Will the choice of cover subjects on fashion magazines matter as much in the next decade? Probably not, not with every other medium, new and yet-to-be-invented, competing to give readers fresh images of the stars, and with all magazines struggling to survive the death of their business model. But in a decade that arguably saw the peak of their power (at least if you measure by circulation), the covers of Vogue, Elle, InStyle, Marie Claire, Harper's Bazaar, Lucky, Glamour, Cosmopolitan, and, until 2007, Jane were benchmarks of what was considered beautiful, relatable, and most of all, saleable. With the exception of top 15 runners-up Gisele Bundchen and Kate Moss, models were replaced by actresses. The key to winning this particular contest: longevity and versatility, with long-running romantic woes providing a possible alternative. Unless, of course, you're Gwyneth Paltrow or Nicole Kidman. Then your total is skewed by four to five Vogue covers.


15. Keira Knightley (12) (tied with Britney Spears)
Sexyface and exquisite bone-structure make a potent combination. But with the exception of Knightley's three Vogue covers in four years, women's magazines seemed to be constantly trying to find the cozier side of Knightley's clavicles.


14. Britney Spears (12) (tied with Keira Knightley)
Spears wasn't always a women's magazine mainstay, and even less so a fashion one, but the end of the decade saw her graduating from Rolling Stone peek-a-boo to relatable features about being a mom, including two covers of her pregnant. That, plus standing up her interviewer.


13. Sandra Bullock (13) (tied with Scarlett Johansson)
The endlessly likable Bullock isn't flashy. She transitioned better from a tomboy rep to a ballgown than to Cosmo's enforced sultriness. This was another turtle-and-hare-style, consistent player.


12. Scarlett Johansson (13) (tied with Sandra Bullock)
Although her men's magazine covers were unfailingly titillating, women's magazines vacillated between presenting Scarlett Johansson as the girl next door or showing off her curves.


11. Halle Berry (14)
Let us consider it some type of progress that the era of "Halle Berry, jungle girl," has apparently come to an end with the actress growing older. (Or maybe editors getting a clue?) That said, who knew it was possible to find an unflattering photo of her? Harper's Bazaar did.


10. Jennifer Lopez (15) (tied with Cameron Diaz and Gwyneth Paltrow)
Reportedly deemed too "trashy" for Vogue at the turn of the century, Lopez finally got her shot in 2005, but had to settle for spinoffs Vogue Living and Fashion Rocks for the rest of the decade. Harper's Bazaar and InStyle were only too happy to have their chance, putting Lopez on the cover three times each this past decade.


9. Cameron Diaz (15) (tied with Jennifer Lopez and Gwyneth Paltrow)
Diaz's ability to comfortably cover both W and Cosmopolitan three times each shows that playing both to the mass crowd and the fashion elite equals, well, lots of play.


8. Gwyneth Paltrow (15) (tied with Jennifer Lopez and Cameron Diaz)
Coronated by Anna Wintour and a fashion darling from the start, Paltrow was rarely found on the cover of the one of the service-y women's magazines, where the emphasis is on down-to-earth relatability. That unaddressed yearning, we can posit, is what brought us Goop.


7. Sarah Jessica Parker (18)
SJP is the classic example of an actress that women like but that will never be found on the cover of a men's magazine, unlike almost every other woman on this list.


6. Jessica Simpson (19) (tied with Renee Zellweger)
Jessica Simpson's prominence here can apparently be attributed to her inability to turn down an offer to be on a cover. Her range would be the widest — Elle several times, Jane, Lucky — except that sadly, Vogue has never come a-calling. And probably never will.


5. Renee Zellweger (19) (tied with Jessica Simpson)
A favorite of InStyle (four times), Vogue, W, and Harper's Bazaar (three times each), the star of the two Bridget Jones movies remained a fashionable choice despite her films' largely mass appeal.


4. Jennifer Aniston (22) (tied with Nicole Kidman)
It may seem like Jennifer Aniston has been on every magazine printed this decade, but when you subtract out the tabloids close-reading her every movement, it's impressive yet not game-changing. Known to be a reliable seller in magazine circles (if not necessarily at the box office), the key for Aniston was ponying up quotables about her love life. (The out-of-context "What Angelina Did Was Very Uncool" ending up on the cover of Vogue was a low point for everyone involved.)


3. Nicole Kidman (22) (tied with Jennifer Aniston)
Nicole Kidman never really went away, at least in the ladymag world. Her porcelain features may have lost some of their mobility, but there she was year after year, setting a record for the decade with five Vogue covers, yet pouring her heart out to Marie Claire about Keith Urban's alcoholism.


