Magazines, value for money ?

[Dangermouse]

For the first time in years, on Saturday I bought a woodworking magazine. The " Woodworking plans and projects ". It was supposed to be the " bench plane " issue. Nice full cover picture of a Stanley no6 or 7. So as I have a bit of a " thing" about planes, I stumped up the £3.75 and went home a happy bunny. Well I really should have spent that on some chocolate or lottery ticket. The entire mag is stuffed with adverts for rubbish stuff I'd never touch with a barge pole, a lot of adverts, disguised as " articles", VERY positive "reviews". The plane section was six pages of huge photo's and in total about half a page of twaddle in writing. Not the in depth nearly full magazine with comparison reviews of new planes and planing know how etc etc.
So what do forum members think of the current magazine offerings?

 

[marcros]

i agree entirely. I bought a Fine Woodworking the back end of last year. I liked what was in it, but there wasnt much of it, and it cost nearly £6!

I am thinking of subscribing to the digital version which is cheaper and unlocks the digital content of the website, ie the downloads and the archieve. That is $35 a year, but FWW is only 7 mags per year so it isnt cheap still.

 

[Spindle]

Hi

I stopped buying magazines years ago for those very reasons - also a lot of the articles seemed to be thinly disguised reprints of earlier material.

Nowadays I rely on the internet, particularly specific forums, for information / inspiration.

Regards Mick

 

[paulm]

Hi

I stopped buying magazines years ago for those very reasons - also a lot of the articles seemed to be thinly disguised reprints of earlier material.

Nowadays I rely on the internet, particularly specific forums, for information / inspiration.

Regards Mick

Yep, likewise !

Cheers, Paul

 

[Jacob]

I stopped buying them more than 20 years ago when I first started learning properly about woodwork. I discovered that the huge collection of mags I had at that time contained very little of relevance. I cut out a few articles and dumped the mags. A bit later I dumped the articles as well.
Books are far better value - well the right ones are: some of them are just mag reprints so you are paying twice for the same rubbish!

 

[Phil Pascoe]

I used to work the theory that if I got a tool from an ad. at a bargain price, or I picked up a good money saving or design idea, it justified the cost of the mag. But they got less and less.....and less.

 

[orchard]

--so not even a respectable journal for woodwork guys?

 

[Losos]

on Saturday I bought a woodworking magazine. The " Woodworking plans and projects "

You are right, that one in particular is not worth the paper it's printed on :lol:

British Woodworking often has some interesting articles and generally has a different 'take' on the woodworking scene, that's the only one I sometimes buy.

 

[Steve Maskery]

I suppose I have a vested interest here, but here is my take anyway.

Magazines are a legacy medium. No-one would invent them today. But so far I don't think that the "obvious" medium has proved economically viable for many people, so mags survive. By the skin of their teeth, I suspect.

I'm delighted that in this conversation, BW is the one mag that someone has endorsed. Nick does a fantastic job against all the odds.

The fact is that newcomers (and that is the market at which almost all mags are aimed) have to find their first knowledge/inspiration somewhere, and the obvious place (the Internet) is even more unreliable than the worst of the mags. Do you really want to learn your basic skills from YouTube? (And I speak as someone who has a YT channel). There is a lot of rubbish out there. In amongst it is a valuable nugget or two of expertise and sound advice. The challenge is to pan the one from the other.

For mags to survive, they must contain good content, and that will only happen if contributors feel that it is worth their while to take the time and trouble to record their projects. Those of you who have given me support recently will know where I am going with this.

In some ways it is a downward spiral. Fewer people buy mags, so advertisers don't see the point of spending so much money reaching a smaller audience, contributors see their pay cheques get smaller and smaller and wonder why they bother, so they don't and the content suffers. So fewer people buy etc etc etc.

If anyone has an answer to this, I'm all ears.

S

 

[Racers]

Hi,

The only magazine worth buying is National Geographic.

I still get F&C but it doesn't take long to read, and I probably won't renew my subscription.

Pete

 

[deserter]

For what it's worth.

