About
The Magazine
BAD IDEA is the magazine of journalism, ideas and opinion for intelligent young Britain.
Reinvigorating the form of narrative journalism, it’s the new stomping ground for ambitious young British writers, a braggadocious melting pot of tragedy, parties, love, death, cybersex and stretched cricket metaphors.
Widely lauded for its stylish and substantial content, a distinguished list of past contributors includes the novelists Patrick Neate, Mil Millington and Xiaolu Guo, and prominent young writers from the Times, Telegraph, Guardian, and New York Times.
Whether it’s stepping inside the shoes of a professional love spy, riding shotgun with the Kurds in Iraq, or exposing the high tech explosion of sex-dating websites, BAD IDEA’s features, photo essays, and non-fiction comics offer insight into the lives of young journalists, and are a return to the personal, the eccentric, the candid and terrifying.
In May 2008, Portico Books published a collection of the best writing from the magazine, entitled BAD IDEA: The Anthology
BAD IDEA online
Our ethos as a magazine is to work with the best young writers, photographers and artists, in print as well as online. Our doors are always open to ambitious contributors who are serious about their craft. There are a number of ways to get involved online:
- Submit a short, non-fiction story to our Writers’ LabSuccessful entries will be published online with comments from the BAD IDEA editorial team, and those of other website users. The ‘Show and Tell’ section of the website is a great way to receive honest feedback on your work in a supportive environment. Every month we will select our favourite submission for special attention, and the winning author will win a BAD IDEA subscription.
- Audition to become a BAD IDEA bloggerThink you can write amusing and insightful blogs? Prove it, and you could become a regular BAD IDEA website contributor. Simply write a snappy article of 150 words or less in which you report on a specialist subject, and email it to us here. If we love your work, we’ll give you instructions on how you can blog for us regularly. Before you do so, you might first like to read some tips on writing a killer blog post.
Praise for BAD IDEA
“… A Granta for the MySpace generation… a happy mix of short memoir and longer reportage.”
– The Observer
“A great selection of work”
– The Independent on Sunday
“Eye-opening”
- The Guardian
“Beautiful to hold and fascinating to read, you’re more likely to add BAD IDEA to the bookshelf than the recycling pile”
- The Observer Magazine
“A small-size magazine with big ambitions”
- Kirsty Lang, Front Row on BBC Radio Four
“The appearance of a good looking magazine with genuine literary merit is something to celebrate in the British media, and BAD IDEA has become a must read for hip young metropolitans”
- Helsingin Sanomat (Finland)
“Shocking, beautiful, fascinating”
- Tom Hodgkinson
“Indie publishing at its most ambitious”
- 3AM magazine
“Ingenious”
- Icon magazine
“In an age of celebrity saturation, BAD IDEA flies in the face of current publishing wisdom, subverting the editorial dynamic by making the reader its star”
- Marketing magazine, Media Choice of the Month: October 2006
“Absolutely fantastic”
Rowan Pelling, 2004 Man Booker Judge
“Exciting, lively, and fresh”
Alexander Masters, bestselling author of Stuart: A Life Backwards
“A wonderful magazine, and important”
Clay Felker, former editor of Esquire and founding editor of New York magazine