2. Angelina Jolie (24)
The evolution of Angelina Jolie's magazine covers neatly mirrors her own transformation: from revelations about blood and bisexuality to imperious queen of Hollywood. The Internet is rife with catfight-esque comparisons between Aniston and Jolie covers, and maybe Vogue was being impish photographing both of them in red dresses on the beach. In any case, in our minds, nothing has quite equaled the Vogue cover above.


1.Drew Barrymore (26)
The surprise queen of the decade has survived a lot more than magazine editors' fickleness. Having spent her entire life in the public eye and overcome early addiction, she emerged as both a likable actress and, increasingly, a Hollywood power to be reckoned with. Quirky, girlish appeal as well as the ability to pull off couture equals ladymag gold.

In the January 2010 issue of Cosmo, sex therapist Dr. Ian Kerner reveals: "The bad economy is leaving a lot of guys without jobs, so they sit at home, bored, and start masturbating more often." Ladies should really police their man's masturbation habits more closely, since there's a good chance he's developing a "solo-sex problem" and will soon be unable to climax during intercourse because "a man's hand can provide a lot more friction than a vagina." So now in addition to other women, we have to fight our boyfriend's right hand to keep his attention?

Luckily, the magazine offers some tips for taking control of a relationship, including a four-page article on a wild new move called "girl on top." Or, you could,

Show him who's in charge with a flick of your wrist. Instead of just unbuckling his belt, grab the buckle and pull it fiercely from the loops. Then add a little flourish by snapping it like a whip before tossing it aside.

There are also 50 "fun ways to fire up your love," but we don't recommend you "gift him with a coloring book featuring you naked" or "emblazon a close-up of your bra-covered boobs and his boxer-clad package on mugs," unless you're willing to risk his mom accidentally pouring her tea into a boob cup when she visits. (Helpfully, Cosmo does include an article on "When You Want To Bitch-Slap His Mom.")

There's one woman who is exempt from all of Cosmo's relationship advice this month: Jason Mojica's girlfriend. When asked to describe what sex feels like for a man, the first thought that popped into her boyfriend's head was: "It feels as though my penis has come home, but after a home-makeover show has remade my home into the most amazing home ever." Lady, chronic masturbation is the least of your worries.

(Click to enlarge.)

In the December issue, we learn all about what men are really thinking. Or rather, what Cosmo editors pretending to be guys think men are really thinking. The article "Guy Love Diaries" ostensibly features relationship journals from two real men, but we have a hard time believing "Paul, 29" used the term "BFF." Also, he writes:

"When girls get together at showers and bachelorette parties, they usually talk about boys and swap sex techniques. Sara always comes back with new sex tricks and great fellatio.

How could a man know that "wedding shower" is really code for "getting sex tips from Grandma and Aunt Janet?"

In both guys' diaries, they mention that they like it when women pig out in front of them, but stay skinny. Cosmo explains:

"Men fear they will marry a gorgeous girl, and then a couple of years later, she'll let herself go and put on 100 pounds. If you're not eating in front of him, he's nervous about what might happen when you let your guard down later on.

Josh Duhamel must have been terrified when Fergie had to gain 17 pounds for her role in Nine. Yet curiously, he didn't stop loving her! Fergie's secret?: "In Italy, Catholic boys are raised to believe that there are two types of women: the Madonna and the whore. And me? I'm both."

That may work for pop stars, but Cosmo advises you drop the whole "Madonna" thing in the bedroom. There's one dirty move guys "crave" and "you're gonna want to drop the magazine and do it on the spot." Thing is, it isn't actually a "move"; guys just "want to be wanted." Tips? Try sneaking up behind your boyfriend while he's on the phone and grabbing his penis, putting lotion on your nipples and dragging them across his chest, or taking his dick to "massage his tip all over your upper body — lips, cheeks, breasts — all while maintaining eye contact." That should give him a hint.

(Click to enlarge.)

[Los Angeles, October 22. Image via INF]

We didn't realize that when we learned to tie knots in Brownies, the Girl Scouts of America were actually preparing us to "turn him into our love slave" (Fig. 1) Otherwise, the November issue is actually more about being a good partner (i.e. giving in to all of your boyfriend's desires) than a "bad girl." The article "What He's Really Thinking During Sex" claims to be "educational for maximizing your pleasure," but all we learned is that the handful of guys interviewed like Brazilian waxes, feel push up bras are deceitful, and are bored by the sight of their fiancée's naked body. And then there's Jeremy, 27, who says:

When you reach in a girl's pants it's like an exploratory thing: You're reaching around, hoping you don't feel anything weird. And if I am in there and feel some kind of bump or something, I'm like, Excuse me, but what the hell is that?

