XY Magazine: The Young and The Naive

"The U.S. Federal Trade Commission [FTC] has warned two people associated with a now-defunct magazine and website for gay teens and young men that they would violate the privacy promises the publication made to subscribers by selling their personal information during a bankruptcy proceeding," reports the IDG technology news service.
That magazine was XY Magazine, which billed itself as "the premier magazine for young gay men, ages 15-29."
And this is clearly a pretty scary story - private information must stay private.
It's also a big story - it was the lead item on the BBC News website Technology section earlier today.
"A row has erupted in the United States centring on the ownership of a gay teenagers' database.
"The owner of XY Magazine and its associated website - which catered for young homosexual boys [sic] - filed for bankruptcy earlier this year."
Founded in 1996 by its British ex-pat editor, Peter Ian Cummings, the twink title went under in 2007.
In a letter from the US FTC (available as a PDF here), the only significant asset cited in Cumming's bankruptcy notice was the magazine's "customer list, personal data and editorial and back issues of XY Magazine and XY.com."
The FTC letter also states Cummings has "names and street addresses of about 100,000 subscribers" to XY - worth a lot to advertisers or anyone looking to set up a new magazine.
That figure has been quoted in almost every new story about this case - but where has this figure come from?
In a 1997 interview Cummings compares XY's sales with the two largest circulation gay magazines in the US.
"There's a thing called the Audit Bureau of Circulations, and they have a thing which they publish twice a year which is the audited circulation of the magazines. Out magazine is 78,554 news stand and 40,938 subscription and The Advocate is 17,530 news stand and 56,813 subscription... Right now, we're doing about 30,000 news stand and 5,000 subscription."
Did XY Magazine not just overtake Out and Advocate in subscription sales, but outsell them both by two to one?
Heaven forfend that a gay magazine would greatly exaggerate its sales figures in say a press release or some bumf sent out to potential advertisers.
IDG also tells us that; "XY.com told prospective subscribers that their magazines would be mailed in shrink-wrapped black plastic so that subscribers' parents couldn't tell what they were getting."
Erm, exactly how many closeted gay teenagers do you think would sign up to have a gay magazine sent regularly to their mom and dad's house?
Even - no, especially - if it was coming "in shrink-wrapped black plastic".
It's just a hunch, but Fagburn suspects that many of the 5,000-100,000 subscribers to the famously photo-heavy XY Magazine, may not have been twinks and teenaged gay men, but their somewhat older admirers.