https://www.badbillys.com/tags/skate-media/Recent content in Skate Media on BadBillys.comHugo -- gohugo.ioenBadBillys.comThu, 16 Jul 2026 00:00:00 +0000https://www.badbillys.com/post/thrasher-magazine-80s-skate-media/Thu, 16 Jul 2026 00:00:00 +0000https://www.badbillys.com/post/thrasher-magazine-80s-skate-media/ <h2 id="thrashers-founding-and-the-media-infrastructure-it-built">Thrasher's Founding and the Media Infrastructure It Built</h2> <p>By 1981, skateboarding in America had no dedicated publication built by skaters, for skaters, at the volume the culture actually operated at — and that gap is what <strong><a href="https://www.thrashermagazine.com/">Thrasher</a></strong> was built to fill. The magazine launched that year, published out of San Francisco by High Speed Productions, the company founded by Fausto Vitello and Eric Swenson. Vitello was not an outsider to the industry looking for a media play; he had already co-founded Independent Truck Company, a hardware manufacturer, which meant Thrasher arrived with an insider's read on what skaters and the brands courting them actually needed from a publication.</p>