Dr Alan Finkel AM speaking at Monash University’s istinguished Alumni Professional Achievement Awards in October 2012.

The Australian Science Media Centre is delighted to announce Dr Alan Finkel as the organisation’s Australian patron.

Dr Finkel has a long history with science and the media through his own work in neuroscience and engineering and as co-founder of the multi award winning science magazine, COSMOS.

“Alan Finkel bridges many sectors in Australia with his background in research, business and media and is thus well positioned to help the centre in its mission to bring more evidence-based science to the public through the media,” said CEO Dr Susannah Eliott.

Dr Finkel is also Chancellor at Monash University, President of the Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering, CEO of Stile Education Pty Ltd and Chairman of the Australian Centre of Excellence for All-Sky Astrophysics.

Chairman Peter Yates said, “I’m absolutely delighted and honoured that Dr Finkel has agreed to become the Australian patron of the Science Media Centre. We are very privileged to have two such distinguished people as patrons – Alan Finkel as our Australian patron and Professor Susan Greenfield as our international patron”.

Alan will be welcomed as patron by South Australian Premier Jay Weatherill at an event hosted by Flinders University in Adelaide, today.

Background on the Australian Science Media Centre

The Australian Science Media Centre (AusSMC) is an independent, not-for-profit service for the news media, giving journalists direct access to evidence-based science and expertise. The Centre works with journalists to help them cover science – as well as identify science angles in everyday news stories – and works with the scientific community to help them interact more effectively with the media.

The Centre has helped journalists cover some of the biggest stories of the past decade – the death of Steve Irwin, the tsunami and nuclear incidents in Japan, the Queensland floods of 2011, the Black Saturday Bushfires and the outbreak of swine flu to name just a few. The Centre is also no stranger to controversy and works to inform public dialogue on some of the most hotly debated issues in Australia, from coal seam gas and recycled water to nuclear power, climate change and genetically modified foods. Since opening, the centre has provided expert comment for more than 50,000 news stories and generated coverage with an average audience reach of 10 million in Australia each month.

The Centre’s aim is for a better informed Australian society with greater access to evidence-based science. The Centre has no specific science agenda and does not advocate or ‘take sides’ on issues, but does represent scientific consensus. More than 1100 journalists are actively registered with the Centre and over 3200 scientists are on the Centre’s database.

Biographical note for Dr Alan Simon Finkel AM
PhD FTSE FIE Aust

Dr Alan Finkel has served as Chancellor of Monash University since January 2008.

Dr Finkel is a respected engineer, entrepreneur and philanthropist. Dr Finkel completed his undergraduate and doctoral studies in engineering at Monash University before serving for two years as a neuroscience research fellow at the John Curtin School of Medical Research at The Australian National University.

In 1983, Dr Finkel established Axon Instruments, a supplier of electronic and robotic instruments and software for use in cellular neuroscience, genomics and drug discovery. In 2000, Axon was listed on the Australian Stock Exchange. It was acquired by the US firm Molecular Devices Corporation in 2004.

Post Axon, Dr Finkel co-founded the magazines COSMOS and G: The Green Lifestyle Magazine to promote science awareness and sustainability; led the establishment of the Australian Course in Advanced Neuroscience; fostered initiatives to reinvigorate secondary school science education; and co-founded a company distributing educational toys and books for children.

Dr Finkel is a Fellow and President of the Australian Academy of Technological Science and Engineering (ATSE). He formerly held governance roles at the ATSE Clunies Ross Foundation in child-abuse research and medical research. Dr Finkel currently serves as the CEO of Stile Education Pty Ltd and as the Chairman of the Australian Centre of Excellence for All-Sky Astrophysics.

The post COSMOS founder is made patron of Australian Science Media Centre appeared first on COSMOS magazine.

The cover of the February 2013 issue.

DR ALAN FINKEL AM, the Melbourne entrepreneur and scientist, and his wife Dr Elizabeth Finkel, an award-winning science writer, have agreed to acquire Cosmos Media – publishers of COSMOS, Australia’s #1 science magazine in print, iPad and online – and will move its editorial and advertising operations from Sydney to Melbourne.

Alan Finkel, currently Chancellor of Monash University and President of the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering, has purchased the balance of the company he and Elizabeth did not already own for an undisclosed sum from co-founders Kylie Ahern, the company’s CEO, and Wilson da Silva, its Editorial Director.

“After eight years at the helm, and with so much achieved, Wilson and I felt it was time to look for new challenges,” said Ahern, a long-time magazine publishing executive who will be staying on until the end of June 2013 to oversee the company’s transition to Melbourne.

“This has been an incredibly rewarding job for me, and while I feel sad to leave, I also feel privileged to have worked with such a talented and innovative team who have helped us soar to such global heights. But I know that COSMOS is going to owners who love it as much as we do, so its legacy is in great hands.”

The immensely successful magazine, founded in 2004 and the winner of 47 national and international awards, has dominated its home market of Australia while also making unprecedented inroads into the consumer and education sectors locally and overseas.

The magazine reaches 70% of Australian high schools, where its popular education resources are greatly valued by teachers and students. In June 2012 it launched a highly interactive iPad edition which has become the best-rated science magazine app in the world by industry analysts iMonitor, and was named by Apple as among the best iPad magazine apps of 2012.

