Pink Triangle Press

Last updated
Pink Triangle Press
Industry Newspaper
FoundedOctober 1971
Headquarters Toronto, Ontario
Key people
Products Newspapers, Website, Television
Subsidiaries Xtra!, Squirt.org, GuySpy
Website pinktrianglepress.com

Pink Triangle Press is an independent, Canadian media organization specializing in LGBTQ2S+ journalism, television and online interactive media. Founded in 1971, Pink Triangle Press is one of the longest-publishing LGBTQ2S+ media groups in the world. Today, Pink Triangle Press publishes Xtra, an online magazine and community platform covering LGBTQ2S+ culture, politics and health. Pink Triangle Press also publishes a series of newsletters including Pink Ticket Travel and Wander+Lust. Pink Ticket Travel is a Queer travel newsletter featuring travel tips and guidelines for LGBTQ2S+ travelers. Wander+Lust is a newsletter featuring travel tips and tricks for gay and bi men, including insider recommendations and exclusive offers.

Contents

History

Pink Triangle Press' roots trace back to 1971 (although not in name) in Toronto, when a group of volunteers began to produce The Body Politic , a paper containing news and opinions on gay liberation. [1] By 1976 TBP was being published monthly, and in the early 1980s it claimed a circulation of over 9,000 nationally, and boasted contributions from writers all over the world.

In 1978, Pink Triangle Press was incorporated, its name was chosen as a symbol of history and commitment, as it comes from the symbols placed on suspected homosexual men in Nazi concentration camps. Later that year, PTP was charged with "publishing immoral, indecent and scurrilous material" because of an issue of The Body Politic which included Gerald Hannon's article "Men Loving Boys Loving Men". [1] The Press was brought up on similar charges again in May 1982, this time for "Lust With a Very Proper Stranger", an article on fisting. [1] PTP however won both cases. [1]

In an attempt to broaden PTP's Toronto readership, the collective launched Xtra! in March 1984. [1] Xtra! was meant to be more upbeat and accessible than TBP. By 1985 Xtra! had taken over its parent publication's role of providing local entertainment and community event listings.

Xtra!'s circulation had soon overtaken TBP which was in financial trouble, so in an effort to save PTP and keep Xtra! going, TBP was discontinued in February 1987. [1]

Xtra! West in Vancouver, later called Xtra Vancouver, and Capital Xtra! in Ottawa, later called Xtra Ottawa, were both launched in 1993.

In January 2015, the company announced that it was discontinuing publication of its print titles, with the final edition of Xtra! published on February 19. [2] Xtra! will continue as a digital media publication via the Daily Xtra website. [2]

Other investments

Pink Triangle Press launched Squirt.org in 1998, [3] a Canadian-based cruising website for gay men. The website includes user-generated listings for parks, saunas and popular gay public sex locations. [4] [5]

In December 2023, Pink Triangle Press announced their partnership with the Canada Media Fund to advocate for LGBTQ2S+ professionals working in Canadian film, television, gaming and streaming industries. This includes the composition of a series of Pink Papers, which will be centered upon LGBTQ2S+ representation.

In July 2004, Pink Triangle Press became a minority partner in PrideVision TV when the channel was sold by Headline Media Group to William Craig. PrideVision was subsequently rebranded OutTV and a new gay male adult subscription channel, HARDtv, was launched at the same time. PTP sold its interest in OutTV to majority partner Shavick Entertainment in December 2012.

Previous to PrideVision being sold, Pink Triangle Press became partners with television producer Les Tomlin, forming Bumper 2 Bumper Media Inc. which produces Bump! , the world's first gay travel show, initially airing on PrideVision and now in production on a fifth season. Bump also recently launched a series of mobile travel guide apps for iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad and Blackberry.

As well, Pink Triangle Press was a partner in Evanov Radio Group's license application for 103.9 PROUD FM, a new radio station to serve Toronto's LGBT community. PTP's agreement with Evanov was discontinued in late 2005 after PTP expressed reservations about the depth of Evanov's commitment to serving LGBT audiences. [6]

Pink Triangle Press also operated a gay telephone personals service under the Cruiseline banner in all three cities where the Xtra! papers publish, as well as five other major Canadian centres across the country. UPDATE: March 2011, Pink Triangle Press sells Cruiseline to First Media Group.

In June 2006 Pink Triangle Press acquired Boston-based publication The Guide, an international gay travel magazine in existence for more than 25 years. PTP ceased printing The Guide in April 2010, and move to an online format only at Guidemag.com.

