After several months of internal tensions, the 61e issue published on Wednesday February 22 will it be the occasion of a new impetus for XXI ? At the dawn of its 15th anniversary, the review of long format reports and investigations is launching a slightly modified formula. She opens also digital with a newsletter, podcasts and a new website under construction.
An evolution contrary to the vision carried by the co-founders, the publisher Laurent Beccaria and the journalist Patrick de Saint-Exupéry, also authors of the manifesto For another journalismwho criticized, in 2013, “Technology Bluff”. After the financial setbacks following the failed launch of the weekly Ebdo, in 2018, the two founders had been forced to throw in the towel, Rollin Publications being placed in compulsory liquidation. The two journals XXI And 6 months (its photojournalistic counterpart) had then been bought by Le Seuil and the co-founders of There Comic magazine and of Topo, Franck Bourgeron and Sylvain Ricard.
A precursor, when it was created in 2008, the magazine claimed, five years later, 50,000 copies per issue, but times have changed in the print media. XXI is now competed by dozens of other mooks (hybrid format between book and magazine) as Zadig, AmericaOr Tomorrow. With its 8,000 subscribers – to which are added 8,500 to 12,000 copies sold in bookstores and in Relay shops depending on the quarter – the magazine is now in deficit.
Launch of podcasts
To make its brand known in the French-speaking world, convince new readers to subscribe and find the balance by the end of the year, XXI is now embarking on the world of podcasting in co-production with the Wave Audio production studio and Canal+ alumnus Pascale Clark for voice.
Accessible free of charge on all platforms, different formats – documentary soap operas, but also behind the scenes journalism, “increased readings” or raw sounds – were thought of as “independent” of the magazine, while being “complementary”. ” XXI needs to exist more than four times a year, hence the need to create back and forth between the magazine and the podcast, the paid and the free »develops Catherine de Coppet, the deputy editor-in-chief.
Arriving in the summer of 2022, the new editor-in-chief, Elsa Fayner, has sought to understand the expectations of readers of the mook with a questionnaire from which she collected 600 responses and exchanged with about fifteen of them. “They told us: ‘Tell us about the world as it is, but without leaving us powerless’”, she synthesizes. A wish also carried by the journalist David Servenay, editorial director of XXI and of 6 months. “We want to give keys to our readers so that they understand the complexity of the world and can act if they wish”explains the former journalist of Street89 and RFI, which also highlights special editions and co-editions of XXI.
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