Update: A source calls the layoffs "a bloodbath" and estimates that half the editorial staff will be gone.

Newsweek’s print edition is ending in a matter of weeks, and the anticipated staff changes have already begun. Layoffs are expected to be announced this afternoon, a tipster tells us. Meanwhile, we hear that a few editors are proactively jumping ship.

Damon Linker, Newsweek’s commentary editor,  is decamping to teach at Penn and iPad editor Melissa Lafsky is leaving for a start-up, a source tells us.

Earlier today, Tina Brown announced three promotions: Justine Rosenthal, the magazine's executive editor, will become the editorial director of The Newsweek Daily Beast Company; the executive editor of Newsweek International, Tunku Varadarajan, will become editor of Newsweek Global; and Deidre Depke has been named editor of newsweek.com. Ms. Depke, former editor of the magazine's website, returned earlier this year as executive editor of The Daily Beast.

"I am pleased to announce some very important promotions that strengthen our organization as we commit to our digital future," Ms. Brown wrote in her memo, Capital New York reported.

We will update when we know more. Tips? Send them over: ksmoke@observer.com.

UPDATED: A memo went out confirming layoffs.

"The sad moment has arrived when we must go forth with the editorial staff reductions that we discussed in person with all of you several weeks ago," the memo says.

Memo below:

To: All Staff
From: Tina Brown / Baba Shetty

The sad moment has arrived when we must go forth with the editorial staff reductions that we discussed in person with all of you several weeks ago. Employees in the affected positions will be notified today. Much of this has already happened on the business side, and today we will be letting staff on the editorial side know where we will be eliminating positions. This is a very difficult day, and one that we approach with enormous regret.

Anyone whose job (or job category) is affected will meet today with a senior member of the editorial team. No one will be asked to leave before December 31st (and many will stay at least into mid-January). Managers will be getting in touch later this afternoon with groups of affected employees to let them know when and where their particular meeting will take place. After the meetings with management, you should feel free to speak with Holly Antiuk or Lauren Strada for more specifics on all aspects of this transition. We are working to ensure that the process is handled as sensitively as possible.

Tina & Baba

But as we read the seven page Q&A with Slate founding editor Michael Kinsley, we were struck by Ms. Brown's frequent use of imagery. So very illustrative! So imaginative! We can practically see it all, from Cinderella waking up from the ball that was the Talk launch party to the refrigerators on each foot that was the print edition of Newsweek. 

We have collected some of our favorites below.

On austerity:

Maybe everyone will now see the light—I hope so. But maybe we’ll all cartwheel over the same austerity cliff.

On becoming a citizen:

9/11 made me a New Yorker. I decided I cared so much about this country that I was kidding myself that I was ever going to go back to the U.K. It was time to get married.

On not being able to save Newsweek:

I think it was a romantic gamble that there was still life to be had for Newsweek.

On the death (or dearth) of glamour at Newsweek:

You know, it was very funny—when I looked at the document of sale, it was like the vestiges of the great galleon it had been. It was like that wreck of the Titanic in the James Cameron film—they’re swimming through the rooms, and you see the chandeliers. Every so often, you would swim around a corner and see a chandelier—things like private dining.

On shedding the print weekly:

But it’s like having a refrigerator on each foot—to have this carapace of the print magazine and all its problems, and all its legacy of unsolved issues.

On the changing media landscape:

Elephants can’t tap dance.

On the (in) famously lavish launch party for Talk:

But, in a strange way, that party was the end of the twentieth century. It was the great end-of-twentieth-century party. I remember going back on the barge afterwards with Natasha Richardson, Kate Moss, and all these people, and this big cold wave came flooding over the boat. It was two o’clock in the morning, and we were all soaking. It was like Cinderella waking up from the ball.

And, of course, that view of Manhattan from the party—very shortly, the Twin Towers were down. New York had changed utterly. Utterly. I mean, we never would have had that party after 9/11. It just ended like that. It was really, really romantic.

On working with older men:

You go to war with the army you have. Please. Let’s not talk about me having things for Si Newhouse and Harvey Weinstein. I enjoyed working for both of them, even Harvey.

