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Magazine industry... will it survive?

dan330

Extreme Android User
i have magazines on the N7 with Zingo... but i find myself using Flipboard and Currents more. so much more to read... and focus to my interests .. and way more current. Both for local news and worldwide.

i have about 10 magazines in my N7... and mostly untouched. i have read maybe 2 articles in 2 mags. was that a waste of $$? :confused:

i am wondering .. why do i even need to pay for magazines?
what will happen to magazine industry in the future??
what does a magazine give me for the price??? :rolleyes::rolleyes:

newspapers are dieing.. and disappearing. there will be a few.
i guess the magazines will do the same eventually.
 
In ten years or less, magazines, newspapers, books, anything printed on paper (except business and legal documents) will be nostalgic, burdensome trinkets.
 
i have about 10 magazines in my N7... and mostly untouched. i have read maybe 2 articles in 2 mags. was that a waste of $$? :confused:

i am wondering .. why do i even need to pay for magazines?
what will happen to magazine industry in the future??
what does a magazine give me for the price??? :rolleyes::rolleyes:

newspapers are dieing.. and disappearing. there will be a few.
i guess the magazines will do the same eventually.

We pay for magazines because we like them and we have a fondness for the printed word. Everyone I know gets at least five magazines every month. I once subscribed to more than 30 magazines myself, not including more than a dozen trade and industry magazines. Every publication I took is still going strong despite ad revenue on the decline.

Some people have been saying the end is near for a very long time, but so far, there are plenty of magazines out there. More than 10,000 magazines are published in the United States alone. Many special magazines without general circulation still arrive in our mailboxes.

I can tell you that the pay rates for writers in the (general) online world generally sucks. There are "writers" out there willing to churn out 500 words for a buck or less. Not per word, the entire piece. Legitimate magazines can pay more than a buck a word. As a writer, I am concerned that the public will accept crappy writing and the web will deliver it in spades and overall, rates will go down.

As a writer, I am not sure I am all that concerned as long as a decent pay rate is there. Be it on the web or in the mailbox, if the money is good, so what? I can accept the online world of magazines.

I do not want to see magazines go away, but perhaps one day, they will. Ink and paper costs are up as are postage and delivery costs. With a decline in income and ever increasing costs, something has to give.

Online magazines are nice, but they are not the same as the printed publication. Books have been said to be on the way out for decades but we still publish 300,000 books every year, worldwide. I think there are about 400,000 scholarly journals published every year.

Perhaps I am a romantic, but eBook versions of "The Sun Also Rises" or "The Old Man and the Sea" can never replace first editions (or other editions for that matter). I met a man with a copy of "A Christmas Carol" and a few other books known to be owned by the authors. To book collectors, a copy of a book known to have been owned by the author means more than non-book collectors can fathom.

If you are a reader in love with books, you will understand; if you are a student with Hemingway on your required reading list, perhaps you do not care.

It is said many online newspapers are different than their printed counterparts, so there are differences. I still prefer ink stained fingers to the glare of my iPad screen.

There was a time when we had The Salt Lake Telegram, The Deseret News and The Salt Lake Tribune. We also had morning and evening editions. But that was before cable TV and the Internet. We will likely never see another large daily published separate morning and evening newspapers. As of today, there are six newspapers published in SLC.

It is perhaps (only to me) interesting that we (Bill Shipler Photo) were "staff" photographers for several daily papers and using film, we could deliver photos to the editor's desk in less than an hour. So the lack of digital cameras meant nothing. that said, the influx of digital technologies dies impact the whole shebang.
 
In ten years or less, magazines, newspapers, books, anything printed on paper (except business and legal documents) will be nostalgic, burdensome trinkets.

Not just your opinion to be sure. Many have proclaimed the death of print over the years. So far, it has not happened.
 
blah blah blaaah!

Well my friendly friend dan333000 I want to add my 0.02 cents in on this so very important subject and I always have the best things to say 24 / 7 like where I sit on the scale of stinkyness...

I wanted to say look at the abbucus!! It is still in use today!

(Stinky mutters under his breath: that is only if you live in communist North Korea that is!)

Look at the Ox wagon too!! I am sure there are a few 10 or so people that use them! :)

So don't stress dan333330 my friend! Many people are still stuck in the stone age but all you need now is a good old fashioned piece of stone and a chisel to start some good old fashioned writing!

:)

Nash all Stinkish jokes aside I seriously appreciated how awesomely life has evolved it is great that I don't have to walk 100 k just to say hello to my grandparents in Durban. :)

Its pretty freaking legendary! :)

Yak yak where's my crack! :)
 
My wife will keep many of them in business :D: Good Housekeeping, Woman's Day, Ladies Home Journal, Family Circle, various Nurse trade publications and anything out of the University of Nebraska Athletic Department. And more. :rolleyes:

Oh, well, whatever makes her happy. ;)

I still get Consumer Reports, Broadcast Engineering and a union rag that comes out quarterly.
 