Maybe it's good that Jeremy is so vigilant about STDs, but are most guys really that focused on checking for abnormal growths? We may never know, because according to Cosmo, it isn't our place to question men about their thoughts or actions. The article "The Six Worst Things You Can Say To a Guy," advises that if a man is unreasonably upset about something minor like running late, we should just apologize, not tell him to lighten up. And we should never ask a guy, "Can you really afford that?" because, "It'll make him associate you with the least sexy, least desirable women in his life: Mom." Who knew men had such terrible Mommy issues?

(Click the image below to enlarge.)

Fig. 1

Essence, number 6 on the A-List, hosts an annual Essence Music Festival. As Larry Dobrow writes for AdAge,

In a year when consumers' travel dollars were tight, a jaw-dropping 428,000 people attended the festival over the July Fourth weekend, up from 270,000 the year before.

It helps that artists performing at the festival included Beyoncé, Maxwell, Ne-Yo, Robin Thicke, John Legend and Al Green. But Essence has "the pulse of the community," says Neil Golden, the chief marketing officer of McDonald's (a major sponsor of the EMF, along with Coca-Cola, Ford, Pantene and WalMart). "It's a proven, successful way to engage African-American consumers where they are most receptive." You may think of Essence as a "black magazine," but Dobrow cautions:

Some observers, in fact, think that those who label Essence as a niche title don't give it enough credit. "It's a crime to place Essence only in the African-American bucket — which is what has happened traditionally but is changing," said George Janson, managing partner-director of print at GroupM. "I can think of few other titles that have such a high degree of loyalty and engagement across demographic groups."

As for Cosmo — number 9 on the A-List — Dobrow calls it a "powerful" and ubiquitous" brand which uses TV, Facebook and Twitter to connect with readers (Dobrow writes that the mag Tweets "to thousands of followers with the verve of Courtney Love on an all-nighter.") Cosmopolitan senior VP-Publishing Director Donna Lagani explains why the brand is doing well: "When clients' business gets tough, they turn back to strong brands they can count on. When choices are being made by consumers to buy fewer magazines, they continue to buy Cosmo — and at a premium price." It's true: With Cosmo, you know what you're getting. In addition, the magazine stays creative with events and partnerships; Revlon sponsored this year's Fun Fearless Male Awards, while Maybelline is on board for the upcoming Cosmo Kisses for the Troops and Cosmo teamed up with Nivea on the Cosmo Bikini Bash.

With many magazines folding and struggling, it's interesting to see what works. And since 6 of the 10 publications on the A-List are magazines targeted to women, it's clear that we have power when it comes to the newsstand. Too bad we're getting stories like "Use Your Thong As A Hair Tie."

The A-List — Magazines, Essence Is No. 6 On Ad Age's Magazine A-List, Cosmopolitan Is No. 9 On Ad Age's Magazine A-List [AdAge]
Earlier: Cosmo: Wear Your Dirty Panties Around Your Ponytail

Like just about every Megan Fox interview, her comments veer from annoying to awesome... sometimes in the same paragraph. We're tired of hearing about how she's "completely, hysterically insecure" about her appearance and hates people looking at her (well, that goes for all starlets). But then she admits to Cosmo that she lies in interviews because she's bored. Whether quotes like, "male actors drop lines about their private jets, trying to seem powerful, but I don't give a shit. I don't need someone else's power. I'm obtaining my own" are true or not, they're certainly entertaining. Sadly, the rest of the magazine doesn't promote Megan's view of female power. In the article "Why He Calls You a Nag When You're Not," writer Matt Titus informs us that, "No matter how much we love you, we're only capable of listening to about 20 percent of what you have to say." According to his armchair psychoanalysis:

"In guys' minds we already did everything a woman (i.e. Mom) asked for 18 years, and it almost killed us. But now that we are, ahem, all grown up, we don't want to be told what to do. If we do everything our girlfriends and wives say, we will actually lose our manly status and turn into children again. Yes, we really think that."

