On December 12th, Nerve Media will launch its second online magazine: Babble.com, an exciting, intelligent daily publication and interactive community for urban parents.

Babble will be every bit as disruptive to the status quo as Nerve was when it started. It will be a revolution in parenting magazines: a publication that talks to parents not just as caregivers, but as fun, smart, intellectually curious people. It will apply Nerve’s tradition of irreverent honesty to the experience of parenting without the infantilizing, hyper-judgmental tone or acquisitive baby-as-accessory bent of so much of today's parenting fare.

The subject of parenting needs a bold new voice because people lie about it so often. The topic is plagued by politically correct clichés and generic sentimentality. This is just what we said about sex nine years ago. Today there are more taboos and more social pressures around parenting than there are around sex. We will cover the most controversial topics in parenting via personal essays, our exhaustive info center, and witty, original columns like "Bad Parent" and "Notes from a Non-Breeder."

Babble will be different from all other parenting magazines and communities, online and offline, in the following ways:

FRESH DESIGN

Babble looks different from other parenting magazines because it is different — for starters, it’s for both men and women. Most parenting magazines and websites looks like exploded Easter eggs — oceans of pink and powder blue. Babble is the first parenting magazine designed from the ground up for a new generation of parents — mothers and fathers who increasingly share the work of raising children, live in cities, and use the internet to access information.

We think this makes Babble more readable, but it’s also a response to demographic and behavioral trends — more and more young parents are choosing to living in cities, and the average father today spends twice as much time with his children than the average father in 1965, according to a recent Time survey. This is a generation in the process of reinventing technology and media, and eager to look at the challenges of parenting with fresh eyes.

HUMOR

Babble may be the first magazine that takes time to enjoy the silly side of parenting. We find it extraordinary that none of the parenting magazines we've seen — none of them! — convey the humor and irony surrounding the modern parenting experience. Babble will feature funny videos (original productions, viral videos, and user uploads), a half-dozen entertaining blogs, splashy features like "Street Fashion" and a weekly design column by David Netto.

GREAT WRITING

Other parenting magazines are long on service — what to do when Johnny gets picked on at the playground, or how to make Sally a packed lunch — but short on reflection and insight, and utterly devoid of great writing.

The Babble editors have invited some of the best American writers to weigh in on the hysterical, humbling and magical experience of having children. It’s clear from the response that writers are hungry for an outlet on this subject. Among the debut issue's contributors are Walter Kirn, AM Homes, Erin Cressida Wilson, Marjorie Ingall, Kevin Keck, Shalom Auslander and Steven Johnson.

NEW TECHNOLOGY

Most parenting websites are old-fashioned by today’s standards. Babble will have efficient, AJAX-powered navigation, a seamless mix of text, photos, video and blogs, and a fully featured community space with profiles, message boards and photo sharing. Nerve Media has been in the online magazine and community business for nine years, and we believe Babble is a case study in the future of content and community.

This publication is close to the hearts of the Nerve Media team. Ada Calhoun, the editor-in-chief, had a baby two months ago; Sam Apple, the director of video, had a baby six months ago; and Rufus Griscom and Alisa Volkman, the co-publishers, had a baby two years ago. Babble will be the magazine we as new parents have been looking for. And with its stylish design and terrific writing, it may also be the first parenting magazine ever to appeal to non-parents as well.

For more information, please contact ada@babble.com.