The magazine is in the process of weaning itself off verified circulation, initially a list of 200,000 culled from the Condé Nast database. Li said that list had been shrunk to 30,000 as of this month, and that total paid subscriptions were now at 177,000. According to a mandatory filing in the November/December issue, the magazine averages 135,000 at the newsstand.

Florio maintained the magazine served a market of older men left cold by the existing polarities of "metrosexual nonsense and the beer and babes" of the lad mags, which, he said, represented "men who resented the rise of women's power." He also claimed political influence: "We basically launched [Barack] Obama's campaign, right or wrong," he said, citing the September/October cover featuring the Democratic presidential candidate.

Though a press release issued when the magazine was first green-lit promised 10 issues in 2007, there will be only eight this year. Florio said the magazine would go on a 10-times-a-year schedule starting in September. — Irin Carmon

POSING FOR THE CAMERA: Donna Karan, Sting and Trudie Styler, Ali MacGraw, Rodney Yee and wife Colleen Saidman, along with other famed yoga instructors, hit their downward dogs for Vanity Fair's June issue. Photographer Michael O'Neill, who credits yoga with helping him regain use of his right arm after surgery to remove bone deposits from his neck, traveled from New York to Hawaii to India to shoot yoga masters for the photo essay, "Planet Yoga." The subjects aren't your average weekend yogi — Karan, for example, has been practicing yoga since she was a teenager, and was photographed in her home in the Turks and Caicos Islands. The issue hits newsstands May 8 nationwide; outtakes from the shoot will be on vanityfair.com beginning Wednesday. — Stephanie D. Smith