Titus offers a tip for ladies who want to get their man to do what they want without nagging: simply walk out of the room when he's doing something that bothers you. In Cosmo's world playing games is always preferable to having a civilized conversation or treating guys like fellow human beings. But, that goes both ways. Our favorite sex tip from this issue involves your boyfriend treating you like a piece of meat... literally:

Have him tie your hands with a scarf and hang them on a hook on his door (the kind you would hang your coat or towel on) before he tantalizes you with oral. Since you'll feel totally like his sex toy, you can add to the arousal of being restrained by begging him to "release" you and let you orgasm."

What could be hotter than having sex while hanging from a meat hook? Oh right, using your dirty thong as a hair tie.

(Click on the image below to enlarge.)

Earlier: Cosmo: Wear Your Dirty Panties Around Your Ponytail

Sex Panic, Bad Girl Sex, The Sexy Ass Workout - at Cosmo, every day is your Sexiest! Day! Ever!


Cosmo's Man Manual claims to teach you to read his body language, but for some reason, this shot does not say "I love you." It's somewhere between the pensive stare you see on soap operas and the look you give someone before you hit them with an ice pick.


Cosmo ain't sayin' you a gold digger/you just ain't messin' with no broke frat boys. 59% of the magazine's readers say that they would "be more likely to go out with" a guy they're on the fence about if he was a baller. The also got Helen Fisher to say it's due to our lady biology. Cosmo's conclusion? "So when you're checking out a guy's designer clothes, as 74 percent of you do, you're really instinctually sussing out his resources."


Still wondering how to nab that Armani suit collar popper? Cosmo helps you figure out how much cash you can take him for by providing evasive questions. So posing a hypothetical about a friend struggling with debt really allows you to see if he has a negative credit score. Cosmo's expert, Pepper Schwartz, says "If he brushes it off as a common mistake, he might have a bad credit history himself." Or, he may be politely telling you to mind your own business.


On a date with Richie Rich and you need to impress him? Try using your thong (the one you currently have on) as a hair tie! It's supposed to sub in for your ponytail holder/cock ring in a pinch, but do I really need my lady juices all up in my hair? (My test panel consisting of four guys I can quickly call to fact check all had the same reaction: eww, why?)


Another sure fire way to impress a dude on a date? Act like an asshole. Cosmo advises us to get a free beer "without using your boobs" by grabbing an empty bottle, filling it with warm water in the bathroom then handing it back to the overworked bartender while accusing them of serving you a warm beer. Classy!


Later, we hear the tale of a guy with a 9 3/4ths-inch dick who calls it The Hammer and wraps his flaccid dick around his wrist as a party trick. His girlfriend won him over by telling his friends her "big vagina" could handle the Hammer.


The magazine's Sex 911 article leads with the horrifying "His Penis 'Broke' During Extra Vigorous Sex." The doc explains that we shouldn't thrust so high and wildly while on top, but how does that go with the sex advice on page 129? Am I supposed to control my thrust while doing the on-his-dick-back-bend-over-the-couch you describe?


Note to Cosmo: Being cocky only works when you can back it up with action. "Redesigning your company's Website...and have no freakin' idea what you're doing" is not one of those times. The sassy poses you included in the side bar are not going to fix HTML fail.


Finally Megan Fox is about to be the victim of a drive by if she doesn't stop talking about Angelina Jolie. The tabloids have it backwards - she isn't stressed out because of Brad, she's stressed from this fake celeb beef/stalkerish admiration/compulsive comparison. The pull quote above is actually Fox referring to the fact that Jolie is aging gracefully.

Cosmopolitan is the magazine with the highest-single copy circulation in the business. Meaning: It flies off of newsstands. But according to new numbers from the Audit Bureau of Circulations, Cosmo's down 7.8% over the first half of the year.

According to the NY Times:

Single-copy sales suffer more than subscriptions during recessions, as people refrain from impulse buys, and higher unemployment means fewer commuters passing newsstands.

But AdWeek has a different take: Ladymags might be growing more and more irrelevant. Lucia Moses writes:

Consumers can now get a wealth of style news and advice from any number of Web sites, blogs and TV programs. A further erosion of the fashion magazine editor's dominance has come from lifestyle and celebrity magazines, which over the years have been busy rolling out their own fashion content.

As a result, fashion editors have made the dismal discovery that slaving long hours to put out a magazine — however great an issue it might be-simply isn't enough anymore.

In addition, those "celebrity magazines," like Ok!, Life & Style and In Touch, aren't without their own problems. As MediaWeek reports, Ok!'s circulation was down about 10% the first half of the year and In Touch was down about 16%.

