The March–April edition of Stab magazine featured two covers, one of Joel Parkinson, the other of Kelly Slater. Stab’s Derek Rielly explains: “The two covers were in response to changing fortunes in the production of the magazine and not as any cheap gimcrackery. We'd sunk a tonne of cash into shooting Joel (hand-sewn jacket, $400 jeans, we flew Sydney shooter Steve Baccon to the Gold Coast,) and then we get the turn of Slater's life – a faux oop from France. Never been run anywhere. So we threw a little more money at the printers and we had two covers.”

Music mags like Uncut and teen mags often use two covers to spike sales of a particular issue or month. “For Stab, it illustrates the difference between magazines where the editors wield real power (‘cause they own the thing,) and where the editor is beholden to the fiscal whims of a tight- fisted publisher,” concludes Reilly.

Ripcurl.com voted most popular sports-brands website in Australia for 2004

Rip Curl’s global website ripcurl.com was recognised by Hitwise Australia as the most popular website in the Sports-Brands online category for 2004. Up against other power sports brands such as Nike, Billabong and Oakley.

“I think an award that’s voted on by the general public through the number of visits to the site – and, in this case, legitimate internet users – holds much more prestige than an award that’s been selected by a judging panel,” said Dane Sharp, ripcurl.com Online Editor. The Rip Curl Pro Pipeline Masters World Championship Tournament, held on Hawaii’s north shore in December last year, was the most successful live surfing event webcast in history, being viewed by over 2.2 million internet users during the two week period. Billabong launches new wetsuit website Billabong launched a new interactive wetsuit website on 17 February. The launch was backed by a consumer magazine blitz in all the major surfing publications and included thousands of catalogue inserts. Check the site out at www.billabong.com/wetsuitsau Today Show live from Quiksilver Pro Channel Nine's Today Show broadcast live from the Quiksilver and Roxy Pro for approximately two hours of live national television. The set was on location at Snapper Rocks for the fourth day of the Quiksilver Pro. Hosts, Tracey Grimshaw and Karl Stefanovic, together with Weatherman, Steve Jacobs, mixed with surfers at the opening event of the Foster’s ASP, WCT event. Quiksilver ran a ‘win a trip to the Quiksilver Pro’ campaign for Today show viewers in the build up to the event. According to Quiksilver’s Marketing Manager, Mark Rayner, they received over 80,000 entries and over 1 million viewers tuned into the show.