COSMOS has continued to grow its advertising and subscription revenue in an otherwise difficult market for the media, as well as expand its audience: in the latest Roy Morgan figures released in November 2012, COSMOS saw a 29.5% increase in readership year-on-year to 114,000 per issue.

Alan Finkel said, “I am tremendously impressed with what Kylie and Wilson and the team have been able to achieve in the past eight years – creating the COSMOS brand from the ground up and making into the world’s most respected literary science magazine. There’s nothing in the world like it, and I am very proud of the exceptional quality and reputation it has gained globally. Elizabeth and I are looking forward to imparting our personal vision for communicating the stories of science in the next chapter of its life in Melbourne.

“I’m also excited by the synergies that will emerge from bringing together the excellence of COSMOS with the new wave of powerful education software tools we are developing for the global classroom at Stile Education,” he added. Stile Education is a Melbourne technology start-up founded by Alan Finkel and others that is developing an intuitive digital workbook – for laptops and tablets of all makes – that will help school teachers easily create and manage interactive and engaging lessons in the classroom while monitoring and grading the progress of students.

Dr Elizabeth Finkel, an acclaimed science writer and author, will take over as Editor-in-Chief in July when COSMOS begins operating from Melbourne. Until then, da Silva will continue to lead editorial operations and develop a close working relationship with the new Melbourne editorial team, before departing the title he helped establish.

“We wanted to create a magazine with literary ambitions that was visually lush as well as intellectually rewarding,” said da Silva, twice winner of the Editor of the Year trophy from Publishers Australia. “We’ve achieved that in spades, and created a loyal following who are as fascinated and excited by science as we are. Over those eight years, Elizabeth has been our star writer, and I am delighted to be handing the editor’s chair to someone with as much skill and commitment to science journalism as Elizabeth.

“To every one of our talented staff, writers and illustrators who have toiled over the years to make COSMOS the success it is – we thank you. We could not have got here without you, and it remains our enormous pleasure to have worked with such a gifted and enthusiastic team.”

Among the company’s many science communication accomplishments over the years was the wildly successful HELLO FROM EARTH initiative, created for Australia’s National Science Week in 2009. In the first two weeks following launch, the campaign website was splashed across 1,000 newspapers worldwide and linked to by more than 11,000 blogs.

Since the magazine’s inception, COSMOS has run a rigorous and highly-sought internship program which has trained 70 university science graduates in science journalism and communication. The company has also been a partner and sponsor of many science awareness events, from the Prime Minister’s Prizes for Science to the Melbourne Writers Festival.

For more information, please contact Andrew Bradley of Holdfast Communications on
Mobile: 0403 777 137 or E-mail: Andrew Bradley here

ABOUT COSMOS

COSMOS is Australia’s #1 science magazine in print, iPad and online, reaching 600,000 people every month. An Australian brand with a global outlook, COSMOS is internationally respected for its literary writing, excellence in design and engaging breadth of content.

It is the winner of 47 awards, including twice Magazine of the Year and twice Editor of the Year at the annual Publishers Australia Excellence Awards. Other accolades include the American Institute of Physics’ Science Writing Award, the Reuters/IUCN Award for Excellence in Environmental Journalism, the City of Sydney Lord Mayor’s Sustainability Award and an Earth Journalism Award.

COSMOS is produced by Cosmos Media, a boutique publisher which has twice won Best Publisher, and which has produced custom media products for a range of clients, including Federal and State governments, corporations, universities and research institutes internationally.

The company was founded by scientist and entrepreneur Dr Alan Finkel, magazine publishing executive Kylie Ahern, and science journalists Wilson da Silva and Elizabeth Finkel. It was formed in November 2004, the first issue of COSMOS launched in July 2005, and the magazine is backed by an advisory board that includes Apollo 11 astronaut Buzz Aldrin, among others.

ABOUT THE FOUNDERS OF COSMOS MEDIA

Dr Alan Finkel AM FTSE is an engineer, entrepreneur and philanthropist and has served as Chancellor of Monash University since January 2008, and this year commenced as the President of the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering (ATSE). He a co-founder of Cosmos Media.

He received his Bachelor of Engineering in 1976 and Doctorate in Electrical Engineering from Monash University in 1981, following which he worked as a neuroscience research fellow at the John Curtin School of Medical Research at the Australian National University. The founder and CEO of Axon Instruments, a publically-listed U.S. company that made precision instruments used in biotechnology in the discovery of new medicines, he led it for 20 years until its sale in 2004.

Alan Finkel has a passionate interest in science education, founding the renowned Australian Course in Advanced Neuroscience to provide advanced training to early career scientists. He also established the secondary school science program STELR, administered by ATSE, which is currently running in over 300 secondary schools around Australia. He’s the CEO of Stile Education, Chairman of the Australian Centre of Excellence for All-Sky Astrophysics (CAASTRO) and formerly held governance roles in child-abuse research and medical research.

