If I am referring to a magazine as an entity comprising its editor and staff, is it correct to say, 'The magazine are keen for submissions' or 'The magazine is keen for submissions'?
(I'm correcting an Australian English text, where they use The magazine are… when referring to the corporate entity.)
Best Answer
I've never heard "The magazine" used as a plural in this way, and Google Ngrams doesn't return any results. However the name of the publication, like the name of a company, is often used to mean the people behind the name. So one might say "The News Of The World were hacking phones", as one might say "Google are recruiting". Obviously this is not to imply that all staff at News Of The World were hacking phones!
(Interestingly, some groups are more likely than others to be referred to in the plural. E.g. people are far more likely to say "Google are" than "Facebook are", compared with "Google/Facebook is". Perhaps some companies are viewed subconsciously as pluralistic and others as more monolithic and homogeneous).