On the preponderance of conferences:

There’s a lot of them. But you know what it also tells me? That people are hungry to hear really interesting conversations. They really are.

The people are famished. And they will feast on intelligent conversation like so many banquet dinners.

Mostly though, we were struck, like Ms. Brown herself, by that cold wave of water hitting the boat as she came back from to New York Harbor from the Talk launch party. How apocryphal.

We can't wait for Ms. Brown's emblematic anecdote that perfectly encapsulates this time in which we live, when we have abandoned the romance of print in favor of the Internet. And in favor of endless conferences. Because that illustrative anecdote is sure to emerge someday. Just maybe not in the pages of a magazine.

DvF and Mitch: lovers once, buddies forever!

As we sloshed, caked with snow flurries, into the Mandarin Oriental for the 2012 Phoenix House Fashion award dinner last Wednesday evening, we couldn’t determine whether it was the way-too-early winter outside, the Sandy-forced relocation or the early start after an endless election season, but at first glance, things looked a bit quiet. (In retrospect, we appreciated the venue upgrade, considering it was originally slated to take place at Pier 60.)

“Well there’s Linda Fargo, at least ...” we uttered to a weary-eyed publicist as she sashayed passed us in a crisp black sheath dress, before we sauntered downstairs to cocktail hour.

Below, on the 35th floor, the considerably more lively and notable fashion crowd imbibed, heedless of the blizzard-like winds that howled without mercy on the commoners struggling to get around Columbus Circle.

With the exception of Glenda Bailey, this didn’t feel like a typical fashion event; nay, it was considerably more corporate—a bit cliquey, but not necessarily in a bad way. Dashing executives (well mostly dashing) in flamboyant tailored suits sipped scotch and red wine, while a more demure population of women squawked about recent highs and lows.

This reeked of powerful retail and media industry figures rather than overcompensated stylists and over-photographed fashion mavens.

The Observer wasn’t feeling particularly social, but we decided to meander aimlessly about the lobby, gorging ourselves with vegetable spring rolls every time they passed.

Eventually, someone had the brilliance to ring the dinner gong and get the show on the road.

“You’re stuck with me,” laughed Rose Marie Bravo, the fashion branding and commerce star, as she welcomed the Phoenix House patrons now enjoying their first plating around candlelit tables. She apologized for emcee Ali Wentworth, who was “lost somewhere in the city.”

“This past week has been a tragic one,” she continued. “Many of our friends have been left homeless or without power.” She went on to explain what Phoenix House does: it helps thousands of people struggling with substance abuse and addiction through its pioneering treatment program. For a second or two, The Observer stopped sipping. But only a second or two.

Seated before us was honoree Jim Gold, president of The Neiman Marcus Group; Tory Burch, evasive and on high alert with her pending lawsuit against ex-husband Chris Burch still ablaze; and Calvin Klein’s Francisco Costa. The weather was most likely to blame for the empty seats, and there was substantial mention of Hurricane Sandy and its affect on the Phoenix House community.

“Substance abuse is an epidemic that plagues the USA,” began Phoenix House CEO Howard Meitiner.

He was followed by a young client of Phoenix House, who spoke of his history with drug abuse, dealing and violence. It was simple, honest and very effective. He said he is now rightly on track, working toward a degree in social work.

“Drug abuse can happen to anyone’s child,” said Mr. Meithner, then diving into the politics and ethos of the drug culture in America.

“But recovery is achievable and sustainable,” he concluded, just as Ali Wentworth, our long-lost emcee, finally stampeded in.

“I’ve got a husband who said, ‘I’ve just done 36 hours of ABC election coverage! You’re gonna get into bed with me!’” she blurted to our disbelief, about her hubby, George Stephanopoulos.

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, not only was the fabulous hostess late because she was having a roll in the hay, she announced it to us all! Our kind of gal. And poor George, election aside, he must have still been shell-shocked by his co-host’s odd drunken-like behavior on election night—Cheers, Diane!

“They messengered this to me,” Ms. Wentworth continued, exposing a shiny Olivier Theyskens for Theory blazer that kept her décolletage in check.

“I thought I was chic, but maybe I’m just a shoplifter!”

We decided right then and there that we all wanted to leave and go home with Ali Wentworth.