Dr Elizabeth Finkel holds a PhD in biochemistry and spent 10 years as a research scientist before becoming an award-winning science journalist. A co-founder of Cosmos Media and a contributing editor of the magazine since its launch, she has written for Science, The Lancet, The Age as well as COSMOS over the years, and made many appearances on ABC Radio National. Her awards include the Queensland Premier’s Literary Award (2004), the Michael Daley Award for Best Radio Feature, Best Analytical Journalist of the Year (Publishers Australia, 2010) and Higher Education Journalist of the Year (Universities Australia, 2011). She is best known for her books Stem Cells: Controversy at the Frontiers of Science and her latest, The Genome Generation.

Alan and Elizabeth Finkel are leading philanthropists in science, education and the environment. They have donated to a number of causes in Australia and overseas through the Alan and Elizabeth Finkel Foundation, including grants and endowments to universities, research groups and the general community.

Kylie Ahern is the CEO and co-founder of Cosmos Media, the publisher COSMOS and an entrepreneurial identity in publishing and science communication. The past Chair of Australia’s National Science Week in New South Wales, she has also served on the board of Publishers Australia, the magazine industry group. She started her career at IPC Magazines in Britain, went on to several senior roles in Australia, including Marketing Director at FPC Magazines, Group Circulation Manager at ACP Magazines and Publisher at Yaffa. Over the past eight years she has led Cosmos Media to win of 54 awards across editorial, publishing and marketing, including twice Magazine of the Year for COSMOS, and she has twice taken out the Best Publisher trophy.

Wilson da Silva is the creative force behind COSMOS, and has served as editor-in-chief since co-founding Cosmos Media in 2004. A former on-air science reporter for ABC TV, he has been a foreign correspondent for Reuters, served as editor of the science magazine Newton and as science editor of ABC Online, is a former staff journalist on The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald newspapers and was a Sydney correspondent at New Scientist. He is the winner of 31 awards, including twice Editor of the Year for his work on COSMOS and the prestigious Australian Film Institute Award for Best Documentary. He’s a past president of the World Federation of Science Journalists, and has held governance roles with the Australian Society of Authors, The Australian Museum Society and Australian Science Communicators.

The post COSMOS Magazine – A New Beginning appeared first on COSMOS magazine.

The cover of the Mars issue of COSMOS on the iPad. Credit: COSMOS

After a 254-day journey, NASA’s $2.5 billion Mars Science Laboratory, with its giant robot rover Curiosity, will light up the skies above the planet as 76 rockets and pyrotechnic devices ignite in a rapid, heart-stopping descent and landing maneuver. About five times larger previous rovers, Curiosity carries over 10 times more instruments, and will spend a whole Martian year (or 687 days) exploring the planet in the search for life.

To celebrate, COSMOS Magazine has launched a special issue devoted entirely to Mars! It includes:
• 177 pages with hundreds of stunning images
• 14 videos and animations
• Live feeds to news and video of the landing on August 6
• Contour maps and stereographic projections
• Interactive fact files and pop-up breakouts
• A gallery of spectacular landscapes and sweeping vistas
• Curiosity‘s story – told in pictures
• Revealed: the cataclysmic impact that created the strange, lopsided world that Mars is today
• An interactive timeline of Mars exploration missions
• Living on Mars: how and when?
• Getting to Mars: the latest rocket technology profiled
• The trouble with space travel: why astronauts are worried about a voyage to Mars
• Should we colonize Mars?

Plus: A first-ever walk-through panorama of Mars, made up of 653 separate images – it’s the next best thing to being there!

All this in the July 2012 issue of COSMOS – now on iPad!

>>> DOWNLOAD THE ISSUE HERE

>>> Watch a video of the COSMOS app in action

RECOGNITION & ACCOLADES

COSMOS app rated ★★★★★

The COSMOS Magazine iPad app, first launched in June 2012, was given a 5-star rating by McPheters & Co, publisher of the iMonitor List of Best Magazine Apps for iPad, which scores each app based on its design, functionality and use of rich media content. It called the COSMOS Magazine iPad app “the most outstanding of the recent batch of introductions” and added: “Some apps transcend national borders more readily than others, and the app from this internationally acclaimed title is definitely in the category of those that transcend.”

Users who have downloaded the COSMOS Magazine iPad app have been laudatory, with the average of 52 reviews ranking it five stars on the App Store.

Sir Richard Branson recommends COSMOS!

In his daily blog, Sir Richard Branson, the British entrepreneur and founder of the Virgin Group, endorsed COSMOS Magazine iPad app, calling it “a beautifully designed read and covers everything from evolution to cutting edge new discoveries”. He also linked on the magazine’s page on Apple’s App Store. This was followed by a tweet to his 2.2 million followers, and a posting on his Facebook page (233,591 fans) and Google + (2.1 million fans).

In his blog, he wrote: “For those who are fascinated by science, I can heartily recommend the new COSMOS iPad magazine. It’s a beautifully designed read and covers everything from evolution to cutting edge new discoveries. The app itself is free, and there’s a free issue to download and try. Enjoy!”

See the original blog here – http://bit.ly/LqB6Wk

BACKGROUND ON COSMOS MAGAZINE

COSMOS is Australia’s #1 science media brand: the biggest-circulation science magazine and highest-rating science news site. Its publisher, Cosmos Media, was founded by three people: Melbourne neuroscientist and entrepreneur Dr Alan Finkel, publishing executive Kylie Ahern and science journalist Wilson da Silva. COSMOS is the brainchild of da Silva, a past president of the World Federation of Science Journalists and a former science reporter at Australia’s ABC TV. It is backed by an Editorial Advisory Board that includes Apollo 11 astronaut Buzz Aldrin.