Then there's the mystique and allure of the magazine culture itself. A magazine editor used to be a know-it-all, a couture connoisseur, declaring items "in" or "out." These days, "real people" marketing campaigns are popular; YouTube makeup tips go viral and fashionistas are more likely to copy something from The Sartorialist than from Vogue. As AdWeek's Lucia Moses points out:

Even the famously aloof Anna Wintour has been making herself more accessible for interviews […] On September 10, Wintour herself is expected to be out rubbing elbows with the hoi polloi at a Macy's pop-up store in (of all places) Queens.

Magazines can be great, when well done: Beautiful photography, intelligent writing, a focused, edited point of view. Maybe a drop in sales doesn't signal the end — but a new beginning, in which some of the current titles are re-evaluated. Lord knows we don't need another "how to touch his junk" story.

Women's Magazines Fare Poorly in Latest Circulation Figures [NY Times]
The Delicate Balance [AdWeek]
ABC: Fashion Titles Hardest Hit for Single-Copy Sales [MediaWeek]

Earlier: The Real Reason Women's Magazines Suck
September Ladymags: "Looking Thin"
September Glossies: Same Sh*t, Different Year

Did you know that breakfast is good for you, but eating fast food every day isn't? Or that a varied sex life can help keep a relationship healthy? Maybe they didn't teach us this in fifth grade, but do we really need Cosmo for "dirty sex" tips like "have fantasies" or "use a blindfold?" Or to remind us of the lame old saw that if we want to pique a guy's interest, we should stop calling for a few days (in a serious overstatement, Cosmo calls this a "risky move")? Actually, the only thing surprising in this month's Cosmo is the suggestion that you tie a necktie around your man's penis — or "lightly dust" his balls with a makeup brush. Just add some glasses on top, and you have a face!

One reason is simple: The editors of these publications hammer out every detail of the stories they're going to print before they've even assigned writers to the pitches. A tipster passed on this e-mail, which she received from a Glamour freelancer foraging for quotes:

Hey Ladies,

For the October issue of Glamour magazine, my editors are working on a story called "Guilty Man Pleasures." The editors are looking for quotes about things good women do with men that are so bad.

Two examples are:

"I am currently seeing a guy who is way, way too young for me, but after ending a serious three-year relationship, he is just what the doctor ordered. The sex is so good I keep thinking he must be a professional and that my invoice is going to arrive any day now." -Elizabeth Hogan, 31, Winter Park, FL

"My most recent naughtiness: ‘accidentally' finding my boyfriend's checkbook and looking through it to see if he'd purchased an engagement ring. He had!"-Jaime Hobson, 27, Boston

Other examples are the woman who has webcam sex with her long-distance boyfriend, the girl who lets the guy she's dating read text messages from other guys just to make sure he knows there are others interested, the woman who's trying to save money but still gets her monthly Brazilian bikini wax just because she and her man love the feeling...

You've read this story before. It was called "The Best Sex Secret I've Never Told Anyone" in Glamour's June issue. In Cosmo, the story's called "Confessions," and they run it every month. These aren't real journalistic sources speaking — these are archetypes. This writer isn't looking for news — she just needs photogenic ladies to slot into a pre-written narrative. Glamour already knows exactly who it's looking for: "The girl who lets the guy she's dating read text messages from other guys just to make sure he knows there are others interested, the woman who's trying to save money but still gets her monthly Brazilian bikini wax just because she and her man love the feeling." No wonder we never read anything interesting in the pages of these magazines.

Anna, who used to work at Glamour, says then-editor Bonnie Fuller was notorious for dispatching writers to find sources who exemplified predetermined characteristics and narratives. "It was like the Bush Administration in the run-up to the Iraq war: first they decided what the 'story' was, then we found ways to make the 'facts' suit that agenda," she says. But it's not a problem unique to any one ladymag: Alison Stein Wellner, a women's magazine freelance writer who'd apparently reached the end of her tether, wrote in January of her exasperation at having to do story after story where the reporting was shoehorned around an inelastic narrative sent down from on high. Of one magazine, which she does not name, Wellner writes:

They wanted a story about how women with certain Bad Disease found their lives changed by the illness. Sounds reasonable enough. The process is this: I am to go out and find a number of women with this Bad Disease and talk to them about how their lives have changed. I am given various storylines by the editors: my distant marriage has been made closer. Bad Disease made her fearless in the face of a relationship that used to terrify her. She embraced alternative treatments, but not too much, so she doesn't seem like a wacko. Etc.

These are storylines dreamed up in an editorial meeting. They are invented. They are fiction.

My job is to then talk to as many women — real breathing women — as possible to find someone that conforms to these storylines. I am asked to provide photos. If the woman has an undesirable quality — like, say, she's a lesbian — she's disqualified.

