Panomania

I have my hands on a first edition of the San Francisco Panorama (aka the one-off, broadsheet newspaper edition McSweeney’s issue 33). I will be reviewing it in some detail, but not quite yet, cos there’s a lot of it: 120 pages of broadsheet, plus two magazines (112 pages and 96 pages), and two broadsheet double-sided posters.

There’s also a four-page insert discussing the experiment, which mainly seems to have been designed to remind newspapers how to engage with an audience. The insert also features a detailed breakdown of their printing and staff costs on the edition, coupled with a few ideas about how to make daily newspapers profitable (which basically involves not going into it with expectations of 12 percent profits, or paying yourself huge wages).

First impressions: this is something deeply wonderful. I may be some time.