For more information, please visit http://bit.ly/PYsBQl

FOR COMMENT, INTERVIEWS, ETC

Call Arnold Perez at COSMOS on +61 2 9310 8510 or email publicity_at_cosmosmagazine.com.
Available for interview:
• Wilson da Silva, Editor-in-Chief: What’s in the issue, how to create a successful iPad app.
• Heather Catchpole, Managing Editor: What’s in the issue, creating engaging iPad content.
• Kylie Ahern, CEO of Cosmos Media: The company’s global strategy for the tablet market.

The post Mars fever! New COSMOS app with A-Z of the Red Planet appeared first on COSMOS magazine.

At 9:07 am on 21 June 2012, the Sun reached its northernmost position in the skies above Sydney, marking the winter solstice in the southern hemisphere.

And, at that exact moment, we launched our first iPad edition of COSMOS Magazine.

It’s fitting, really: June 21 is the 7th birthday of COSMOS. And in the past nine months, we have been secretly working on completely re-imaging and reconceptualising our beloved magazine, developing and testing the limits of the technology and the available platforms, to create something on the iPad that we think is pretty special.

Now it’s over to you, the readers, to tell us what you think! Hopefully, you’ll like it

There’s been a lot of news lately about how the tsunami of disruptive technological change sweeping the publishing industry is killing newspapers and magazines and wiping out jobs.

The pace of change has indeed been remarkable, to the point that just this week, major media companies like Fairfax Media and News Ltd in Australia are announcing thousands of job losses, downsizing of print publications and even – for the first time – publically airing the possibility of not producing print editions any more. The same is happening in the United States and across Canada and much of the developed world.

That’s Earth-shaking news. And, if you’re in the media business, it’s a good time to reassess what you’re doing and wonder if you have it right.

Here at Cosmos Media, we’ve been reviewing how we do things since August 2011, and pondering what we might do over the next five years. And as we researched what was happening in the publishing world, what technologies were emerging and how we might utilise them to make our magazine better, we realised that here was an opportunity, not a crisis.

It was clear to us that magazines had to reinvent themselves if they were to not only survive, but thrive. That meant thinking of print as just another platform, and to find other ways to deploy the unique COSMOS voice and character of storytelling across a range of platforms.

And so, we started on the long path that has brought us to the launch of our first iPad app today. There’s much more to come in the next 18 months – a complete overhaul of our daily news and features website, our newsletters, our Teacher’s Notes and popular study guides.

The browser edition of the magazine has already been revamped; it’s widely used in an education setting in Australia and in some territories overseas, allowing all students in a subscriber school to read each issue simultaneously. This has proved quite popular; so much so, we’ve made it also available free to all print subscribers, as well as giving them access to the archives of the magazine going back seven years.

But it’s the iPad edition which has been the most challenge for us. We didn’t just want to produce a print replica, we wanted to re-imagine COSMOS editorially, but also maintain a clear narrative structure throughout. The functionality of the iPad allowed us to fundamentally change the nature of the magazine, and we relished the opportunity!

Rather than job losses, we’ve actually doubled editorial staff in the past six months in order to bring our multi-platform ambitions to reality. Over the next 18 months, there’ll be more announcements as we launch new products, new publications, and branch out into new areas. Stay tuned!

Personally, I think the media industry has been overly focussed on advertisers for too long. Now that advertisng revenue is declining, many publishers are cutting editorial staff, and I think this is a mistake. What the industry needs to do is refocus on the fundamentals, and that’s their readers.

At COSMOS, we’ve been fortunate that our readers have been very, very supportive – to the point where they represent the majority of our revenue. Without them, we would not be here.

Hence, we’re excited about a world where creating engaging narrative content that readers want, and are willing to pay for, is the name of the game – because that’s been what we’ve excelled at for years. Hopefully, we’ll continue to do so – with your continued support.

On the iPad, this means providing more quality content at lower cost: 12 iPad issues a year (versus six issues a year in print) for half the price of a print subscription. Then there’s extra content, and the seamless integration of video and animation, live updates and multiple layers of reader interaction.

Why did we do this? Because the truth is, making a print magazine is expensive: the cover price of A$10.95, and the annual subscription price of A$59, is actually what it costs to deliver the lush, tactile, high-resolution platform that is print. And we do love it, and will continue to do so as long as people buy it and love it too. But like most beautiful things, it has a cost.

With the iPad edition, there’s less cost: no printing, binding, shipping, distribution, postage, returns or warehousing. There’s only the awesome science content we love creating. By removing these ancillary costs, we’re able to double the amount content while halving the price. It’s a win for our loyal readers, and a win for more good science content.

We’d love to bring this lovely, re-imagined version of COSMOS to many platforms, including Android. But the investment to get us this far has been significant, especially for a small publisher like us. Hopefully, the iPad edition will be such a resounding success that it won’t be long.

In the meantime, we wanted to show our print subscribers that we value their continued support. That’s why we’ve decided to give them automatic access to the iPad editions at no cost, instead of charging extra, as most publishers have. And, on top of that, to give print subscribers free access to our newly-revamped browser edition, including the complete archives dating back seven years – again, at no extra cost.