Just a few weeks ago I happened to get into conversation with a junior editor at Vogue — which, for all its faults, is still one of the only American women's magazines to actually include any long-form feature writing that goes much beyond Area Woman Brought Closer To Husband By Bad Disease. This editor told me that she was itching to cover the financial crisis. (Vogue has apparently noticed that there has been a financial crisis.) The only problem, said this editor, was that her magazine's coverage would have to take the form of a profile, and because of Vogue's female audience, the profile would have to be of a woman. What's more, any appropriate profile candidate would need to be attractive. "I pitched Sheila Bair to the photo department," said this editor, "and they said, 'Are you kidding? We can't shoot her.'"

That next week, the New Yorker published an excellent profile of Bair, the chairman of the FDIC, a profile that explored her Republican background and how her pro-choice leanings probably scuttled her own political ambitions within her party, and explained how Bair had tried to address the subprime mortgage crisis before it actually came to threaten the rest of the economy. Vogue's latest issue, in case you're curious, has a story about Vanessa Traina (rich, likes clothes) and devotes two pages to a mother-daughter duo from Austin who sometimes like to share dresses and shoes. I did not notice any stories about the financial crisis.

But at least you'll be able to read all about Guilty Man Pleasures come October in the pages of Glamour.

The Best Sex Secret I've Never Told Anyone [Glamour]
Confessions [Cosmopolitan]
Why Magazines Suck [TDB]
The Contrarian: Sheila Bair And The White House Financial Debate [New Yorker]

In what reads like a slightly more transgressive version of Glamour's tame "Hey, It's Ok" feature, Cosmo's Mina Azodi tells ladies to respond to a pimple by pointing it out and making a silly joke. Don't feel like getting a Brazilian this month? Azodi says,

Let it grow. Proudly give it a nickname, like your Lady Jungle.

To worries that "the large fries" will compromise the fit of "skinny jeans," Azodi answers,

Supersize it and unbutton your stretch low-riders.

And if your boss is acting angry, she advises,

Blame her bad mood on PMS, because it can't possibly be you.

Blaming anger on PMS is pretty annoying no matter who does it, but at the same time, it can be kind of liberating to assume that other people's problems are about them, not you. But why does this have to be "acting like a man"? And why are joking about pimples, having body hair, and eating designated as dude traits? We're willing to bet you have plenty of crude/fun habits that are "acting like a man" only in the Cosmo-and-Steve-Harvey universe.

Cosmopoitan [Official Site]

Don't ask guys what they likes — they can barely talk anyway. Instead, remember that 61.6% of men pay attention to "a hot body" — so get one! And you'll probably want to put your hair up, because 76.1% of guys like to see a girl in a ponytail. That scrunchy will come in handy later. Speaking of sex, 27.4% of men would like to bring "a kinky costume" into the bedroom, so wear your sexy maid outfit for about one out of four guys you sleep with. But watch out for the "backdoor area" — 60.7% of dudes say you should never touch it "under any circumstances." If all these numbers don't put enough science in your summer, flip to page 142 for an exhaustive chart that explains how you can use this season to "chill out and recharge" or "have an adventure." Because what's the point of fun if you can't graph it?

Apparently the crew at Cosmo got tired of drawing diagrams of two awkward looking people in the missionary position and coming up with different CosmoSutra names for it, so they've gone back to basics here, reminding their readers of one of the biggest "sexy" cliches ever: the ol' sexy ice cube bit.

Have you heard of this thing called ice? Apparently it is what you get when you freeze this other thing called water. Liquid into solid, crew! Lessons in matter transformation are soooooo hot for Fall '09. And bonus, y'all: ice is practically free, because all you really need is running water, a freezer, and an ice cube tray! Get into it, Recessionistas!

Here's an example of what you, too, can do with ice:

Use the ice cube to trace a chilly path along his naked body and then follow it with your tongue. The temp change will heighten his pleasure, while the anticipation of watching where your lips go will send him over the edge.

Can't you just picture this happening? Of course you can! Because it's been in about 900 million stupid sex scenes over the last 40 years. Remember when your high school boyfriend saw Ali Larter in a whipped cream bikini Varsity Blues and was all, "That is the sexiest thing a girl can do," and then you spent a week or two figuring out if or how you'd end up in a whipped cream bikini, as stupid as it seemed? And then years later you suddenly recalled said memory and thought, "That was so fucking dumb and that guy was a douchebag." That's kind of what's happening here, except Cosmo probably still thinks Varsity Blues is really hot and a guidebook for sexual activity.

