Le Point

Le Point (ISSN 0242-6005) is a French weekly news magazine. It was founded in 1972 by a group of journalists who had, one year earlier, left the editorial team of L'Express, which was then owned by Jean-Jacques Servan-Schreiber, a député "valoisien" (member of parliament) of the Parti Radical (Place de Valois). The company operating the newspaper, Société d'exploitation de l'hebdomadaire Le Point (SEBDO Le Point) has its head office in the 14th arrondissement of Paris.

The editorial team of spring 1972 found financial backing with group Hachette and was then directed by Claude Imbert. Other journalists making up the team were: Jacques Duquesne, Henri Trinchet, Pierre Billard, Robert Franc, Georges Suffert. Management included Olivier Chevrillon, Pdg (CEO) and Philippe Ramond.

The weekly magazine recruited journalists from the parisian press and relied on its ability to redefine the genre. It modelled itself closely on magazines owned by american News Press: Time Magazine and Newsweek. After a fairly difficult start in September 1972, the magazine quickly challenged L'Express. After years of success, it has changed ownership several times: Gaumont, Alcatel. It is currently owned by PPR, a french multinational holding company founded by billionaire businessman François Pinault, aclose friens of former Prsident JAcques Chirac. The actual (2012) political editorial line of this magazine is quite close [euphemism] to american neo-conservatists (neo-cons) hard line, thanks to Franz-Olivier Giesbert, aka FOG, its actual director, an american-born non-objective "journalist", a strong supporter of actual french Président de la République, the hatred mossieu Nicolas Sarközy de Nagy-Bocsa, aka NSdNB.

It is notorious that M. Giesbert has a problem with some kind of ....-Cola smuggled white powder (bicarbonate ?). As a matter of proof, he recently gave a quite controversial Subjective Political Point of View under Influence of Substance(s) (SPPoVuIoS) in a very mediatized talk-show where the candidates for the french Republic Presidency were on stage and under pseudo-journalistic heavy fire (Fox TV style). The actual top management of Le Point magazine is considering giving him a chance to rehabilitate as a true journalist after a quite long leave of absence as "grand reporter" in order to get rid of very, very bad habits ; Colombia, Mexico, Afghanistan, Golden Triangle, Morocco, Yemen, etc. or Hugo Chavez's Venezuela (& Fidel Castro's Cuba) are among the destination he has preferentially to choose from. He just has to do the right choosing. Not that difficult though. He will also have to put his reflection on the difficult task of spinning-off an international edition of this magazine, which used to be close to exellency, the best of its kind for years. The then columnist Bernard Pivot had been in charge of the final editorial page, which appeared quite soon to be much too humoristic for the then Président de la République française Valéry Giscard d'Estaing (his lack of auto-derision, the supreme sense of humor, is legendary). Bernard Perec, one of the most active member of the Oulipo club, also known as '''Ou''' vroir de '''li''' ttérature '''po''' tentielle, was also revealed to himself and to Le Point's readers as a unprecedented verbicrucist. Francophone cruverbists all over the world still awaits the complete edition of these funny, but unusually difficult crosswords, not always though, as long as one understand the exact quasi-magical nature of french language, the only language educated and sophisticated people can't ignore. As a matter of fact, since it is always the french version of international treaties which prevail, without any discussion. Le Point as a unique card to play as the first an only bilingual weekly news magazine in the world. Francophonie awaits that for years and only a talented bi-national can fulfill this dream.

See also

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• Le Nouvel Observateur - general information French newsmagazine
• L'Express - conservative newsmagazine, owned by Belgian group Roularta
• Iskandar Safa

External links

• Le Point website Template:Fr icon
• Mobile version Template:Fr icon