My wife will keep many of them in business :D: Good Housekeeping, Woman's Day, Ladies Home Journal, Family Circle, various Nurse trade publications and anything out of the University of Nebraska Athletic Department. And more. :rolleyes:

Oh, well, whatever makes her happy. ;)

I still get Consumer Reports, Broadcast Engineering and a union rag that comes out quarterly.

I like Good Housekeeping. Just sayin.'
 
I'm a book lover. I have many, many books and I proudly display them in huge bookcases. I love the feel of books, the smell of books, the ability to thumb through them, taking a look here, there, somewhere else, finding what I feel like reading at that moment, referring back to something later, lending books to friends, etc. I love going to the library--I love the smell of it, the quiet of it, the millions of books. Although I've always been on the cutting edge of technology, I have yet to read an e-book. And I have no plans to do so any time soon. Ditto for magazines.

When Linux Journal ceased publishing its hardcopy version about a year ago, I stopped reading it. I've subscribed to LJ since the last millennium...and I still do, but I have yet to read a single issue in its digital form. I used to devour each month's issue cover to cover, but no more. I used to leave a few LJs sitting around on my coffee table, which prompted questions from micro$oft users--and led to my converting many of them to Linux. But no more. :(

I do not want paper and ink books and magazines to disappear. But I'm a realist. I see the writing on the wall. I will just decline to participate until it's no longer a choice...
 
yes.. i agree... many mags will keep going for a long time.
touch / feel is important to a lot of people. but we are being converted slowly but surely.

paper books will not go away. the value for collectors and such..

but more and more.. digital will be the norm.
but for me... i cant see wasting $ magazines at full price.
on Zingo they sell some specials for $.99.


what about the PRICE... Digital vs Paper.
why do they both cost the same??
shouldnt the digital version be much less than the printed version?
because of the extra cost associated with paper: print, paper, storage, delivery, store shelf, waste, environmental cost....
 
what about the PRICE... Digital vs Paper.
why do they both cost the same??
shouldnt the digital version be much less than the printed version?
because of the extra cost associated with paper: print, paper, storage, delivery, store shelf, waste, environmental cost....

Well, one would think the e-version would cost less. Why this is not so is an argument many readers will happily debate. Lots of issues to consider.

Writers must be paid. Keeping a web site current represents a cost. Certainly, there is no paper or ink, just electrons, so manufacturing and distribution costs are far less. No reason to believe an online version is less costly to create than the printed version.

What about profits? Why should a Time Magazine cost the same online as printed? Rather, why should Time charge less? Artwork, writing, layout, distribution, web maintenance and other things make an online paper/magazine costly these days.

All things being equal, the cost should be less, or one would think that is the case.

Perhaps they want to make a profit? You cannot assume that a web version is paying its way. Some do not and they close. A web site can be costly to produce and maintain, and everyone on the web is looking for a profit.

Short answer, it is what it is and if you want the content, pay the freight.
 
There is a simpler answer to the OP's query: yes, it will definitely survive. One must separate delivery method from content. Be it printed or online, Time is still Time and Road and Track is still Road and Track. Well, there can be differences in content but that can change if the printed version goes away.

Kids might prefer a web version and if that is the case, perhaps printed magazines will go away. Artists, writers, art directors, layout wonks and others will still have a job. Those daring to call themselves Writers might not play any part because fortunately, most editors hopefully know the crap from the good stuff.

And from my perspective, as long as the check clears, should writers really care?
 
bob that is just a bad argument.. holds no water.

web hosting cost money.. but not as much as the paper costs...

the magazine publisher does have cost to produce the content. but after that.
it can go to print or to webfile. i would guess that the cost associated with paper to client is a huge % of the final cost to reader.
 
bob that is just a bad argument.. holds no water.

web hosting cost money.. but not as much as the paper costs...

the magazine publisher does have cost to produce the content. but after that.
it can go to print or to webfile. i would guess that the cost associated with paper to client is a huge % of the final cost to reader.

Not saying it costs just as much. Just pointing out it all costs. I have seen the costs associated with large magazines running online versions of their rags. Publisher's weekly does periodic reports on this topic and it can be quite high.

Remember, what largely supports most magazines (and web sites) is advertising. Ad revenues are down in some areas and up in others.

Print costs are way up. This I know. As are ink and distribution costs. No argument. But until you see the costs associated with each version, it is hard to say.

To be clear, it likely does cost more to print content compared to web based content.
 
so we both can agree that Printed version would cost more than e-versions.
this cost difference should be a direct savings to the client/reader.

and may win a magazine a new sale if it was priced lower.

the readers that want paper.. will always pay for the paper.
why not try to capture more readers by showing a savings where you can?
 
