Tyler Brûlé, Media Maverick

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who don't expect double-digit growth but whose CEOs have far more fun going into the office every day than in the States."

Brûlé loves the counterintuitive and the freakonomical. In Monocle's popular weekly podcasts he will champion the reemergence of Polaroid film to flout the digital revolution or promote the benefits of old-fashioned over online shopping. He places his faith in service rather than in technology. This intuition informs much of his decision-making.

"People are intrigued by how we manage to charge 50 percent more for subscriptions," he says. "Partly, the subscription gives people access to some Monocle extras, the website archive, and so on. But it is really based on the idea that people want to belong to something that says something about them." This is one of the reasons he remains skeptical about digital content. "People will choose what denim they want to wear, and they will choose what newspaper they want to buy, and they want other people to be aware of that, too. Until an iPad is backlit, no one will have any idea that you read Der Spiegel or the Guardian or whatever."

To back this belief, Brûlé is planning a one-off newspaper in the summer full of essays and reportage, all printed on luxurious paper. "It has already made a fortune in terms of advertising," he says. "But it brings up another thing. Would you take an iPad to the beach? To the pool? No. It's too precious. You can leave your newspaper on your towel and no one will nick it. And the thing about good newsprint is that it actually gets more tactile with a bit of sun and moisture." The code name for the paper is Monocle-on-Med; its distribution will be the coastal areas of Spain, Portugal, Italy, Egypt, Greece, France, and comparable spots in the U.S., such as The Hamptons.

The venture gets somewhere near the heart of what Brûlé is about: "Would I rather have a Monocle iPhone app than an office in São Paolo?" he asks rhetorically. "Absolutely not. I'd rather have the excuse to get out to Brazil."

A week later Brûlé is at a garden party in London to launch Monocle's annual survey of the world's most livable cities. The party is populated with stylish Danish and Lebanese diplomats and groomed men in slightly too tight seersucker jackets. Beakers of rosé wine are brought around by younger men in what appear to be cricket whites. If they have one thing in common, I'd guess it's a shared belief that in general São Paolo is more appealing than an iPhone app.

The winner of the most livable city is Munich, which is a surprise not least to the representative from Hamburg, who has been asked to receive it. The German attaché struggles for the combination of criteria that might have led to the unusual choice. "Number of men in lederhosen?" he wonders out loud.

"You never know," says Brûlé, quickly. The German settles on Munich's reputation for being both rich and relaxed. He is talking Monocle's language. Brûlé, who has been in California and Hong Kong since we last spoke, nods in approval and raises a glass to his world.

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