Dear Editor,
I read the unkind words Francis Walsingham wrote in his recent letter about journalists’ strikes regarding the use Urbano Cairo makes of his publications. Not satisfied, he even resurrected an old post known to me by the sharp Paolo Ziliani who, honestly, seemed overly venomous on that occasion (he claimed that Cairo was the anagram of How-to-Get-Rich-Infinitely-Ruining-Everything).
Instead, I find that man brilliant.
And I’ll explain why. First of all, he is from the Berlusconi school. And historical facts are pushing us, government after government, to reassess good Silvio Berlusconi, whom we may have mocked for his lifts in shoes but who today would stand tall compared to the dwarfs dotting the current political landscape.
On the entrepreneurial front, no one can criticize Berlusconi’s work: his businesses are still there, standing despite streaming, despite Netflix and Amazon Prime. TV remains central in the life and information of Italian families.
Cairo, who worked for a long time at Fininvest, has never hidden that he took him as a mentor.
And I’ll tell you more: this is one of those rare cases where, in the long run, the student might surpass his own mentor.
Francis Walsingham, a man of another era, is outraged by articles such as: Not only Apple Watch: the best smartwatches currently on offer, How to protect digital privacy? Gadgets to defend personal data, smartphones, and PCs, Unbearable high heels? What are the alternatives to be elegant and How to clean prescription (and sunglasses) without damaging them? Tips and tricks, just to name a few examples.
I find them instead brilliant articles, giving the reader what the reader is looking for. Which doesn’t have to be necessarily yet another quarrel between Poste Italiane and the Privacy Guarantor, the endless game of musical chairs in public companies, the everyday political blah blah, yet another case of dossiering (the spy market is really competitive). It’s easy to soar high on the next moves of Sam Altman, but in the end, people want to know How to install artificial intelligence on a home computer (and who benefits from doing it).
But Cairo went further. And for some hours now on the Instagram page of Corriere della Sera this advertisement has been bouncing around:
As you can see, the Corriere logo appears everywhere and in fact, given how Instagram is structured, it seems that the editorial staff of Via Solferino is the one speaking, displaying that copy. Meanwhile, to the left of the text column, images of a couple caught by passion, rubbing and entwining, loop continuously. Not before having “worn,” properly, the advertised condom.
Now, in a world where publishing is in deep crisis, I found this social partnership simply brilliant, which will also be a hard blow to all those who claim that Corriere is a stuffy publication that does not take risks. Instead, “bam!”, it pulls out content we would have expected to see on the now-defunct Freeda, which spoke to young people, daily about topics like sex and how to have fun doing it while protecting yourself.
So I suggest, if you want to keep your salary in an editorial world where, as the closure of Wired Italia teaches us, the situation seems to be rapidly deteriorating, a new line of content for social use.
Why not, for example, advertise sex toys on the profiles of Startmag and the Innovative Publishing group? A nice solar-powered dildo for Energia Oltre, furry handcuffs for the friends of Policy Maker, and a hi-tech vibrator controlled remotely via app to install on smartphones for Start Magazine readers who so far have gone wild reading the latest exploits of Mark Zuckerberg, the Amodei brothers opposing the Pentagon, and Sam Altman, but imagine the excitement they would feel with such gadgets?
You could also include them with the print issues of the magazine and, in the Health section, test and review sexy devices, condoms, and hi-tech erotic games just like Corriere does in the page La scelta giusta. But, beware, here lies the core of my plan: the publication directed by Luciano Fontana limits itself to reviewing traditional devices (smartphones, laptops, PCs, cleaning robots… how boring) while you could focus on sexual ones, overtaking Urbano Cairo on the right. After all, as early as ’72 Woody Allen came to cinemas with that masterpiece “Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex… But Were Afraid to Ask.” People want that and want to read that.
I even have a name for the section, partially borrowed from Corriere: The Right Choice… in Bed. With all due respect to Francis Walsingham who, no offense, is always clear-headed and punctual, but when it comes to communication he is now a dinosaur: after all, as a strategic analyst of sexual and advertising tactics, he understands nothing. But you’re no slouch either: is it possible that colorful dildos don’t appear on the pages of Start Magazine since this 2024 article? See, your journalist had already figured it all out? Reward her by giving her the direction of the newly born sex toys section, please!
I find it a brilliant plan. And it’s no coincidence that there’s a certain resonance between brilliant and genital…
A very excited
Claudio Trezzano