It may sound like marketing, but it’s not. It really is our way of saying “thank you” to those who have been on the journey in print with us for the past seven years: readers, subscribers and fans. And to give them a taste of what the future holds.

More information

• Interview on The Media Report, on Australia’s ABC Radio National, with editor-in-chief Wilson da Silva about COSMOS’s new powerful iPad app, the publisher’s future plans, and why COSMOS is so chirpy about the future of media. Visit the The Media Report webpage here, or download the audio interview here.

The post COSMOS re-imagines the future: doubles staff, expands across platforms appeared first on COSMOS magazine.

The June 2012 cover of the COSMOS iPad edition. Credit: Lucy Glover/COSMOS

SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA: The tsunami of disruptive technological change sweeping the publishing industry is an opportunity, not a crisis, and magazines must reinvent themselves if they are to not only survive, but thrive.

So argue the publishers of COSMOS, the celebrated science magazine, who today launched an innovative iPad edition – the first of a series of planned multi-platform products. The iPad edition is the result of nine months of development and testing, and represents a complete reconceptualization of the print magazine.

“It’s not good enough to just produce a print replica on the iPad,” said Wilson da Silva, editor-in-chief of COSMOS. “You need to completely re-imagine what a magazine is editorially, which is what we’ve done, but also maintain a clear narrative structure throughout. The functionality of the iPad is fundamentally changing the game, and only those who capitalise on this will prosper.

“The media has been overly concerned with advertisers for too long. Now that ad revenue is declining, many publishers are cutting back on editorial resources – and that’s a mistake. What the industry needs to do is refocus on the fundamentals: their readers. At COSMOS, our revenue has always come mostly from readers rather than advertisers. Hence, we’re excited about a world where creating engaging narrative content that readers want, and are willing to pay for, is the name of the game, because that’s been what we’ve excelled at for years.”

On the iPad, this means not just providing excellent content at lower cost, but also the seamless integration of video and animation, live updates, multiple layers of reader interaction and a cross-platform approach to engaging audiences.

“If anything can save quality journalism, it will be the readers who are willing to pay for excellence in writing, photography and design. And those readers, who engage with magazines more than any other medium, will attract the advertisers – which is the way it should be,” said da Silva.

COSMOS, which celebrates its 7th birthday with the June 2012 issue, specializes in long-form features and lush design. The winner of 45 journalism and publishing awards – including Magazine of the Year awards twice in its native Australia – it has developed a strong following around the world. Based in Sydney, its content is nevertheless global in scope, attracting authors such as Richard Dawkins, Margaret Wertheim, Steven Pinker, Paul Davies and Simon Singh.

Founded by scientists and media professionals who believe in the transformative power of clear and engaging writing, it is now set to take on the world with the launch of its iPad edition.

“What COSMOS has done on the iPad platform is both innovative and itself disruptive,” said Dr Alan Finkel, the Chancellor of Monash University in Melbourne and the chairman and co-founder of Cosmos Media, the magazine’s publisher.

“We’ve not only re-imagined COSMOS for the iPad, but will be boosting frequency, creating bonus iPad issues, giving print subscribers free access to the iPad editions, as well as free access to the complete digital archive. I don’t think any other publisher has so completely overhauled its business model.

“COSMOS has done so because we’ve set our sights on the future. We’re preparing not just for the eventual demise of print, but looking to take a dominant position in the emerging tablet market. We aim to be the world’s number 1 science magazine in five years,” said Finkel.

The COSMOS Magazine app, launched today, runs on the powerful Oomph digital publishing platform created by Mogeneration, a successful Sydney-based developer of over 100 iOS and Android apps who worked closely with the COSMOS team to push the boundaries of functionality.

“The iPad is changing the media industry in unpredictable ways – in our case, for the better,” said Kylie Ahern, CEO of Cosmos Media. “The App Store is global, so the iPad edition of COSMOS – which has always been global in outlook – can suddenly tap an international market. COSMOS can compete with the world’s leading science magazines on an equal footing: at a compelling price and available as soon as it is published, without the delays and cost of shipping and distribution from Australia, which the print issue has had to face.

“That’s why we’ve doubled our editorial staff in the past six months, and have completely overhauled our business strategy. For us, print is now just another platform. And we have a raft of new iPad, digital and online products set to launch in the next 18 months,” added Ahern.

The COSMOS Magazine app is free, and readers can also download a complete issue free from the App Store. Individual copies of each monthly edition can be purchased for US$4.99 each, and annual subscriptions for US$24.99.

See a video demonstration of the COSMOS Magazine app here.

>>DOWNLOAD A FREE ISSUE HERE <<

iPAD EDITION BASICS

• Frequency: 12 issues per year
• Annual subscription, iPad-only: US$24.99
• Single iPad-only issue: US$4.99
• Annual subscription, Print + iPad + Browser + Archives: US$60
• iPad app launch date: Thursday, 21 June 2012

BACKGROUND ON COSMOS MAGAZINE

COSMOS is Australia’s #1 science media brand: the biggest-circulation science magazine and highest rating science news site. Its publisher, Cosmos Media, was founded by three people: Melbourne neuroscientist and entrepreneur Dr Alan Finkel, magazine publishing executive Kylie Ahern and science journalist Wilson da Silva. COSMOS is the brainchild of da Silva, a past president of the World Federation of Science Journalists and a former science reporter at Australia’s ABC TV. It is backed by an Editorial Advisory Board that includes Apollo 11 astronaut Buzz Aldrin.

