What is a Magazine?

The stubborn pride behind number 5 (It’s permanent. Once created, it can’t be changed) is the reason traditional media struggles. Didn't he say "Ink on Paper" by using the word "permanent"?

These criteria all make sense, except I don't understand the first one. What does "metered" mean in this context? I don't get it.

Content, information, entertainment what ever, but that list without content is toilet paper.

One thing my friend Bob failed to add is the fact that there is no valid business model to support such a magazine. Can you please name 10 such magazines, with major followers, that are making any money? Innovation is more than needed in our industry, but magazines in ink on paper are going to be a major part of this innovation.

Tony, I don't think permanent necessitates printing. I view eZines similarly -- to publish updates is to create new content.

It's Bob Sacks, bless his heart. What else do you expect? (OK, Bob. If you read this, I'm just kidding.) Personally, I think a magazine involves paper. I have a bit of history in evangelizing all things digital -- but I have never understood the need some people have have to pretend that a digital magazine is the same medium as a print magazine. Sure, they used to call movies "moving pictures" until they figured out there was more to film than that. When you convert a magazine into a PDF or other format that replicates the conventions of print, you create a new medium that has the potential to do things you could never do with print. Likewise, you can do things with print you could never do with an electronic version. Like display it on a coffee table.

I think Bob has hit most of the important points here - missing only two that I can think of, offhand: - A magazine contains full-page display advertising on LHPs, inserted across from relevant editorial in a format that legions of readers over generations have agreed: 1) adds value, 2) improves the look and heft/thud of the book, and 3) does not feel intrusive, interrupt the reading process or compromise enjoyment of the product. ... and the somewhat more esoteric but still critical summary point that: - A magazine is a utility appliance for the periodic dissemination of a reading experience coupled to an advertising opportunity, produced (at least in part, or in most cases) for a deliberately-cultivated readership, and embedded in a culture of reading that understands how to consume these things. My point being that if you start breaking this down into bullets via the Cognitive Style of Powerpoint, it's easy to find yourself herded back into the flow towards "the web way of looking at things." Periodic? Permanent? Maybe it _doesn't_ have to be periodic and permanent. Maybe it can be updated daily, electronically. And maybe we can slot ads in there, dynamically, all over the place ... etc. Except that when you let this happen, you're right back on the treadmill of firing the good editors, hiring a bunch of kids to blog daily, driving your salespeople nuts with all the dynamic inventory and traffic and targeting rigamarole, and competing with Google for cheepniz. In fact, the essential notion of a magazine, as Bob describes, is very powerful and beneficial, and can indeed go online in various ways without breaking its criticalities.

For those of us still trying to sell ads into these magazines, let's not forget their POV. A magazine: 1. Delivers a consistent focused audience 2. Delivers to that audience a concentrated experience that elevates their level of involvement 3. Delivers a reader experience guided by the wisdom of editors, not a random process 4. Engages its audience periodically

I can appreciate what Bob is trying to do here - he's trying to distill the essence of the magazine into something that no longer relies on an unsustainable manufacturing and distribution process. The only problem is exactly what Rex points out: "When you convert a magazine into a PDF or other format that replicates the conventions of print, you create a new medium that has the potential to do things you could never do with print." Amen. When you create that new medium you have new properties available. To take these six properties from the old medium and graft them onto the new and say this is what a magazine is seems forced to me. What you end up with is a media object that purposely takes as its core properties six of the weakest properties available to it in the new medium. A recipe for success?

Just to clarify, I never said in my story or headline above, and Bob never said in his speech, that Bob was EXCLUDING print from these characteristics. His point is that they don't REQUIRE print. Samir in his blog read it as Bob saying these six elements are "Anything but print." That's not correct.

Twice this month someone dropped the "Yellow Book" on my porch. I considered it litter. I'm 40 years old. If I was 30 years old and someone dropped Newsweek or Fly Fisherman on my porch, I'd consider those litter too.

The Bob Sacks bullet as supplemented with a liberal interpretation of the points by John Jainschigg sound pretty good to me. And that's just about the formula we used a few years back to establish ArchitectureWeek, a serious, professionally-written magazine for building design professionals that's published online-only in simple HTML formats. You can see if it looks and feels like a magazine to you: http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/ And if not, do tell... Given the universality of a good platform neutral definition of magazine, it's hard for us to grok why there are still so few serious, solid, online-only magazines to be found - aside, that is, from the inadequacy of dominant ad formats and the stupendous inertia of advertising agencies and clients, which temporarily make the business proposition so challenging.

Kevin, I surveyed ArchitectureWeek.com quickly. I appreciate simple HTML formats, we do it too at FordMuscle.com. Nevermind our audience and review our formatting. We've taken general guidelines from traditional print page composition and had great success with it. Plus, we index REAL WELL in Google by doing this. There are common elements with our articles that are proven: 1) Think pictorially, then backfill with creative writing. I think print works reverse... which doesn't work online. 2) Sidebar, Sidebar, Sidebar 3) Summarize the article above the fold 4) No more than 600 characters without visual support 5) If it can be expressed with imagery rather than words, go get the image! Samples: http://www.fordmuscle.com/archives/2008/06/400MockUp/index.php http://www.fordmuscle.com/archives/2007/12/400Rods/index.php http://www.fordmuscle.com/archives/2007/06/AirFuel/index.php Good luck, Jon