Clay Felker of New York magazine dies

I can't really say I knew who he was, though his picture does look familiar, but it was a top headline this morning: Clay Felker, the editor of New York magazine and other publications, has died. Apparently all of us writers have him to thank for the way magazines are today:

New York’s mission was to compete for consumer attention at a time when television threatened to overwhelm print publications. To do that, Mr. Felker came up with a distinctive format: a combination of long narrative articles and short witty ones on consumer services. He embraced the New Journalism of the late ’60s — the use of novelistic techniques to give reporting new layers of emotional depth. And he adopted a tone that was unapologetically elitist, indefatigably trendy and proudly provincial — in a sophisticated Manhattan-centric sort of way. The headlines were bold, the graphics even bolder. (Excerpted from the New York Times article)