Place the ice cube between your breasts and run it back and forth so that your skin feels cool and wet, then guide your man's penis between them for a hands-free massage.

Because nothing says "true love" like trying to please your potential-necrophiliac boyfriend by trying to make your body as corpse-like as possible, I guess.

Give your guy a sexy scalp rub with one hand and use the other to trail the ice along his hairline and temples, all the way down to the base of his neck.

Who doesn't like to have an ice cube smeared all over their head, I ask you, who?

Post-sex, slowly move the ice cube across your guy's back for a frisky cooldown, then ask him to return the favor.

What kind of magic ice cube is this, you guys? Over the course of the article, it moves from your mouth to his body to your breasts to his penis to his hair to your feet to your clitoris and somehow it's still kicking around for an after-sex "frisky cooldown"? Can we patent this shit? We'd save the polar bears in about 2.4 seconds.

Of course, nothing here is really shocking or new: Cosmo is really into the whole "ooh, girl, get him with ice" phenomenon. Don't believe me? Read this. Or this! Or perhaps this! The ol' ice trick is as much a Cosmo staple as their articles at how bad you are at being a woman, why you need to fix your hideous face and wardrobe before leaving your house, and why everything you've ever done in your life is really dumb because you don't have a boyfriend. It's tired and expected and pretty much sums up everything you'd expect from a women's magazine that pushes "hot new" tricks that your great-grandmother was probably gossiping about as soon as the Kelvinator was placed in her kitchen.

10 Sexy Things To Do With Ice [Cosmopolitan]
Hot And Cold New Sex Tricks [Cosmopolitan]
How To Have Steamy Summer Sex [Cosmopolitan]
How To Make Sex Yummier [Cosmopolitan]

Smith is particularly into the new navigation bar, which offers "illustrated links into specific features and popular articles rather than generic links into subsections." True, the new pulldown menus offer pictures and links to stories Cosmo's currently pushing. Take the Celebs & Style menu:

Pretty flashy. But when you click through to the swimwear story, you get the same lame "best swimsuit for your shape" advice that's in every magazine every summer — except even more repetitive. The story is basically a slideshow of bathing suits ranging from okay to hideous, many of them with the same exact caption: the words, "If you're small up top, flaunt what you've got with a foxy style that will make your twins the main attraction," for instance, appear four times. I don't even want to hear my breasts referred to as "my twins" once.

The featured article under Secrets & Advice, 40 Ways to Survive Any Sticky Situation, is pretty standard Cosmo fare. Advice ranges from the uninspired (if you get laid off, start looking for another job) to the bizarre (are penile fractures really common enough that the Cosmo reader needs a detailed game plan in case of one?). For extra annoyance, though, the feature includes a tacked on webvertorial called "Plan B Summer Tips," in which the makers of everybody's favorite emergency contraceptive explain how to combat tan lines and frizzies. What's next, makeup tips from Mirena?

It's true that, as Smith points out, users can now access Cosmo's "Hot Right Now" articles from the interior pages as well as the homepage. But when those articles are things like "10 Summer Truths You Can't Ignore," (sample truth: use bug spray) do you really even want to? Cosmo's redesign does look kind of nice initially, but further investigation is repeatedly rewarded with annoyance. And ultimately, the new site reveals a sad truth of web design, not just in summer but year-round: no layout will make up for crappy content.

A Flatter, Sexier Cosmo Site [Minonline]
Cosmopolitan [Official Site]

In the world of Cosmo, everyone's boyfriend is a lazy, selfish, messy, unromantic jerk who needs to be "trained" to be, you know, marriage material. Men, in Cosmo-Land, are dogs. Or elephants, horses, or chimpanzees, depending on the situation. Everything that your crappy, terrible boyfriend does wrong can apparently be fixed by utilizing animal training methods: essentially, you need to trick and train him into being the person you want him to be. Mmm, healthy! Sounds like a really mature, open way to build a relationship. Here's an example:

#5 BOYFRIEND BUMMER: He Won't Drag Himself Off the Couch

As Used on Lions. Lions are, in a word, lazy. According to trainers, they sleep for up to 20 hours a day and only move when they see it as beneficial to themselves. "Trying to get a lion to do something when it's in resting mode can be very difficult and even dangerous," says lion wrangler Dave Salmoni, host of Animal Planet's "After the Attack." "That's why we make use of the animal's active time instead of trying to force it into doing something it doesn't want to when it's chilling."