In February 2008 Pink Triangle Press acquired Toronto-based publication fab , a gay scene magazine which had previously been seen as Xtra!'s competition. On March 12, 2013, Pink Triangle Press announced that fab would be discontinued, with its final issue slated for publication on April 24. [7]

In March 2017 Pink Triangle Press acquired the location based gay dating and social network app GuySpy. The terms of the deal were not disclosed. The acquisition was part of Pink Triangle Press' growth strategy to expand into an entirely new segment through the GuySpy social network and mobile app. They instructed their users to delete the app and re-download it, in order to keep using the GuySpy service. [8] [9]

Subsidiaries

Defunct

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pink triangle</span> Nazi concentration camp badge, later international symbol of gay pride and the gay rights movements

A pink triangle has been a symbol for the LGBT community, initially intended as a badge of shame, but later reclaimed as a positive symbol of self-identity. In Nazi Germany in the 1930s and 1940s, it began as one of the Nazi concentration camp badges, distinguishing those imprisoned because they had been identified by authorities as gay men. In the 1970s, it was revived as a symbol of protest against homophobia, and has since been adopted by the larger LGBT community as a popular symbol of LGBT pride and the LGBT movements and queer liberation movements.

Xtra Magazine is an LGBTQ-focused digital publication and former print newspaper published by Pink Triangle Press in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The publication is a continuation of the company's former print titles Xtra!, Xtra Ottawa, and Xtra Vancouver, which were all discontinued in 2015.

Xtra Vancouver, formerly Xtra! West, was a gay bi-weekly newspaper, published by Pink Triangle Press in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.

Xtra Ottawa was a lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community newspaper published in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. It was launched in 1993. Xtra Ottawa, started as a monthly, and was later published 17 times a year, with a publication schedule of every three weeks. The Ottawa edition had a circulation of 20,000 copies which reached 36,000 readers.

<i>fab</i> (magazine) Canadian gay magazine

fab was a Canadian gay magazine that published biweekly issues in Toronto, Ontario from 1994 to 2013. It published alternate weeks to the city's other biweekly gay publication, Xtra! The publication's official spelling uses a lower-case F: fab.

<i>The Body Politic</i> Early LGBT magazine in Canada (1971–1987)

The Body Politic was a Canadian monthly magazine, which was published from 1971 to 1987. It was one of Canada's first significant gay publications, and played a prominent role in the development of the LGBT community in Canada.

CIRR-FM was a radio station in Toronto, Ontario. Owned by Evanov Communications, it broadcast a rhythmic contemporary format with a focus on the area's LGBT community. Launching on April 16, 2007, it was the first radio station in Canada targeted specifically to an LGBT audience, and the first commercial, terrestrial radio station in the world to target such an audience. It was one of six stations in Toronto that reports to Nielsen BDS' Canadian Top 40 airplay panel.

Supporting Our Youth (SOY) is an organization based in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, which runs programs and events geared to supporting the special needs of gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, transsexual and intersex youth. SOY gets support and involvement from local youth and adults that volunteer their time to help improve each other’s lives. SOY’s main focus points are helping the youth create healthy arts, recreational spaces, culture, supportive housing, and employment.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Capital Pride (Ottawa)</span> Annual LGBT pride week festival in Ottawa, Ontario

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This is a timeline of notable events in the history of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community in Canada. For a broad overview of LGBT history in Canada see LGBT history in Canada.

Ken Popert has been involved with Pink Triangle Press (PTP) since 1973 when he began contributing to The Body Politic. In 1986 he was appointed interim publisher of PTP, and he served as the executive director until April 3, 2017, when he was succeeded by David Walberg. An established queer liberation activist, Popert has been fighting for sexual liberation for almost 40 years. Popert lives in Toronto and is partnered with Brian Mossop, an activist in his own right for his 1993 case against the Government of Canada. In addition to his role at PTP, Popert serves as a board director of OUTtv and The ArQuives: Canada's LGBTQ2+ Archives.

Although same-sex sexual activity was illegal in Canada up to 1969, gay and lesbian themes appear in Canadian literature throughout the 20th century. Canada is now regarded as one of the most advanced countries in legal recognition of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) rights.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Gerald Hannon</span> Canadian journalist (1944-2022)

Gerald Hannon was a Canadian journalist whose work appeared in major Canadian magazines and newspapers.

Jearld Frederick Moldenhauer was born in Niagara Falls, New York on August 9, 1946. He has been a gay activist from his college years onward, and was the founder of the Cornell Student Homophile League, the University of Toronto Homophile Association (UTHA), and The Body Politic gay liberation journal, Canada's most significant gay periodical. He was a founding member of Toronto Gay Action (TGA), and the Toronto Gay Alliance toward Equality (GATE). On February 13, 1972, he became the first gay liberation representative to address a political party conference in Canada when he addressed a session of the New Democratic Party Waffle convention. In 1973 he began collecting the books, newspapers and ephemera that seeded and grew into the Canadian Lesbian & Gay Archives. He opened Glad Day Bookshop, the first gay and lesbian bookstore in Canada, in 1970 and operated it until 1991 when he sold the store John Scythes. In 1979 he opened a second Glad Day Bookshop in Boston, Mass. Glad Day Bookshop Toronto is now considered the oldest gay/lesbian bookshop in the world. Glad Day Bookshop Boston closed its doors in the summer of 2000, when its lease expired and its building was sold.

