Here's how Vanity Fair managed to keep the Caitlyn Jenner cover so secret
But it's not easy to surprise the world with an image or a story these days, and the magazine went to great lengths in order to keep the cover from leaking ahead of Monday's big reveal.
A spokesperson for Vanity Fair revealed to Mashable the extreme measures that were taken during the Annie Leibovitz cover shoot and subsequent printing process:
The magazine was concerned about leaks and took security measures 'every step of the way,' including on the photo shoot, in the VF editorial office and at the printing plant for the upcoming issue. The story and pictures were done on a single computer that was never connected to the Internet, with the assets put on a thumb drive every night and then deleted from the computer. The story was even hand-delivered to the printer.
Additionally, reports Mashable, "The magazine hired security for the shoot and forced people to give up their cell phones to prevent anything from leaking."
VanityFair.comBut the extra precaution was worth it.
After Vanity's Fair's "Call me Caitlyn" cover was released Monday, the image and story went completely viral. #CallMeCaitlyn became the top trending topic on Twitter.
After joining Twitter, @Caitlyn_Jenner broke Obama's record to one million followers and her first tweet - the Vanity Fair cover - has been retweeted over 229,000 times.
And Caitlyn wasn't even compensated for the cover.
"Vanity Fair does not pay for interviews," a rep for the magazine simply explained to Business Insider.