Our hostess extraordinaire thankfully kept the pace brisk as we cruised into the awards segment. Monsieur Theyskens gave a poignant and astute speech before plopping a Phoenix House award in the hands of Andrew Rosen. The CEO of Theory then delivered a heartfelt personal story of his own family’s struggle with addiction and praised the Phoenix House for its wonderful work.

Tina Brown, editor in chief of Newsweek/The Daily Beast, made an anticipated handoff to Diane von Furstenberg. We never got to pester her with our gossipy questions about her publication’s demise.

“Diane is a vision broker,” Ms. Brown professed.

Once DvF accept her award, she dove into a tale of how she first met Phoenix House Founder Mitchell S. Rosenthal. Apparently Ms. von Furstenberg had mistaken the addiction innovator for ’80s star Chris Sarandon, whom she mistakenly referred to as Chris Rock. “He was hot,” she said.

“Then I got to know more about Mitch Rosenthal. I’ll spare you the details ...”

The romantic jaunts of the fashion queen brought the crowd great delight.

“This young, smashing man who looked like Chris Sarandon—created this place where shame was not an issue,” Ms. von Furstenberg gushed.

“I really want to make sure that we all raise our glass to this special man!”

At that flawless declaration, we lifted our glass, emptied it, and dashed downtown, to partake in rowdier action at Le Baron—alas, without Ali Wentworth.

Brown.

Is it happening again?

The bad time went by many names: the meltdown ... the shakeout ... the reckoning ... the death of print... or sometimes, simply, “trying to freelance.”

Old-timers can still remember it—how, amid the frozen winter of 2008, the corridors of once unshakable media empires ran red with ink as the insertion orders dried up and crumbled into dust. Aeron chairs grew wet with tears. Editors were cashiered, contract writers flung overboard like chum. Soon you could see them all over Midtown: the sleek black Town Cars sitting idle on cinder blocks, rusting in the bleak unforgiving sun.

It was terrifying. The death knell—a merciless, unrelenting Twitter feed titled “The Media Is Dying”—sounded on a daily basis, sometimes hourly. Staffers watched in fear as the ghouls of HR, fingernails dabbed in scarlet, inched ever closer.

No publication was spared. The New York Times cut 100 newsroom jobs. Time Inc., cut 600 and then, unsated, came back for more. At Condé, 180 souls were lost. Issues bleached on newsstands as replacements failed to arrive. Gone were Gourmet, Cookie, Elegant Bride, Modern Bride, Radar, Vibe, Portfolio, Blender, Home, Country Home, Metropolitan Home, O at Home, Cottage Living, Southern Accents, Hallmark, Best Life, Golf for Women, Travel + Leisure Golf, Domino, Teen, Cosmo Girl, Playgirl, Quick & Simple, Men’s Vogue, PC Magazine.

Poof.

Graydon Carter was reduced to waiting in line in the Condé cafeteria—Frank Gehry’s suddenly funereal Windex wonderland—an industry titan contemplating garlic-free stir-fry and make-your-own salads, trapezoidal tray in hand. Flower deliveries stopped cold. The devil could barely afford Prada.

Christmas parties were summarily canceled, dancing on graves having been deemed unseemly and expensive. Throughout the industry, a sobering sadness fell. Gone even were the days of schadenfreude; survivor’s guilt was all that remained. There was talk, endless talk, about the future of the industry and how to adapt to the changing world. There were lessons to learn.

But then, ad sales bounced back. Companies started hiring again. Mr. Carter opened Monkey Bar. Things may not have been as lavish as they’d been in the glory days, but they were better. Better was the operative word—it made it possible to forget. A collective amnesia settled in. The storm was over, and the sunshine was so very pleasant. Yes, media is a shaky industry, people would ruefully acknowledge. The future is digital, that much was obvious. iPad apps became de rigueur, but the investment was halfhearted. Websites were relaunched, then re-relaunched, then more or less ignored.

Things are fine now, people said. Let’s focus on the next deadline.