The last 2 magazines that I subscribed to is now gone. One is a magazine with articles for a hobby/game that I play. It went away at the end of the 90's. The reason was that by the time the magazine was printed and distributed, the articles were already out of date. That publication now exists in the gaming company's web site with daily articles.

The other is TV Guide. It's gone. I now use a web site to get my TV listings. Even cable boxes now have a built-in TV listings view for you to browse through.

Right now, I primarily read articles online. Whenever I see a newspaper, much of the information is out of date or I had already read it somewhere online. A big disadvantage of printed media is its timeliness. It simply takes time before the article gets into the hands of a reader. For some things, the value of an article greatly diminishes the more time has past since it was written. Online publications have the advantage of getting the information out right away. Printed publications cannot compete with that. Only if an article retains its value over time will it be beneficial to have a printed copy. There are advantages to printed material. Sometimes I print things out because I only have so much screen real estate on my devices and would like to easily view multiple pages at a time.

What will kill the printed publications if displays become cheap enough and abundant enough so that we can display multiple pages at a time. That has not happened yet, but may happen some time in the future. Display technology may be as light as a sheet of paper and become cheap enough for people to have dozen's lying around. Right now, devices with displays still have some bulk and the price is prohibitive for most people to have access to very many.
 
Was it too ahead of it's time?
The-Daily-iPad-008.jpg


News Corp to close iPad newspaper The Daily | Media | guardian.co.uk

...and I'm sure The Guardian will still be available on the dead tree format for a while yet....as will the Xilinhot Evening News and The People's Daily and The China Daily.
 
I haven't been able to figure out what to do with years of Astronomy and Sky and Telescope. I dropped Astronomy, and got the digital version of S&T. I get it as a pdf file and I have an external HD with plenty of memory.

Peterson's Photographic I will buy from the newsstand.
 
I stopped subscribing to magazines unless they have a digital version. I just don't need the extra paper laying around my house. I have three kids in school. That's enough paper to last a lifetime lol :-)
 
I stopped subscribing to magazines unless they have a digital version. I just don't need the extra paper laying around my house. I have three kids in school. That's enough paper to last a lifetime lol :-)

That is so true.. :D Children in school can consume a frightening amount paper.

Unwanted textbooks at the end of term last summer...
Welcome to my China. - End of term at school. Old textbooks no longer...
...and this was only a small fraction. There's 4,000 students at my school.

Myself, I try and teach my lessons electronically.
 
I always said ebooks were dumb. Half the fun of reading was flipping the pages and that old book smell. Then I got a kindle. I am able to hold more books on my kindle than I could ever hope to have on a bookshelf. The *only* exception are the coffee table books (I have two). Yeah, I can definitely see the printed word fading out. Our local newspaper has been cutting pages for years, and now is cutting days out of their print/delivery routine.

And it makes sense... the printed newspaper is out of date by the time they start printing. I can hop on reddit and find out more of what is happening in a few minutes than if you watched the news or read the paper for a few hours.

Now with magazines... I think a lot of that is also going down hill. I canceled my last magazine subscription when I found the exact same articles were being posted by the publication to google currents.

I guess that's all I have to say on this topic.
 
Ask the question this way: I digital media had been around since the 15th century and print media started in the late 20th century, would print have a chance or just be dismissed as an expensive, clunky novelty?
 
Magazines may not be dead but they're moribund for certain. More and more of my favorite dead trees magazines are either gone electronic (without much notice often) or gone altogether. It's only a matter of time before the only dead trees magazines you will be able to buy will be the ones specifically for people who are too backwards to learn how to use the Internet. I'm not judging here, but I think we all can name a "magazine for airheads" from US magazine to the Robb Report.

Once they've gone electronic, does it really make sense to keep on obeying the magazine format? I don't see why. No doubt the word will morph into another meaning, and e-magazine publishers will wise up and increase their market penetration by going to a web format. It's silly to hitch your wagon to a certain e-book vendor when you can self-publish.
 
I believe the US is losing something like two newspapers a week at the minute. I don't see that changing, sadly.

A large part of the problem, IMHO is how the newspapers charge for content on-line: the price is set in comparison with what the dead tree version would have cost. This fundementally misunderstands how people consume content on-line and the numbers of people on-line compared to those who can buy dead tree versions.

For example, I get daily e-mails from the NYT. I like the NYT. I would probably like to read one or two of their articles a day. I would be prepared to pay to do that. I'm just not prepared to pay the $16.25 a month they demand. That's more than I pay for my cell phone service (yeah: I'm cheap)!

So instead, I read fewer NYT articles than I'd like and the NYT doesn't get a dime.

We'd both be better off I read more articles and paid a couple of bucks a month. Sure, that's peanuts compared to what I'd pay for the dead tree version, but I'd probably only read the equivalent of one dead tree version in a month.

So how could that work for the NYT? Well, there are millions of potential low revenue customers on-line, while their dead-tree distribution is in the tens of thousands: the economies of scale are totally different.
 
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