Hymy

History and profile

Hymy was launched in 1959 and named after his wife Hymy Lahtinen. The magazine dealt with the experiences of the low income Finns and is an example of yellow journalism.

In the 1960s and 1970s Hymy became a success with sensationalist stories containing much sex and gossip about Finnish celebrities, often verging on the invasion of privacy.

All texts and articles published in the magazine are written by professional journalists. Typical Hymy stories would be about the singer Irwin Goodman, Finland's first openly gay celebrity Monsieur Mosse, or the notorious pictorial on Jörn Donner naked on a Gambian beach with a local underage girl. The most famous writer for Hymy was Veikko Ennala, and probably one of the most infamous stories was about the author Timo K. Mukka. The story allegedly became one of the main causes for the author's early death soon afterwards. This resulted in a Finnish law called the Lex Hymy, regulating any press stories published about private persons.

In March 2008 the magazine published story of the then Finnish Foreign Minister Ilkka Kanerva's SMS messages to erotic dancer Johanna Tukiainen.{{cite book|author=John Keane|title=Democracy and Media Decadence|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ia5ZAQAAQBAJ&pg=PA44

The editor-in-chief of Hymy is Mika Lahtonen.

Circulation

In 1970 Hymy had a circulation of 435,000 copies. Its circulation was 904,000 copies in 2007.{{cite web|author=Anne Austin|display-authors=etal|title=Western Europe Market & Media Fact

References

References

1. (19 March 2008). "Jyrki Hämäläinen (1942-2008) Long-serving teen magazine editor and pop-culture biographer dies at 65". [[Helsingin Sanomat]].
2. Tuija Saarinen. (2014). "The Soviet Union and Soviet Citizens in Finnish Magazines". Nordlit.
3. (2014). "Political Scandal Tests Trust in Politicians". Nordicom Review.
4. (30 April 2014). "Top 50 Magazines". IFABC.
5. "Circulation Statistics 2011". Media Audit Finland.