Trivia Questions For: Amy Plitt, Senior Editor, Time Out New York

.As part of our “Trivia Questions For…” interview series, I am thrilled to have caught up with Amy Plitt, senior editor at Time Out New York (TONY), one of the most celebrated event guides in New York City. As a senior editorial staff member, Amy helps decide which events will appear on the pages of TONY every week, exercising tremendous influence over which happenings New Yorkers are made aware of, attending, and talking about.

Today, we’re going to peek under the hood of one of New York’s most important media outlets by asking Amy how a TONY editor decides which events to publish.

1.    Event listings with TONY are extremely influential among New Yorkers who want to know the best of what’s happening each week. What are some of the things you look for in an event submission, to determine if it is TONY-worthy?

Well, first and foremost we consider whether or not something is the right fit for the specific section. Speaking just for This Week in New York (which I used to edit), we cover a lot of types of events—lectures, parties, trivia nights, pop-culture events, etc.—so I try to make sure that whatever has been submitted fits in with the section’s voice and beat. Some of the decision is subjective; if I find an event to be cool and interesting, then there’s a good chance that readers will, too. And there are the big events that happen annually that we’ll always cover; those never really change.

2.      Roughly how many event submissions does TONY receive on a weekly basis? Of these, how many will actually be published, based on space and other considerations?

It varies from section to section. In my experience, This Week in New York—which covers a lot of different types of events—would receive anywhere from 75 to 100 (sometimes more!) event submissions per week. We can only list maybe 40 in print every week, but we try to list as much as possible online, so about 40–50% actually makes it into print. But like I said, it varies; other sections, like Music or Books or Dance, have their own systems.

3.     What’s a surefire way NOT to have your event listed in the magazine?

There really isn’t any one specific thing that will deter editors from listing an event; but if you send the event listing to the wrong section editor, that’s something that will almost certainly keep it from getting listed. (It happens more often than you’d think!)

4.     Can/should event planners submit recurring events, even if they’ve never been selected for publication in the past?

Sure! There are a lot of reasons why an event may not have been listed; timing, lack of space, etc. Just make sure you’re sending it to the right person.

5.     One of the best forms of event promotion in NYC is having a feature article about your written in TONY, or <faint> mentioned on the cover. What is the thought process in determining which events will be assigned to these coveted spots?

Again, it varies from section to section. Feature space is often granted to the biggest events of the week (big yearly events like the NYC Marathon, or Halloween, will always be given feature space), but it’s also at the discretion of the editor; we’ve done feature stories on events simply because they sound like fun, or because we think readers will find them interesting. (Anything with a fun pop-culture hook, for example, usually grabs my attention.) The most important thing, though, is that there’s a good story there – an event may sound fun, but if there isn’t much to say about it then there isn’t much point in covering it.

Cover lines are at the discretion of our editor-in-chief; those are almost always reserved for the biggest, most interesting stories in the issue each week.

6.     What other advice would you offer people who wish to have their events listed in TONY?

Make sure you include as much information about the event as possible, and attaching a photo that we can run with a listing never hurts.

Now, Amy has a trivia question she’d like to ask YOU:

Q)     Which famous British musician’s alleged demise in 1967 created a brief controversy in 1969?

To find out the answer, either connect with Amy via Twitter @Plitter, via the official TONY feed @TimeOutNewYork or on on the TONY Facebook page.