Nudity No More — Playboy Magazine

Since the first publication of Playboy in 1953, pictures of naked women were the main attraction.

Husni added that Playboy was “the original man’s magazine that serviced men through advice and helpful information” while also dealing with the nude photography.

The magazine’s founder, 89-year-old Hefner, recognisable for his trademark red smoking jacket, agreed to the change proposed by Mr Jones.

The struggling magazine’s surprising new direction is thanks to Cory Jones, a top editor at Playboy. The magazine claims it website audience soared with that move. It published the work of such writers as John Updike, Jack Kerouac, Ray Bradbury and Joseph Heller and interviewed the likes of Jimmy Carter, Fidel Castro, Malcolm X, Muhammad Ali, Miles Davis, Frank Sinatra and Bob Dylan. There’s sort of a big note about this one, though, as nude photos will no longer be part of the once boundary-pushing publication.

Playboy has rightfully insisted for decades that its articles measured up well against any good standard of writing, reporting and interviewing. It’s possible their new plan is influenced by rival glossy Penthouse’s attempt to win back readers by turning more explicit, effectively churning out the grease-laden Double Downs to Chipotle’s en vogue burrito bowl. Its global editions will still contain nude photos. But, according to its own research, Playboy’s logo is one of the most recognisable in the world, along with those of Apple and Nike. “And so it’s just passe at this juncture”, Scott Flanders, the company’s CEO, said. “Forty percent of their sales come from China, despite the fact that no magazine is published there”. As a result, Playboy executives have said the average age of its reader went from around 47 to early 30s and the web traffic jump from four million to about 16 million unique users per month! “I think we have a cleaner image in the mind of the consumer in Asia”, Flanders said, because customers there might not immediately associate the bunny with the magazine’s nude content.

For many brands and organizations that have forever been reluctant to pitch Playboy because of nudity, the magazine brand just got a lot sexier as a possible PR and marketing vehicle.

Playboy said the internet has made its pinup obsolete.

Five years after her split from Mike Tyson and being considered “the most hated woman in America”, Robin Givens posed for Playboy’s September 1994 issue.