Apply It to Your Guy. A man in veg-out mode is unlikely to move no matter how much you try to engage him. "You have to gauge when he's in a productive mood and then pounce to get him to do what you want," says Riche. If you notice that he prefers working out in the morning, that's a good time to ask him to help you clean when he's finished. If you need something done during his downtime and don't want to wait, bribe him. "Motivate him by making it worth his while," says Riche. When you feel like you haven't been able to have a heart-to-heart but he's in a coma in front of the TV, try plying him with his favorite snack. If his cravings for the food outweigh his interest in the TV, he'll eventually cave.

So...basically you should treat your man like a lion by bribing him to clean up his shit with a delicious snack. You know who else this strategy works on? Four year olds. Look, man. If you need to "train" someone to fit the mold of what you feel your ideal partner is, perhaps you're with the wrong person. These articles are just as gross as the Men's Health articles that give instructions on how to "make her yours," by weird manipulative techniques: there's no emphasis on real conversation as much as how to manipulate the situation for your own benefit. And sometimes, it's better to leave people's bad habits alone. Here are a few lessons I've learned over the years:

#1 Boyfriend Bummer: He Won't Stop Sleeping As Experienced With: Cthulhu
Look, all I'm saying is, sometimes you should just let him sleep. He will wake when he wants to. And if you wake him up, you might not like the results. I had this boyfriend once (you don't know him, he lives in R'lyeh) and I totally woke up him before he was done dreaming and let me just tell you: it was NOT a good move on my part. I mean, it was really bad. Really, really bad.


#2 Boyfriend Bummer: He Wears A Costume As Experienced With: Batman
So I was all about the costume for the first few weeks, because I'm pretty gothy and was all "Ooh, bats, nice." But then he insisted upon wearing it everywhere: to the movies, to the grocery store—he even wore it to my friend Tricia's wedding, which was so embarrassing, because it was in August and it was 102 degrees outside and his pants nearly melted and stuck to the pew at church. But as soon as I asked him to take the costume off, I lost him, and I've missed him ever since. Thankfully I've started dating a nice rich guy named Bruce who, strangely enough, kisses just as well as my beloved bat.


Boyfriend Bummer #3: He's An Imaginary Creature As Experienced With: Figment
Nobody liked Figment, but we were in love. Everyone kept saying, "He's not real, Hortense, that's why his name his Figment!" But I didn't care. I saw him for what he was, not what he wasn't. It wasn't until he stood me up for an anniversary dinner that things fell apart. "You didn't show!" I yelled. "I never show," he yelled back, "I don't exist!" I begged him to materialize into a real thing, but he refused. Sometimes you just can't force an imaginary being to cross into the real world.


Boyfriend Bummer #4: He Is A Bowl Of Cereal As Experienced With: A Bowl Of Frosted Flakes
I tried so hard to make him understand that true love meant never getting soggy in milk. He didn't agree. And now I'm left with nothing but a dirty spoon and a box of empty promises.

6 Ways To Train Your Boyfriend [Cosmopolitan]

So, will having many partners loosen you up? Cosmo's complete answer: "No." Well, at least we didn't get a lengthy made-up explanation for the made-up question. Although, we wish Cosmo's editors applied this kind of brevity to their other relationship articles, like "4 Signs He's Into You." According to their experts, if he's making fun of his friends in front of you, he's totally smitten and going to propose next week. Oh boy, this is the kind of advice that turns insignificant male actions into false hopes and unhealthy obsessions. Below find out what other useful tips the issue has for you:

This month's issue was so comparatively tame we're wondering if it was penned by the Seventeen readers Gossip Girl is actually aimed at. Leighton Meester's profile notes in the headline that she's "not really a bitch." Reassuring us that she's a "good girl" in real life is a total teen mag move, and frankly, we enjoy Meester's teen series forerunner Shannen Doherty more because we know she's as bitchy off-screen as she was on 90210. This month's sex advice was also more taint-free than usual. Basically, if you prolong sex, you'll stay aroused for a longer period of time. The mag says this is how people achieve a one-hour orgasm, but quickly squashes readers' hopes by explaining that won't actually happen. In "Recession-Proof Your Love," we learn that "a guy's self-worth is often directly tied to his ability to earn big," so we should be sweeter and less demanding of pricey dinners if he loses his job. Finally, an article reveals that it freaks men out when you "try to be sneaky," "when you're jealous," or "when you're downright crazy." Below, we take a look at the various ways this month's Cosmo recommends taming our inner Blair.