MEDIA

Naked ambition:The Smart Set plans to post new stories Monday through Friday.

All Set

Drexel’s new online publication experiments with audaciously long stories.

by Cassidy Hartmann

After the demise of the Drexel-funded online magazine Dragonfire in March, the university bestowed a mandate upon its hiring committee: Come up with a high-quality general-interest online magazine. Shortly thereafter, The Smart Set was born—or, more accurately, reconceived, this time with a decided nod toward the golden age of journalism.

“We wanted to recreate the kind of intellectual magazine that existed at the beginning of the 20th century,” says editor Jason Wilson, 37, who was hired in March to lead the three staff members retained from the old Dragonfire.

The new site borrows its title from a literary magazine by the same name published from 1900 to 1930 that featured writers like Dorothy Parker and F. Scott Fitzgerald, mentored by editors George Jean Nathan and H.L. Mencken.

“The Smart Set didn’t take itself so seriously, as I think a lot of magazines do,” says Wilson. “I think it gave us a design aesthetic. It was a jumping-off point.”

The Smart Set is also taking an even greater leap: The debut online issue features almost exclusively long-form content—a format that runs contrary to the gospel of online journalism, which preaches that readers want information quickly, and they want it concise.

Three of The Smart Set’s feature stories run more than 5,000 words.

“Of course it’s a concern, because traditionally that’s not the way people read online,” says Wilson. “By the same token, I don’t know of any online magazines paying for that kind of work either, so maybe they haven’t tried it. Nobody’s put anything out worth reading that long, unless you have a print version.”

The Smart Set launched two weeks ago with an impressively diverse collection of stories, ranging from first-person compositions to travel essays to an 8,000-word feature by Daily News sports writer Mark Kram Jr. on his father’s writing legacy. The caliber of its contributors is also noteworthy, including work from New Yorker staff writer and author Susan Orlean and Swiss author Alain de Botton.

The publication pays anywhere from $350 to $750 for columns and negotiable rates for longer features.

In addition to editing The Smart Set, Wilson is also editor of the Best American Travel Writing series. He writes a spirits column for The Washington Post, and contributes to travel magazines.

“I understood they were ending Dragonfire, and I initiated contact,” Wilson says of his hire. “We had lots of talks about the direction of the magazine and the way it would go. It was really fortuitous that Drexel was looking to do something like this and to support it in a big way.”

“The university pays the salaries of some staff members, provides space and equipment—and in that way it supports the publication,” says Mark Greenberg, The Smart Set’s publisher and dean of Drexel’s Pennoni Honors College. “The university doesn’t dictate the content.”

Greenberg says the university doesn’t review stories before they’re published or have an ideological, political or social agenda. “It’s not a house organ of Drexel,” he says. “It will do its job best if it projects high-quality, imaginative, innovative stories, photo essays, short film and video clips—things like that.”

The Smart Set launched with 20 stories and is now adding new pieces Monday through Friday.

“Even my mother isn’t going to read all 20 pieces, so we wanted to have a critical mass of traffic before we really started updating it,” says Wilson. “We don’t have a print version, so why would we publish every two weeks? Seems like we want people to check in once in a while to see what’s new.”

If Wilson sounds a bit unsure, it’s because he is. While he and The Smart Set’s other staffers are committed to the magazine’s lofty vision and service to “an audience who reads,” they repeatedly refer to the publication as “an experiment.”

“Honestly, I’m not really thinking about whether it’s going to fail,” says Wilson. “Maybe I’ll be talking to you in six months saying, ‘Crap, we’re going to run 1,100-word stories, no longer, with lots of photos and lots of tips,’ but I don’t think that’s going to happen.”

Financial support undoubtedly helps an editor’s confidence. But why would The Smart Set succeed when the similarly funded Dragonfire failed?

“In execution it’s a lot different,” says Wilson. “We don’t sound like we’re four teenagers in heavy metal T-shirts playing a role-playing game in the basement at my mom’s. I guess that’s an improvement.”

Wilson says The Smart Set won’t resort to publishing service journalism pieces “like the top 10 beauty tips” or “the best five cheesesteaks,” and will instead focus on well-crafted in-depth storytelling.

“The longest story we have is 8,000 words, and it’s the one driving the most traffic to the site,” he says, adding that a large number of readers are printing the story out. “So how do people read online? It’s hard to know right now. I guess we’ll find out, right?”