MORE INFORMATION

• Interview on The Media Report, on Australia’s ABC Radio National, with editor-in-chief Wilson da Silva about COSMOS’s new powerful iPad app, the publisher’s future plans, and why COSMOS is so chirpy about the future of media. Visit the The Media Report webpage here, or download the audio interview here.

• Interview in the Publishers Australia Newsletter with editor-in-chief Wilson da Silva and managing editor Heather Catchpole. Visit the Publishers Australia news website.

• A blog to COSMOS readers by editor-in-chief Wilson da Silva explaining the changes, the reasons behind it and the future of the COSMOS brand.

FOR FURTHER COMMENT, INTERVIEWS, ETC

Call Arnold Perez at COSMOS on +61 2 9310 8510 or email Publicity at COSMOS here

The post Future of media is bright – if you reinvent to expand appeared first on COSMOS magazine.

The June 2012 cover of the COSMOS iPad edition. Credit: Lucy Glover/COSMOS

At 9:07am today, the Sun reached its northernmost position in the skies above Sydney, marking the winter solstice in the southern hemisphere. And, at that exact moment, we launched our first iPad edition of COSMOS Magazine.

And, at that exact moment, we launched our first iPad edition of COSMOS Magazine.

It’s fitting, really: June 21 is the 7th birthday of COSMOS. And in the past nine months, we have been secretly working on completely re-imaging and reconceptualising our beloved magazine, developing and testing the limits of the technology and the available platforms, to create something on the iPad that we think is pretty special.

Now it’s over to you, the readers, to tell us what you think! Hopefully, you’ll like it

There’s been a lot of news lately about how the tsunami of disruptive technological change sweeping the publishing industry is killing newspapers and magazines and wiping out jobs.

The pace of change has indeed been remarkable, to the point that just this week, major media companies like Fairfax Media and News Ltd in Australia are announcing thousands of job losses, downsizing of print publications and even – for the first time – publically airing the possibility of not producing print editions any more. The same is happening in the United States and across Canada and much of the developed world.

That’s Earth-shaking news. And, if you’re in the media business, it’s a good time to reassess what you’re doing and wonder if you have it right.

Here at Cosmos Media, we’ve been reviewing how we do things since August 2011, and pondering what we might do over the next five years. And as we researched what was happening in the publishing world, what technologies were emerging and how we might utilise them to make our magazine better, we realised that here was an opportunity, not a crisis.

It was clear to us that magazines had to reinvent themselves if they were to not only survive, but thrive. That meant thinking of print as just another platform, and to find other ways to deploy the unique COSMOS voice and character of storytelling across a range of platforms.

And so, we started on the long path that has brought us to the launch of our first iPad app today. There’s much more to come in the next 18 months – a complete overhaul of our daily news and features website, our newsletters, our Teacher’s Notes and popular study guides.

The browser edition of the magazine has already been revamped; it’s widely used in an education setting in Australia and in some territories overseas, allowing all students in a subscriber school to read each issue simultaneously. This has proved quite popular; so much so, we’ve made it also available free to all print subscribers, as well as giving them access to the archives of the magazine going back seven years.

But it’s the iPad edition which has been the most challenge for us. We didn’t just want to produce a print replica, we wanted to re-imagine COSMOS editorially, but also maintain a clear narrative structure throughout. The functionality of the iPad allowed us to fundamentally change the nature of the magazine, and we relished the opportunity!

Rather than job losses, we’ve actually doubled editorial staff in the past six months in order to bring our multi-platform ambitions to reality. Over the next 18 months, there’ll be more announcements as we launch new products, new publications, and branch out into new areas. Stay tuned!

Personally, I think the media industry has been overly focussed on advertisers for too long. Now that advertisng revenue is declining, many publishers are cutting editorial staff, and I think this is a mistake. What the industry needs to do is refocus on the fundamentals, and that’s their readers.

At COSMOS, we’ve been fortunate that our readers have been very, very supportive – to the point where they represent the majority of our revenue. Without them, we would not be here.

Hence, we’re excited about a world where creating engaging narrative content that readers want, and are willing to pay for, is the name of the game – because that’s been what we’ve excelled at for years. Hopefully, we’ll continue to do so – with your continued support.

On the iPad, this means providing more quality content at lower cost: 12 iPad issues a year (versus six issues a year in print) for half the price of a print subscription. Then there’s extra content, and the seamless integration of video and animation, live updates and multiple layers of reader interaction.

Why did we do this? Because the truth is, making a print magazine is expensive: the cover price of A$10.95, and the annual subscription price of A$59, is actually what it costs to deliver the lush, tactile, high-resolution platform that is print. And we do love it, and will continue to do so as long as people buy it and love it too. But like most beautiful things, it has a cost.

With the iPad edition, there’s less cost: no printing, binding, shipping, distribution, postage, returns or warehousing. There’s only the awesome science content we love creating. By removing these ancillary costs, we’re able to double the amount content while halving the price. It’s a win for our loyal readers, and a win for more good science content.