The reprieve has been sweet, but will it last? Lately there have been some uneasy rumblings, a disturbance in the Force, small but unmistakable indications that the past is catching up with us. The Daily, Rupert Murdoch’s bold foray into the tablet future, laid off 50 a few months back. Condé Nast just let 60 staffers go after announcing that all its magazines needed to slash 5 percent from next year’s budget. Most had already had to cut 10 percent over the summer. Hearst is reorganizing the shelter titles, but it’s hard to take shelter anywhere when there are cracks in the foundation.

“We’ve gone through a period of treading water, but now it’s crunch time, and there will be lots more of these,” said Paul Armstrong, who writes the “The Media Is Dying” Twitter feed. Although Mr. Armstrong continued tweeting through the good times, his dispatches were mostly about innovation and other happy things. Now he is once again the angel of death.

Last week, Tina Brown announced that Newsweek would cease printing a physical magazine in December. The cracks are getting harder and harder to ignore.

“We are transitioning Newsweek, not saying goodbye to it,” Ms. Brown wrote in a Daily Beast post. Transitioning ... Sounds painless, doesn’t it? Like shedding one’s corporeal vessel and just floating up to the clouds ...

“We remain committed to Newsweek and to the journalism that it represents,” she continued, reassuringly. “This decision is not about the quality of the brand or the journalism—that is as powerful as ever. It is about the challenging economics of print publishing and distribution.”

But had anybody really learned anything in the intervening years? Newsweek and the Daily Beast merged in 2010—a marriage of convenience that was never very convenient at all.

Newsweek struggled during the two years under Ms. Brown. There were misfires like September’s “Muslim Rage” cover, the “First Gay President” cover and the “crazy eyes Bachman cover,” and fan fiction imagining Princess Diana alive at 50. Just last week, a six-page cover article asserted that heaven is indeed real. The strategy might have gotten the magazine some publicity—indeed, mocking the Newsweek cover became something of a media sport—but it didn’t sell enough copies of a magazine that relied almost entirely on subscriptions. Meanwhile, the Daily Beast began to suffer, becoming just another good-enough aggregator that spent an awful lot of time covering the royal family. “Read This, Skip That” was the Beast’s motto. Over time, we began to skip it all.

Try as Ms. Brown did to put an upbeat spin on the news that there would be no more Newsweek, she could not avoid the unavoidable fact that there wasn’t room or money for all her employees in the exciting digital future.

“Regrettably we anticipate staff reductions and the streamlining of our editorial and business operations both here in the U.S. and internationally,” she wrote.

Now, once again, there is fear and paranoia and silence.

Hold onto your K-Cups; it’s probably just beginning.

“We are certainly going to see more of this,” said Reed Phillips, managing partner and co-founder of DeSilva & Phillips, a media banking firm. “It’s a product of the downturn and the transition to digital. But most publications will transition in a more gradual way.”

The hope, of course, is that magazines will figure out how to bring in revenues with digital before they have to kill print. But sources working on the digital side at various media companies privately express doubt that there is really a substantial commitment to apps and websites, despite the easy enthusiasm.

“Magazines can ‘survive’ by going all-digital, but, like Newsweek,will find that they can only justify a small staff, given far reduced revenues,” said Ken Doctor, a news industry analyst. “It’s a downward spiral.”

Meanwhile, the clock is ticking, and iPad apps don’t monetize themselves.

“Time is running out faster on the print products than magazine publishers anticipated, and their tablet products, readers and advertisers aren’t yet ready to replace that print,” Mr. Doctor added. Thanks, Doc.

Newsweek Global may well work. It probably won’t. But either way, the magazine industry should take note. Unless the Mayans were right about 2012, there probably isn’t much time.

The cover of the current issue.

Newsweek will no longer be a print magazine, Tina Brown announced in an early-morning blog post. The last print edition will be December 31, 2012.

"In our judgment, we have reached a tipping point at which we can most efficiently and effectively reach our readers in all-digital format," Ms. Brown writes. "This was not the case just two years ago. It will increasingly be the case in the years ahead."

The new all-digital, paid-subscription publication will be called Newsweek Global and be available for tablets and online. Select content will be available on The Daily Beast's website. The Daily Beast, which launched in 2008, merged with Newsweek two years ago.

Tina Brown (Photo: BeastTV)

Newsbeast editor in chief Tina Brown seems to have developed a redemptive streak, at least when it comes to the bad boys and girls of the media world. Her website has recently published several pieces by otherwise disgraced journalists.

