Gargoyle Magazine leaves 89-year home

Daily Staff Reporters

The Gargoyle Magazine, a student-run humor publication, may no longer continue publication after 89 years at the University.

Gargoyle staff members decided to leave the Board for Student Publications after they and board members could not reach an agreement about the magazine's fiscal direction at a board meeting last night.

"Unless we can find alternative sources of funding ... Gargoyle magazine will be on WOLV Television," said LSA senior Dan Pipski, Gargoyle acting business manager and captain of the senior staff.

The Gargoyle is funded almost entirely by the board, which also oversees publication of The Michigan Daily and the Michiganensian yearbook.

Board members said the Gargoyle's departure from the Student Publications Building was not provoked by changes by the board but by a proposal by the Gargoyle. The board rejected this proposal, saying it would have forced the board to breach its bylaws.

The board kept its policy consistent and the Gargoyle chose to depart, said board chair Joan Lowenstein.

"As a board, we have certain fiscal responsibilities of how money is spent for the publication," Lowenstein said.

LSA junior Tom Dillon, the Gargoyle's junior business manager, said the dispute between Gargolyle staff members and board members does not stem from a funding issue. Rather, the magazine's staff members do not want publication to be contingent on the sale of advertisements. They do not want the magazine to be more of a commercial enterprise than an educational experience, Dillon said.

Gargoyle Editor-in-Chief Tony Zarat said staff members plan to funnel most of their efforts into a television show on WOLV-TV, and they also plan to seek alternative sources of funding to publish another Gargoyle magazine.

"As far as next year, it's up in the air," said Zarat, an LSA junior.

Lowenstein said that although the magazine might find a way to publish without funding from the board, the rights to the name of the publications will stay with the board.

"(The name) really belongs to the Board," Lowenstein said. "They can't use the name Gargoyle for any publication."

02-24-98