Slight Differences?

             

TIME US Edition                          TIME Europe, Middle East & Africa                          TIME South Pacific

     Aside from the oddness of the cover of the magazine on the left, if you looked at these three covers you would probably think "oh, they're just three different editions." Well no, these are the exact same edition (May 21) but the covers had to be altered because some countries would not allow the US edition cover to be displayed. This is not the only reason why certain magazines publish different covers for different regions. Sometimes certain stories have a bit more significance than others due to the regional preference of the readers. If you notice the edition on the far right has a cricket player to appeal to the readers in that region. The stories and content in these three magazines are exactly the same, the stories have just been "reprioritized" according to region. This occurs many times by many different magazines; some even change the content itself to suit other cultures; Cosmopolitan, for example is known for giving women sex tips and advise, but Cosmopolitan Middle East puts a limit on how much sex can be talked about in the magazine's content. It is especially interesting to get two different magazines of the same edition, same name and compare the content or covers of the two. I would advise those who are living in Dubai, to go to Giant or Carrefour's magazine sections and try to find two regional versions of the same edition, it can be quite a lot of fun.