Despite spending far too many daily hours on the Internet trawling photography sites - mostly fashion-oriented - I never came across the late magazine. Not only did they need more advertising, they needed to do some more of their own.
I wonder if it would make any sort of good sense for such magazines to cross-reference/link one another? The obvious fear might appear to be that of losing readership to competitors, but would that really happen? If free to the "consumer" then why would said person stop looking at any one of them? There are so many websites already where people turn themselves into clowns and "test" cameras and lenses and so on, and every new thing they touch is better than the last, and a definite keeper for the tester... right. Who needs those sites? Maybe some people actually do - God help us. Perhaps a content-rich sort of virtual publication might work better today.
I tried to get such a thing underway myself recently, and quickly realised that it needs a far younger person to do it, which is difficult: youngsters need to be out there making money and I don't, but I no longer have either the health or energy of a young man upon which to draw, I only have some experience, and that's not enough to do the whole thing myself. Worse, it needs cooperation from influential and busy people and the ability to suit their schedules. "At the drop of a hat" is, for me, a thing of the distant past: I need lots of warning before I can gird up my loins and go do anything sixty or seventy klicks away from home. I was offered a day's shooting on a new superyacht a couple of weeks ago but couldn't go due to all sorts of damned problems of my own. It puts age into perspective somewhat; not a lot positive to say for it.
But would I pay anything to look at old stuff, as in past issues? No. I would perhaps pay to buy some (paper) leading, current fashion magazines, despite being out of the industry for years, but not at today's prices, and not when most of the pictures are eventually to be found online for free if you look hard enough; truth to tell, the making-of videos are usually more exciting than the printed shots!
As I have thought recently, the day of a new, long-running printed paper anything is probably past. At least, short of some miracle, I think that it is for me. One problem I have always had with photography-related magazines has been that I can't easily dump them. I ended up with cubic feet of French PHOTO as well as the later American version of it, and the American Black and White which had to be given away or dumped when I simply had no space left for the kids to put their luggage when they came avisiting. (I did end up saving a few of the French ones, though! Magazines, I mean; I have no French kids.)
Rob