We’d love to bring this lovely, re-imagined version of COSMOS to many platforms, including Android. But the investment to get us this far has been significant, especially for a small publisher like us. Hopefully, the iPad edition will be such a resounding success that it won’t be long.

In the meantime, we wanted to show our print subscribers that we value their continued support. That’s why we’ve decided to give them automatic access to the iPad editions at no cost, instead of charging extra, as most publishers have. And, on top of that, to give print subscribers free access to our newly-revamped browser edition, including the complete archives dating back seven years – again, at no extra cost.

It may sound like marketing, but it’s not. It really is our way of saying “thank you” to those who have been on the journey in print with us for the past seven years: readers, subscribers and fans. And to give them a taste of what the future holds.

The post Why the future of media is bright appeared first on COSMOS magazine.

Left to right: Richard Dawkins, Lawrence Krauss and Wilson da Silva on stage on 12 April 2012. Credit: Corey Butler/COSMOS

The view toward the stage from the back of Sydney Grammar School’s stylish new meeting centre. Credit: Corey Butler/COSMOS

SYDNEY: A capacity crowd of almost 1,500 people in Sydney on April 12 came to hear two of the world’s best-known names in science – Richard Dawkins and Lawrence Krauss – talk about … well, nothing.

Dawkins is a British evolutionary biologist and author of best-sellers like The Selfish Gene and The God Delusion. He shared the stage with Krauss, an American physicist known for his wit as much as his writing, and whose most recent book is A Universe From Nothng.

They discussed the origin of life and the universe, and how both could be explained without the need for the concept of a creator.

The event, “Something from Nothing: An evening with Richard Dawkins and Lawrence Krauss”, was introduced by COSMOS editor-in-chief Wilson da Silva, and staged as part of the magazine’s push to develop a constellation of activities around its quality reputation and its growing recognition as a global brand.

“COSMOS is highly regarded by its thinking readership, who are frustrated at the lack of good literary writing that can satisfy their intellectual appetite to understand the world,” said da Silva. “The market for this is global.”

The lecture, which went on sale in February and sold out in three weeks, was held at Sydney Grammar School’s stylish new meeting centre, and video recorded for webcast by COSMOS and its media partners.

“Most of the audience were under 30, and we had hundreds line up afterwards for autographs,” said Cosmos Media’s CEO Kylie Ahern. “Science is hot, and great science talent attracts big crowds.”

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Alan Finkel, the co-founder of COSMOS , will be the next President of the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering (ATSE). Credit: Melissa Di Ciero/Monash University

Alan Finkel, a prominent Australian engineer, entrepreneur and co-founder of COSMOS , will be the next President of the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering (ATSE).

Finkel, Chancellor of Monash University, will take up his new role on 1 January 2013, succeeding former Australian Chief Scientist Professor Robin Batterham, who completes his term at the end of 2012.

Finkel will lead the ATSE Fellowship of more than 830 members – one of the nation’s four learned academies – with a strong focus on achieving improved public discussion and policy on key national issues where applied science and technology offer solutions.

Finkel, a former member of the Academy Board, will rejoin the board and become its chair from 2013. He was elected by the Academy’s Assembly, which represents the broad Academy Fellowship and includes the Board and leaders of ATSE’s divisions and topic forums.

Batterham, announcing Finkel’s election, said it had been a great privilege to serve in the role.

“Alan Finkel will do a wonderful job as President of the Academy and will bring a range of skills, experience and commitment that will enhance its activities and its impact,” Professor Batterham said.

“His commitment to education – which he backs with strong personal involvement – has been the key to developing our own STELR program in high schools across the country.

“And his understanding of science and technology policy and the ability of our nation’s scientist and technologists to contribute to building a better Australia will position him to make a great contribution to the work of the Academy and the advice it provides to government and industry.

“His unique combination of engineering, entrepreneurship, innovation and management in Australia and overseas will serve the Academy well.”

Finkel said he was honoured to succeed Professor Batterham as the Academy’s eighth President and join the group of distinguished Australians who had led the Academy.

STELR is a national secondary school science education initiative; it is a hands-on, inquiry-based, in-curriculum program designed for Year 9 or Year 10 students, on the theme of global warming and renewable energy. A range of directed and student-designed practical investigations are an integral part of the program.

Background on Alan S. Finkel

Dr Alan Finkel AM FTSE is an engineer, entrepreneur and philanthropist and has served as Chancellor of Monash University since January 2008.

He received his Bachelor of Engineering in 1976 and Doctorate in Electrical Engineering from Monash University in 1981, following which he worked for two years as a neuroscience research fellow at the John Curtin School of Medical Research, located at the Australian National University.

In addition to his role as Chancellor, Finkel is also the Chief Technology Officer of Better Place Australia, a company that will provide clean energy to run Australia’s future fleet of electric cars.

Previously, for 20 years Finkel was CEO of Axon Instruments, a publically-listed American company that made electronic instruments used by pharmaceutical companies in the discovery of new medicines.

Between running Axon Instruments and joining Better Place Australia, Finkel established two magazines. The first, COSMOS , is a literary science magazine that is now Australia’s #1 science publication and seeks to being the wonder of science to a general audience; and the second, G Magazine, was Australia’s first green lifestyle publication and promotes environmental sustainability.

