Slate launched its new Web site, Double X, yesterday. The online magazine is written for women by women, and some powerful writers, actors, and politicians, including Margaret Cho, Amy Bloom, and Sandra Day O’Connor, helped get the party started by sharing some of their childhood dreams in a feature called The Secret Dreams of Famous Women. Who knew that Cho dreamed of being Wonder Woman or that O’Connor envisioned her future on a cattle ranch?
According to the site, Double X was inspired by Slate’s group blog The XX Factor, which focused on politics, sex, and culture from a female perspective. The XX Factor, started in 2007, became a favorite for Slate readers of both sexes, consistently ranking as one of the site’s top 10 features and bringing in about a million visitors a month.
‘It became immediately obvious that a different kind of discussion happened when women were writing,’ Hanna Rosin, one of the lead bloggers, told The New York Times.
Slate is hoping that men will continue to be a part of the discussion: ‘Although the editors describe [Double X] as a savvy, intellectual, feminist antidote to glossy, celebrity-obsessed women’s magazines, it will not turn away male readers, which they say have made up 40 percent of the blogs readership,’ according to the Times.
So far, Double X doesn’t disappoint. With articles about everything from breast-feeding to the recession, it may be worth adding to your daily Web rounds–even if you don’t agree with everything the writers have to say. But read the comments below for our revised opinion of this initially promising site.
Photo from Doublex.com
