One of the many magazines I edited for Sovereign Media a decade or so ago was titled Sci-Fi Universe. It had originally been edited by Mark Altman and published by Larry Flynt, but Flynt eventually grew tired of losing money, and so went looking for a buyer, which turned out to be Sovereign.

The magazine had been Altman’s dream project, but he had no ownership interest in it, which meant that when the magazine was sold, he did not come along. He was out and I was in.

(Most editors have no stake in their magazines, even when they are their babies. Want another example? My own Science Fiction Age.)

He wasn’t happy about it, and neither were a number of the readers. Sci-Fi Universe had been an edgy magazine molded in the Film Threat style. But since it was felt that however much fun that attitude might be, it also contributed to the publication’s lack of profitability, Sovereign reinvented it to be more traditional entertainment magazine. We did try to keep some lightheartedness to it, though, and I pulled in Paul Riddell to rant each issue in a department called, appropriately enough, “Rant.”

For the first few issues, the letter writers pounded me. One, as you can see in the letters column above, went so far as to tell me:

Scott Edelman, you are a media whore. You may sleep well, but no one with any intelligence reads you.

I can’ t remember whether or not I did happen to be sleeping well at the time, but that’s neither here nor there. The point is— (more…)