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"FacebookPinterest\n\nThey dub themselves journalistic partners, but Johannes Bonke and Sven Schumann, the founders behind online magazine The Talks, are the oldest of friends. Both based in Berlin, the two celebrity profilers have been interviewing bold faced names for a slew of different publications (GQ included) over the years and what they've learned is that more often than not, the best content gets left on the cutting room floor. And at the end of the day, good content is good content - so why not find it a home? So that's what they did. Their mission with The Talks was to dig through their editorial archives to profile one individual a week, documenting all the stuff that never made it to print. So, if you ever wanted to learn about Justin Timberlake's quarter life crisis or Marina Abramovi&amp;amp;#xC4;&amp;amp;#xBF;'s' thoughts on Lady Gaga, The Talks is where you should direct your browser.\n\nGQ: You launched The Talks, a weekly-updated online interview magazine on July 22nd, 2011. What was the mission?\n\nJohannes Bonke: Over the years we have had a lot of experience talking to people and writing for magazines and newspapers. But because most of them were published in print magazines we felt like it was time for an online magazine: a platform where we could choose who we wanted, a platform for our own special selection of inspiring people. So after a lot of planning and preparation we launched our site\n\nSven Schumann: It's supposed to be a platform where people can talk about anything that we find interesting. It's a platform where people can swear and where our audience can get the right impression of who people are and what they sound like. That's why, for instance, we wanted to include an audio sample. It's more than just reading an article; one also gets a second dimension of whom the person might be. In the end, The Talks is supposed to be something fun, but something that can also make you think. We post an interview every Wednesday.\n\nGQ: How did the two of you meet? I know you've been buddies forever, but you kind of broke the rule in mixing business with friendship. Why do you think it made sense for you two to collaborate on this?\n\nSchumann: We met on a tennis court in southern Germany at the age of seven and have been best friends for over 20 years. We always stayed in touch very closely and after traveling the world individually, we both ended up living in Berlin\n\nBonke: It was at that time when we decided to start a company together called COLORSTORM MEDIA where we put our focus on interviewing people. What might feel like a rule to others, never really bothered us: we know each other well enough to know that business is fairly irrelevant compared to our friendship and that the pure thought of fighting over money feels more silly to us than scary.\n\nGQ: You've said that the two of you work as \"journalistic partners.\" What does that mean?\n\nBonke: It simply means that we double the joy and divide the work by doing it together. We usually sit down and plan the weeks and months ahead; we discuss concepts, strategies, questions and placements. We go from there, either on an individual mission or together.\n\nSchumann: You might also call it business partners.\n\nFacebookPinterest\n\nGQ: In the past 10 years, your interviews and articles have been published in numerous international editions of Vogue, GQ, Elle, Harper's Bazaar, Marie Claire, W Magazine, Rolling Stone and many others. After years of conversations with a wide range of creative minds, the desire arose to open up your archives and release the most interesting \"talks\" for your own use. Well played. How do you decide what content you want to release weekly?\n\nBonke: We try to find a good mixture of people who have influenced culture in their own special way... people that matter.\n\nSchumann: We usually decide a few days prior who we put online next. Sometimes there is a current reason for choosing one of the candidates, or a peg, but usually we try to have a good variation of names, questions and answers which are not repeating themselves.\n\nGQ: Both of you... dream interview? Why?\n\nBonke: Keith Richards, please! I already had the chance to meet Mick Jagger who is featured on The Talks, and having a chat with Keith Richards would really give me the ultimate pleasure. The Rolling Stones just made my life so much better and their songs have been the soundtrack of my life.\n\nSchumann: Jack White who is in my eyes the most exceptional guitar player of recent times.\n\nBonke: Featuring the Dalai Lama could also be an interesting take. Would love to hear his comments about the Chinese!\n\nSchumann: God.\n\nGQ: You've mentioned that the aim of the site is to provide an \"in-depth but brisk read.\" Do you think you've achieved this?\n\nSchumann: Well, it was and is our aim but it's pretty much up to the readers to decide if we achieved that.\n\nBonke: You are absolutely right. But I think it's fair to admit that it makes me happy to look at the archive we assembled. It brings back a lot of good memories.\n\nGQ: Throughout all your interviews, what have the two of you learned about yourselves as journalists?\n\nBonke: Being an interviewer taught me that listening to others is sometimes way more interesting than talking about yourself. And I learned to appreciate the wisdom and charm of older people who lived their life to the fullest. To capture the thoughts of people who've stayed true to themselves over a long period of time and who have always followed their own special course can be a very exiting task for a journalist. It teaches you a lot about what really matters.\n\nSchumann: That I can keep up a conversation with somebody who really bores me if I have to.\n\nGQ: What's next?\n\nBonke: Well, hopefully some more in depth but brisk reads [laughs].\n\nSchumann: New sections of the site will be introduced towards the end of 2012. It has been a year now and we feel like it's time to evolve the whole concept a bit. But one thing is for sure: The Talks will always be The Talks.\n\nCheck in with Johannes and Sven every Wednesday, here."^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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