On Friday, Ms. Brown brought in Mike Daisey to pen a piece on the first anniversary of the death of Apple founder Steve Jobs. You may remember Mr. Daisey as the man who forced the public radio show This American Life to air an extensive mea culpa after he adapted his one-man show about the brutal conditions at Chinese factories that make Apple products for its broadcast, and it was later found to contain, as the subsequent retraction put it, “numerous fabrications.” Though Mr. Daisey included untruths in his story and, in the words of the radio show's team, “misled This American Life during the fact-checking process,” The Daily Beast apparently had no problem giving him over 1,000 words and two accompanying four-minute “BeastTV” videos, in which he “reflects on the last year” in which he “fell from grace” and acknowledges that mistakes were made, but nonetheless credits himself with sparking a wider discussion of Apple’s labor practices.

Mr. Daisey isn’t the only fabulist who has contributed to The Daily Beast in the past few months. In late July, the site brought in disgraced former Timesman Jayson Blair to weigh in after The New Yorker staff writer Jonah Lehrer was busted for making up Bob Dylan quotes in his best-selling pop science book, Imagine: How Creativity Works.

“Nine years ago, I was Jonah Lehrer,” Mr. Blair wrote. That sentence may be the most accurate thing Mr. Blair’s ever written, and it’s why he’s blacklisted throughout the journalism word, except apparently at the Beast, where it increasingly looks like Ms. Brown is running some sort of media rehab facility.

Indeed, just one day before Mr. Blair’s piece ran, Joan Juliet Buck took to the Beast to tell “her side of the story” about a widely reviled puff piece profiling the wife of brutal Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad that she wrote for Vogue in February 2011. Ms. Buck’s story praised Mrs. Assad as “wildly democratic” and “glamorous, young and very chic—the freshest and most magnetic of first ladies.” The story provoked instantaneous ridicule and was eventually scrubbed from Vogue’s website.

The Daily Beast didn’t include an explanation for why it allowed Ms. Buck to make the improbable claim that she “didn’t know” Mr. Assad was “a murderer” when she started working on her story. However, based on the growing rogue’s gallery accumulating bylines at the site, it seems that ethical questions won’t stop the benevolent editor-confessor from opening her pages to the fallen. But not all good deeds go punished, and giving a new platform to wayward scribes may be a speedy route to page-views—if not to critical acclaim. For example, the piece by Ms. Buck was criticized by many other websites, which of course linked to it in conjunction with their critiques.

We reached out to Ms. Brown to ask about her decision to publish these journalistic miscreants and whether we might expect more blighted Beast bylines in the future. As of this writing, she has yet to respond. We imagine she’s probably busy trying to get in touch with Mr. Lehrer.

Update (10/10/12 11:42 a.m.): An earlier version of this story described This American life as an NPR show. It is distributed to public radio stations by PRI, not NPR. 

Code and Theory's Brandon Ralph with wife Adriana Biasi

“God, have you ever walked into a meeting and thought, This is not going to go well?” Code and Theory founder and creative director Brandon Ralph moaned. “That’s what it was like when we went to pitch to The Daily Beast.”

Sitting with him in his 5th floor SoHo offices, it was easy to imagine what the handsome and lanky 33-year-old was talking about. The Observer had come in to meet with the man who had been hand-picked by Tina Brown, Anna Wintour, Peter Brant, and Jason Binn to create their online platforms. With long, dark, wavy hair; leather bracelets; and a penchant for John Varvatos; Mr. Ralph looked more the part of a hip New York restaurateur.

He was quite press-shy: his only major interview since he co-founded his company in 2001 was with Ad Week, and he obliquely referred to not being happy with the results. In addition, some recent layoffs at Code and Theory had attracted unwanted attention by MediaBistro’s Agency Spy, leading Mr. Ralph to be even more reticent in front of a recorder than usual. So yeah, after five minutes in Mr. Ralph’s office, we actually could visualize a meeting that wasn’t going well.

“They were trying out four different design teams, and I think we were the fifth,” Mr. Ralph told The Observer of his first meeting with Ms. Brown’s staff. “We only had two days to prepare specs, and the whole presentation, people were just checking their watches.”

