June 13, 2008
FAKE Steve Jobs is jumping ship.
Dan Lyons, the veteran Forbes tech editor who runs a blog under the pseudonym "Fake Steve Jobs," has been poached by Newsweek Editor Jon Meacham.
It's the first significant hire since Newsweek went through its massive downsizing that slashed the staff by 111 people, including about 30 on the editorial side.
Lyons will replace veteran tech writer Steve Levy, who jumped to Wired.
As Fake Steve, Lyons has written "The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs" blog, which lampoons Apple Inc. co-founder and CEO Steve Jobs.
For the first 14 months of the blog, Lyons' identity was unknown, triggering a firestorm of speculation in Silicon Valley over who was behind the Web site.
Things reached a fever pitch when he began shopping a book, "Options: The Secret Life of Steve Jobs," which incorporated elements of Job' real-life stock-option-backdating imbroglio.
"I think I probably told 100 people, so I figured it was only a matter of time," he said. Oddly, he was ultimately "outed" by Brad Stone of The New York Times.
Lyons didn't make a fortune on the book, which was ultimately picked up by the Da Capo imprint of Perseus Press and is believed to have paid him around $75,000. The book sold modestly and is coming out in paperback in August.
A 10-year veteran of Forbes, Lyons worked out of his home near Boston.
"I had a great time at Forbes, that part is hard," he said about leaving.
Despite some recent difficulties in the newsweekly category, Lyons is excited about the new gig.
"To me it's a really plum job," he said. "It's a bigger circulation than Forbes and I'll get to build some new stuff on the Internet."
He's joining Newsweek on Aug. 1, and Fake Steve will come with him, according to Meacham.
"We're hoping he'll develop some new blogs, maybe new sites. He's clearly shown an amazing kind of creativity," Meacham said. "It's part of a broader strategy of hiring a voice that [one] can't get anywhere else."
Stampede
Aside from Lyons' departure, it looks like there's a mini-stampede for the exits at Forbes.