Finkel has a passionate interest in education. He established the Australian Course in Advanced Neuroscience to provide advanced training to early career scientists. He also established a secondary school science program named STELR, administered by ATSE, which is currently running in nearly 300 secondary schools around Australia.

He currently serves as the Chairman of the Australian Centre of Excellence for All-Sky Astrophysics, a research consortium that is preparing to analyse the data from the world’s largest radio telescope that will be built by the end of this decade.

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COSMOS contributing editor Elizabeth Finkel.

Elizabeth Finkel, a contributing editor of COSMOS Magazine, has been named the Higher Education Journalist of the Year for 2011.

The prestigious national award, which is conducted in conjunction with the National Press Club in Canberra, was for her story “The trouble with genes”, dealing with the groundbreaking research undertaken by the University of Queensland’s Professor John Mattick.

National Press Club president and chairman of the judging panel, Laurie Wilson said, “Elizabeth’s story displayed all the hallmarks of outstanding journalism – she tackled an extremely complex topic, translated it into layman’s language and turned into a great story.”

“The trouble with genes” traces John Mattick’s quest to decode genetic material and translate what was once considered ‘junk DNA’, something which Finkel says “puts him way ahead of the curve”.

“We know he is leading the scientific world with his ideas and we really ought to be writing about them,” says Finkel, who herself trained as a geneticist, “but it is difficult to understand what he has discovered – one seems to require degrees in both computing and genetics.”

The Higher Education Awards are judged in two categories, each with awards for print and broadcast. The Journalist of the Year is selected from the category winners and wins a $10,000 study tour funded by Universities Australia.

The two Higher Education prizes make it a total of 44 awards and commendations won by COSMOS since it was launched in 2005.

The judges were Laurie Wilson, President of the National Press Club; Dr Matthew Ricketson, author and former journalist who is now professor of journalism at the University of Canberra; Misha Schubert, National Press Club Vice-President and political reporter for The Age; and Malcolm Colless, journalist, media consultant and former director of News Ltd.

Awards were presented by Peter Coaldrake, chairman of Universities Australia and Vice-Chancellor of Queensland University of Technology.

The full list of winners and commendations appears below:

Category 1: Award for excellence in communicating knowledge of Australia’s university sector

• WINNER – PRINT: John Ross, Campus Review – “Death by a thousand cuts”
• Special commendation – print: Sarah Jane Collins, The Age – “Foreign students in retreat”
• Special commendation – print: Dinah Arndt, The Examiner – “Trouble at school”

Category 2: Award for excellence in communicating research and innovation, teaching and learning, equity and access, social inclusion or Indigenous education issues

• WINNER – PRINT: Elizabeth Finkel, COSMOS Magazine – “The trouble with genes”
• Special commendation – print: Bernard Lane, The Australian – “Rudd’s ANU China centre puts noses out of joint”
• WINNER – BROADCAST: Rebecca Baillie ABC TV, 7.30 REPORT – “Indigenous doctors”

• WINNER, HIGHER EDUCATION JOURNALIST OF THE YEAR: Elizabeth Finkel, COSMOS Magazine.

The post COSMOS editor named 2011 Higher Education Journalist of the Year appeared first on COSMOS magazine.

COSMOS contributing editor, Emma Young, wins the Health Journalist of the Year Award for her article “Learning to forget”, published in October 2009.

Young attended the annual Excellence in Health Journalism Awards, hosted by the National Press Club of Australia, today in Canberra. She was named as one of four category winners, for Best News Feature, Article or Presentation, and as the overall winner for “the most outstanding entry among the winners of the previous four categories”.

Young, who has been covering health for 16 years, wins a study tour to the United States with a focus on the health industry.

“I’m thrilled to win this prestigious award,” says Young. “I still get excited at finding out about discoveries that have such an impact on people’s lives. Our memories are such a fundamental part of ourselves that it’s impossible not to be fascinated by work aimed at tinkering with them – and perhaps even deleting them.”

In the award-winning article, “Learning to forget”, published in October 2009, Young details investigations into how memories are stored, created and retrieved to understand why one third of people who experience a traumatic event, such as a physical attack or a nasty car accident, go on to develop post-traumatic disorder.

In her in-depth article, Young looks at new research into memory manipulation that may be used to treat the disorder, which affects 6% of Australians.

The four category winners were:

Best News Feature Article or Presentation, covering Health, Health Sciences or Innovation: Emma Young, COSMOS Magazine for “Learning to forget”

Best Documentary or Documentary Series, covering Health, Health Science or Innovation: Rebecca Le Tourneau and Rahni Sadler, Seven Network for “The Vanishing”

Best Feature Article or Presentation, covering health policy, economics, business: Mary Gearin, 7.30 Report ABC TV for “e-health”

Best News Feature Article or Presentation, directed to medical professionals:
Stephen Pinnock – Australian Doctor for Jumping Through Hoops

The duo of awards make it a total of 42 prizes and commendations COSMOS has picked up since it launched in 2005. In November 2010, the British Institute of Physics awarded COSMOS Online as the People’s Choice award for Best Online Magazine, calling the website a “real treasure trove of science news, opinion, reviews and more.”

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