The Right to Privacy Committee (RTPC) was a Canadian organization located in Toronto, and was one of the city's largest and most active advocacy groups during the 1980s, a time of strained police-minority relations. The group focused on the Toronto Police Service's harassment of gays and infringement of privacy rights, and challenged police authority to search gay premises and seize materials. At the time of the 1981 bathhouse raids, RTPC was Canada's largest gay rights group with a mailing and volunteer list of 1,200 names. People associated with the RTPC include Michael Laking, Rev. Brent Hawkes, John Alan Lee, Dennis Findlay, Tom Warner, and George W. Smith.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">LGBT culture in Vancouver</span>

Vancouver's LGBT community is centered on Davie Village. Historically, LGBT people have also gathered in the Chinatown and Gastown neighborhoods. Former establishments include Dino's Turkish Baths, a gay bathhouse on Hastings, and the city's first drag bar, BJ's, on Pender Street.

Squirt.org, launched by Pink Triangle Press in 1999, is a Canadian website which describes itself as a place "where men meet other men for sex, cruising, hookups, dating, fun and friendship". The website, based in Toronto, is available worldwide. It includes user-generated listings of parks, saunas, public toilets and popular sexual locations for men who have sex with men (MSM). It was called "unique and ideal for cruising world-wide" by the 2006 Spartacus International Gay Guide.

GuySpy is a location based online social network, gay dating app. It is available on Android, iOS and via web browser. The app uses location based services like GPS to connect gay, bi and curious men. Through their platform users are able to create profiles with detailed descriptions and with multiple photos. They are able to chat with guys around them and send additional photos, have video messaging and provide their exact location. There is a voice option within the app as well. The app is similar to Grindr, GuySpy also has a map feature that allows the users to search for other guys in other towns and cities. The app was officially launched in 2011 for GayWhistler's WinterPride festival. In 2013 GuySpy launched The PEARL Pride Party app, which was helping users to keep up to date, build and maintain a personal schedule, share information via social networks related to global LGBT pride events and circuit parties.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">We Demand Rally</span> 1971 gay rights demonstration in Canada

The We Demand Rally was the first large scale gay rights demonstration in Canada. The rally occurred on August 28, 1971 in Ottawa, and was organized by the gay rights activist groups Toronto Gay Action (TGA) and Community Homophile Association of Toronto (CHAT). There was a parallel rally in Vancouver that was organized in solidarity with the rally by the Vancouver group Gay Alliance Toward Equality (GATE). The rally plays an important part in the history of queer equity-seeking and gay rights in Canada, as well as the history of feminism in Canada, and has had a lasting legacy in Canadian gay rights activism.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 "Historicist: I Sing The Body Politic". Torontoist , February 14, 2015.
  2. 1 2 "Gay newspaper Xtra to stop printing, go digital only". Toronto Star , January 14, 2015.
  3. ↑ GuideLive Staff (1 April 2015). "Gay sex cruising app puts billboard up in Dallas". GuideLive. Retrieved 7 October 2018.
  4. ↑ Damron Travel Company (November 2005). Damron Men's Travel Guide. Damron. p. 1. ISBN   978-0-929435-55-8.
  5. ↑ Tim Fountain (2008). Rude Britannia: One Man's Journey Around the Highways and Bi-ways of British Sex. Weidenfeld & Nicolson. p. 17. ISBN   978-0-297-85262-9.
  6. ↑ "Radio partners split", Xtra! , January 5, 2006.
  7. ↑ "RIP Fab Magazine (1994-2013)". NOW , March 12, 2013.
  8. ↑ "GuySpy Acquired By Canadian Media Group And Squirt Owners Pink Triangle Press - Global Dating Insights". Global Dating Insights. 2017-03-20. Retrieved 2018-11-22.
  9. ↑ "Gay Dating App GuySpy Acquired By Pink Triangle Press". Online Personals Watch: News on the Online Dating Industry and Business. Retrieved 2018-11-22.
  10. 1 2 "Other Press Ventures", CLGA, January 1, 1998. Retrieved March 22, 2017.
  11. ↑ Donald W. McLeod, Lesbian and Gay Liberation in Canada: A Selected Chronology, 1976-1981, Homewood Books, 2016.
  12. ↑ "We Are the PinkType", Lesbian Organization of Toronto, September 1978. Retrieved March 22, 2017.
  13. ↑ "Preface", Gay Fathers of Toronto, 2008. Retrieved March 23, 2017.
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