As they were about to be ushered out, a deus ex machina descended in the form of a bomb threat, forcing the whole building to evacuate. Somehow, Mr. Ralph and Ms. Brown were separated from the rest of their respective teams, and ended up at Cookshop on 10th Avenue, where they drank coffee and connected.

“We just sat at a coffee table, talking about designs and different approaches to the site,” Mr Ralph told The Observer, still incredulous over the series of events. “People kept asking how it went. I told everyone it was ‘very strange, but then very intimate.’”

“Twenty minutes later, we got a phone call telling us we were hired.”
But Ms. Brown and Mr. Ralph didn’t immediately see eye to eye on how to approach the digital news site’s layout. When Code and Theory presented a mock-up using gibberish—a standard design practice—the Newsweek editor demanded to see actual content in its place.

“We ended up having to create a new site mock-up every single day through the launch,” He grimaced. What he learned from the exercise was that his design couldn’t rest on sexy photos; it had to have energy even on a slow news day.

Ms. Brown remembered her first scuffles with Mr. Ralph as well. “He wasn’t used to clients saying they were coming down to the studio to sit in front of the screen and try stuff out,” she told The Observer. “He freaked out at first, then realized how fun it is to marry news adrenaline and digital design.”

Ms. Brown and Mr. Ralph still keep in touch. He refers to the media mogul as one of his greatest teachers. She, meanwhile, gushes about some of Mr. Ralph’s other impressive qualities.

“Brandon’s a heartthrob,” she told The Observer. “Every single woman in the office is a bit in love with him.”

Tina Brown’s colleagues aren’t the only ones vulnerable to Mr. Ralph’s charms. He and Lenny Kravitz became close personal friends after Code and Theory redesigned his web site and filmed and edited two of Mr. Kravitz’s music videos.

“I invited him and his wife down to New Orleans to visit me,” Mr. Kravitz told The Observer. “He’s brilliant designer and a great thinker and a great friend. He’s inspiring. We’re constantly emailing each other things, like photos of camera gear, architecture, art. We like to bounce things to each other. He’s got this amazing eye, for photography and design and everything.”

Mr. Ralph’s LennyKravitz.com is a fresh-looking aggregator of web content about the artist, one that employs bold hieroglyphics and symbols where there otherwise would be titles. Such a heavily accessorized look is risky these days, but somehow, it works—especially considering the rock personality it reflects.

The offices of Code and Theory

“Code and Theory’s sites get attention for disruption,” said Nicholas Daniel-Richards, former CTO of the company. “Making something that’s completely different from what you’d expect might not even make sense at first. Then the industry takes notice and starts trying to do the same.”
The difference between Mr. Ralph’s shop and the larger agencies, Mr. Daniel-Richards told The Observer, is that the big firms will churn out “a very efficient German machine, like a Mercedes: very powerful, with perfect craftsmanship, but no personal touches. And then you have these alternatives like an Aston Martin, which are creative and funky, and have soul. That’s Brandon.”

Code and Theory’s name has become synonymous with old media’s more innovative forays into new media. The most recent example would be last month’s launch of Jason Binn’s 1%-er magazine, DuJour, which sought to create a unique web entity separate from but associated with print. For the project, Mr. Ralph came up with the idea of having the site resemble the physical product: it begins at the cover, and readers have to flip through pages of content, like they would on an iPad (or an actual paper product).

“It was this insight I had,” Mr. Ralph recalled. “No matter how old a magazine is, or if it’s at your house or a dentist’s office...you’ll go from cover to cover.” So Mr. Ralph created a “focused” digital product that didn’t show the top news stories of the day.

When first viewing the DuJour website, readers might be confused by the cover photo and lack of a scrolling content bar. But once the user is accustomed to the unconventional design, the images pop, the stories breathe and the overall effect is uncluttered and refreshing.

