Madison touts that the usual rules don't apply to their publication. And they're right. The magazine that they're trying to createone with a little bit of everything for both sexeshas been attempted many times before, but the success rate has not been good. The folks at Madison seem confident that they can pull it off.

"A significant part of everyone's dayof everyone's lifeis grounded in the conflict between playing by the rules, bending them, or shattering them completely," writes publisher Pamela Schein in the first issue. "Madison grew out of our philosophy that a broad spectrum of experience and a life not necessarily played by the rules is meant to be explored and celebrated. Madison revels in all the best life has to offer...."

The premiere issue featured stories on Virgin's Richard Branson, singer Chris Isaak and movie director John Waters, plus a story on England's Millennium Dome, the world's largest construction project in progress. Fashion, travel, food, beauty, the arts, interiors, entertainment, commerce and architecture are regularly featured in Madison.

"While this idea of diversity within our pages potentially made us too eclectic and without any unifying focus, we found this journalistic tendency towards uniformity to be a rule that should be broken," Schein continued. "Scanning a newsstand, it becomes clear that the American scene is teeming with publications that narrow a reader's focus. Our audience is far from one-dimensional, so we have created a magazine that reflects that depth and offers more than one voice." Will they be able to pull it off? I guess we'll have to wait and see.