I subscribe to Furniture & Cabinet Making, and often buy British Woodworking (I would subscribe but there subscription offers never appeal to me). I thoroughly enjoy reading both mags, and think that every now and then some of the articles are perfect, for new and not so new woodworkers.
An example is the article on plane running David Charlesworth has written split through the past 3 episodes if F&C, absolutely brilliant.

However they also have articles which don't appeal to me personally, but I assume must appeal to someone somewhere.

My only criticism of them would be that they all without exception rerun the same topics/articles far too frequently. I understand the need and idea is to educate/appeal to new readers but 12 months is too soon for regulars.


~Nil carborundum illegitemi~

 

[Graham Orm]

I suppose I have a vested interest here, but here is my take anyway.

Magazines are a legacy medium. No-one would invent them today. But so far I don't think that the "obvious" medium has proved economically viable for many people, so mags survive. By the skin of their teeth, I suspect.

I'm delighted that in this conversation, BW is the one mag that someone has endorsed. Nick does a fantastic job against all the odds.

The fact is that newcomers (and that is the market at which almost all mags are aimed) have to find their first knowledge/inspiration somewhere, and the obvious place (the Internet) is even more unreliable than the worst of the mags. Do you really want to learn your basic skills from YouTube? (And I speak as someone who has a YT channel). There is a lot of rubbish out there. In amongst it is a valuable nugget or two of expertise and sound advice. The challenge is to pan the one from the other.

For mags to survive, they must contain good content, and that will only happen if contributors feel that it is worth their while to take the time and trouble to record their projects. Those of you who have given me support recently will know where I am going with this.

In some ways it is a downward spiral. Fewer people buy mags, so advertisers don't see the point of spending so much money reaching a smaller audience, contributors see their pay cheques get smaller and smaller and wonder why they bother, so they don't and the content suffers. So fewer people buy etc etc etc.

If anyone has an answer to this, I'm all ears.

S

I'm afraid it's not going to happen Steve. It must be such a battle for mags to keep advertisers on board these days. I ran a medium sized business for 18 years. I advertised in every conceivable place and measured the results carefully asking every inquiry where they found us. Magazines and local newspapers were simply money pits. I would often get more response to the ad from other magazines trying to sell me advertising. Specialist publications like woodworking mags must find it even harder. The internet will probably take over from all paper reading eventually in my opinion. It's an irrecoverable situation. I hardly ever read a book until my wife bought me a Kindle 2 years ago, I've now read over 80 on it, simply because it's easier than going to a shop or library and choosing one. I hope you don't depend too much on magazine revenue.

 

[Graham Orm]

For what it's worth.

I subscribe to Furniture & Cabinet Making, and often buy British Woodworking (I would subscribe but there subscription offers never appeal to me). I thoroughly enjoy reading both mags, and think that every now and then some of the articles are perfect, for new and not so new woodworkers.
An example is the article on plane running David Charlesworth has written split through the past 3 episodes if F&C, absolutely brilliant.

However they also have articles which don't appeal to me personally, but I assume must appeal to someone somewhere.

My only criticism of them would be that they all without exception rerun the same topics/articles far too frequently. I understand the need and idea is to educate/appeal to new readers but 12 months is too soon for regulars.


~Nil carborundum illegitemi~

David Charlesworth's books are a collection of his magazine articles and are all superb reading. :wink:

 

[selly]

Books and Torrents are pretty good for info.

 

[James C]

I pay 19 dollars for a digital description to Popular Woodworking Magazine which I find is usually worth the outlay.

The issues of most American magazines are available as PDFs for free on certain sites by I don't feel comfortable downloading them.

 

[graduate_owner]

I don't buy magazines either. I used to buy an occasional copy of a woodworking or DIY magazine but (as others have said) I can get all the info off the web these days. I also don't think they represent value for money. Books are a much better buy. Another good reason for not buying is I was recently given a stack of ' The Woodworker' and 'Wood Working' magazines about 3 feet high (sorry, 90cm high) and am still putting them in date order. I have enough to read for months, if not years, and when I've read some I can pass them on to friends. Those with really useful reference articles I'll probably keep.
I have to say though that I find magazines are much nicer to browse through than a computer screen, even if they do take up a lot of space and lack the quick search features of my DVDs.

K