevitable but disheartening conclusion that Andrew is, apparently, all girl.
If you are looking for the San Francisco pajama party you might have been seeking, you're in the wrong place. However, if you have come here looking for the 'all-original' content they promised, this is the place!
Why, you ask, would a fledgling literary magazine name itself after a magazine that has been publishing since 2004? We have no idea, but thanks for the free press!
Shouldn't, you ask, editors of any literary venture do a quick Google check to make sure no one is already using the rather distinctive name? We think so, but we're going to throw out a guess that accuracy is not the first priority with the gals over at Defenestration Journal.
If, you ask, I were to submit to you with the sort of party-friendly piece that seems to do well with Defenestration Journal, what would happen? We will laugh hysterically at your mistake, read the submission aloud and laugh even harder, and then delete it and go for a burger.
In fact, a burger sounds really good. Go buy one if you want - on us! Just remember to send the tab to Defenestration Journal, San Francisco. No, no, thank YOU.
After reading that, all the sympathy we had for them trickled down the drain. Doesn't it seem like their big issues are that an unsuspecting reader might think that their publication is A) written by women and B) based in San Francisco? Since when are either of these things negative qualities? "San Francisco pajama party?" Are you freakin' kidding?
Again, we totally get the upset over the confusion between the names, and wouldn't think anything about a brief note on the front page acknowledging and/or redirecting traffic -- and maybe even making the same point about being a little better with the Google. But to turn that into some "oh no, they might think we're GIRLY" rant just makes you sound like choads. Another unnamed SFist said it best: "Clearly any "humor" magazine that gets that worked up about a link isn't very funny." Defenestration Literary Journal "gals"? We got your back.
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Wow, this is really surprising to me since one of my good friends from high schoool is a staffer of the offended Defenestration mag! Seems like a lot of hot air over nothing IMO.
One of the funniest things ever in my life was the time when on Melrose Place (first run, people, back when there was no TiVo and this piece of super-excellence followed 90210 for the most craptacularly fabulous one-two punch of the college dorm chemically-enhanced TV viewing week) -- anyway this one time on Melrose Place when Calabro and Gay Matt were standing in front of a whiteboard at the hospital with all the doctors' names listed and, like, whether they were with patients or whatev, and one of the doctors' names was: DR. DEFENESTRATE.
I cherish that memory -- and Snarky P.A., whoever you are: Know, sir or madam, that you live on in television immortality.
I'd never heard that word before. Now I've heard it more in one article than I probably would have heard in a lifetime. And now I know about all sorts of magazines and websites and intrigue!
This is rad.
(and I'm not being sarcastic....)
"After reading that, all the sympathy we had for them trickled down the drain. "
I believe it's called "humour"...
Did your "humour" trickle down the drain with your sympathy too?
Uh, from what I can tell from Defenestration Magazine's staff page, 2 of their editors are women. So it looks like you failed to do your research...again.
Can we get back to talking about San Francisco please?
KT: Where I come from, "humour" is usually funny.
Patsy: Wha? I never said no one on Defenestration Magazine's staff was female, I said that I thought it was odd that they seemed so offended by the implication that all of them were.
WOW, Eve--you really need to chill out. Do what Defenestration suggested--go buy yourself a burger :).
Where I come from journalists don't abuse their positions to talk about their personal internet cat-fights either.
Perhaps you should get back to writing about the goings on in SF, instead of writing about simple domain name mishap, and how your feathers got ruffled.
And don't worry DefenestrationMag, "I got your back"
Just a tad immature... isn't it Eve?