“We’re not showing you 100 things on every page, like some websites that have all these links that scream, ‘Please, look at me!’” Mr. Ralph said. “I mean I think that works for websites that need to be very timely,” he amended quickly. (He did design the layout for the scream-worthy TMZ.com, after all). “But for a magazine that needs to be very luxurious, we told the editors, ‘Invest in your content. Users will scroll.’ ”

For Vogue.com’s 2010 overhaul, the challenge was to modernize the site’s color way and typefaces and create a brand-specific social community. In a response that typified reviews among the fashion set, Women’s Wear Daily wrote: “Love the oversize features carousel and the locking navigation bar! A beautiful redesign work by (once again) Code and Theory.”

For the record, Vogue.com is more than happy with the results, editor Caroline Palmer told The Observer. The “relaunch was one of our brand’s most important recent initiatives, making it essential that we collaborate with the right agency. Now that we’ve worked closely with Brandon and his team for more than two years, it’s clear to us that they are one of the top agencies in their field.”

That doesn’t mean Mr. Ralph and company will work for any media entity with a blank check. Without naming names, he told The Observer, “We’ll tell clients we want to work with them, but we don’t think they should do this project, because it’s set up to fail.”

Bossing around big names is a far cry from the firm’s humble beginnings 11 years ago, when Mr. Ralph opened up shop out of his Lower East Side apartment with childhood friend Dan Gardner. The two had $500 to their names.

They had grown up on Long Island, and spent time working in the dot com age with smaller, online agencies before being asked to create the digital department of a traditional ad firm, Draft. When Ralph and Gardner got the opportunity to strike out on their own, they went for it. One of their first jobs was creating a site for Sony using Flash Video Player.

Today, they employ more than 100 people at Code and Theory, which Mr. Ralph stressed, was another kind of collaborative process. “There are creative people who have moved into the strategy group, and creatives who have taught themselves how to be engineers.”

“Everyone here is a Swiss army knife,” he boasted.

Like many arty types that have taken the corporate route, Mr. Ralph—who also dabbles in interior design, fashion, and photography—worries that he’s sold out his craft. Meanwhile, his colleagues sometimes wonder whether they can possibly execute his outside-the-box ideas, according to a former employee.

“Brandon has the ideas, but then there are the realities of the situation, and they’re not always feasible,” said the employee. “You can’t expect people to work 110 hours a week and not get burned out with the crushing hours and a volatile employer, but that’s how they get things done there.”
In January of last year, Code and Theory helped recreate Interview magazine’s web site, and then the two companies traded spaces. The design shop’s new space is more than 20,000 square feet, all the better to branch into print design and TV commercials, Mr. Ralph’s next moves.

After we had turned our recorder off and packed up, Mr. Ralph offered to give us the grand tour, culminating in his favorite place in the never-ending floor of Code and Theory. Leading us through a side door into a cramped, almost hidden corridor lined with two stories of books, he flung open the heavy wooden doors to the library: a gigantic room with thousands of books left over from the Interview days.

“Now if we could only figure out the Dewey Decimal System they were using when they organized everything,” Mr. Ralph grinned.

Mr. Ralph shook his head at the archaic line of code that had created order from the massive amount of data. It was a design he could respect, and for the first time since we had walked into his office, he looked genuinely happy.

Screenshot via Instagram

Illusionist David Blaine stopped by Newsweek/The Daily Beast for an appearance on BeastTV today. While in the company's West Chelsea office, Mr. Blaine couldn't resist demonstrating his powers to what we assume were wowed staffers.

Excited writers tweeted the events (with pictures). It isn't every day that magic happens in a newsroom. 

"I just held David Blaine's wrist for a trick and my hand was SO clammy ..." tweeted reporter @ElizaShapiro.

"@aliyarrow just got served by @davidblaine. She was lost in his eyes.#aztektomb @ IAC," tweeted Deputy Books Editor Jimmy So.

Mr. Blaine is making the rounds to promote his latest stunt--he will stand on top of a 20-foot pillar for 72 hours and be electrified by a million votes of electricity. Mr. Blaine will not eat or sleep for the entire three-day period.

Based on the Beast staffers' awed responses to Mr. Blaine this afternoon, it sounds like the magician will have no trouble generating fawning coverage for the feat.

Newsweek

We say, if you're going to go for it...really go for it. Click through to see our ideas for future Newsweek covers. Have at it, Tina.

Photo illustrations by Ed Johnson.