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Linux Journal Goes — Surprise! — Digital
Mr_Perl writes "Linux Journal sent out an email to subscribers today announcing that they are going 100% digital. Subscribers signed on for a paper version of the journal, and now have been switched to an electronic version, apparently at the exact same subscription rate. No news yet on why they did it, and no sign of any offers to reimburse unused subscriptions for subscribers who are disappointed."
I like having hard copies of journals, books, and magazines. I don't want to read stuff on a fucking tablet of some sort.
People go on and on about how paper is fragile, but it's a lot more durable than the shitty Chinese-made devices that you have to use to read this "e-content". It gets worse when the publishers and vendors can arbitrarily delete material from your device, even after you've paid for it. Fuck that.
Why the fuck would I pay the same amount of money and not get something physical in return? No thanks.
I just started buying this magazine at the news stand to take with me places I can't bring electronics. Now I guess I'll stop reading it.
If you let a paper subscription lapse, you don't have to return the books that you paid for under the subscription. It might be hard to find articles or search them, but you can keep a copy for as long as your copy survives! With reasonable treatment and storage conditions, that's upwards of 50 years.
If you have a digital version... they have the ability to pull the old issues at any time; e.g. 10 years from now they might decide to "archive old articles", so you can no longer find them. Also if you let your subscription lapse, when your web account is disabled, you lose access to ALL issues, even ones put out last month when you had a subscription to the periodical.
Also, if they go out of business and their website goes away, you lose access to all the articles you got under the subscription, and will have to pay more if you ever want to see them again, probably exorbitant fees to a database service or other archival service.
Loss of articles may hurt you if you remember/kept a tab of it, and want to use the info. either to help you, to show someone else, or for research/paper writing purposes
Of any periodicals, I think Linux-oriented rags are excellent candidates to go all digital. I think I'm pretty safe in assuming that the readership is on-line enough that getting their subscription material on-line is a natural step. They are probably more likely to have a tablet of some sort, even the rumored (gasp) non-Apple tablets.
On the flip side: even if they increase their subscriber base, advertisers may lose eyeballs that would have flipped through an issue on the newsstand, or on a friend's coffee table/desk. Advertisers LOVE newsstand sales because the readers typically consume more of the content. Finally, I'm not surprised, but not pleased, that the subscription rate doesn't reflect the fact that major expenses will be eliminated: the post-layout printing and distribution costs.
Luke, help me take this mask off
When I sit down with a dead tree version of anything, I read it with as much full attention as I can muster. I don't know why, but I really have to make a conscious effort not to get distracted when reading online and I want to skim. And then there's the read an article, see what's on /., read part of an article, go to Fark, read some more ....etc ....
It's annoying but I find that my bad habits from online reading are moving over to the "real" world - I'm skimming more. I'm getting lazy with my reading habits. If the point isn't made in the first paragraph, I loose interest.
The whole World is becoming tl;dr
While that sounds like a coincidence, it's probably the truth.
Borders carried all of the computer rags that mattered. Now it's just down to Waldenbooks and Barnes&Noble and the odd "super-mega-newsstand" (that is getting rarer than hen's teeth) for retail dead tree geek mags.
--
BMO
At least I can wipe my ass with it after I take a big shit. I'm not even joking. Magazines and newspapers make great toilet paper substitutes.
I disagree. Glossy paper just smears the shit around and newspaper gets ink all over your ass. You're better off with a sock.
That really sucks for the subscribers who either don't have access to or don't know how to use a computer.
linuxjournal is squatting linuxgazette.com. You may want to try the net domain for the real thing.
I stopped buying linux journal when the articles became too predictable - rehashes of the same articles from the same month the previous year. Boring!
Ever since I discovered HTML, it’s been my preferred format for writing. Every word of mine that’s gone into Linux Journal, since I started in 1996, has been written and delivered in HTML.
Hahaha, totally typical. When I edited Randall Schwartz's column for Web Techniques magazine, he delivered his manuscripts in Perldoc format. (Note: This was neither cute nor geeky, it was just a pain in the ass.)
What’s different for me this time is that I’m not paying attention to my monthly 900-word limit (or less if images are involved). While a word limit does impose the discipline of brevity, the fact remains that brevity is not the only virtue of good writing. Yes, it’s a good one to have when your column appears on the last page of a print magazine. But when that magazine is no longer confined by the dimensions of printed pages, you’re free to go longer—or shorter, as the case may be.
It's my belief that this is precisely what is wrong with a lot of online-only writing. Nobody is bothering to edit it anymore. Writers are free to ramble on for as long as they choose, and most readers end up tuning out after the first page (or not reading TFA at all). When an editor pretends that an online brain-dump is actually better than a well-edited article, watch out: the publication is about to take a nosedive.
Linux Journal always has been a publi- cation for the Linux Community. Linux Journal will now be a publication by the Linux Community as well.
Oh, so no editing, and no actual writing either? Where's my checkbook?
Breakfast served all day!
I subscribed to Linux Journal because I wanted to support a Linux publication. I can get everything I cared about from Linux Journal from a variety of blogs that I already subscribe to, for free, via RSS.
the rate everything is going digital, pretty soon I won't have anything to read when on the porcelain throne.
PC Mag went digital, subscription is up, I didn't renew. That's the way I intend to treat each magazine every time that happens. I pay money for a magazine, not a download. Do not enjoy reading on a monitor.
"Ever since I discovered HTML, it’s been my preferred format for writing. Every word of mine that’s gone into Linux Journal, since I started in 1996, has been written and delivered in HTML
Um, Doc, the Linux Journal Author's Guide says "Articles must be sent as plain ASCII text".
Advice: on VPS providers
Oh, wow, I enjoyed Web Techniques back in the day. Thanks for that.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
Oh, wow, I enjoyed Web Techniques back in the day. Thanks for that.
You're welcome, though I can't take a lot of credit.
I was hired at Web Techniques as Senior Technology Editor. It was the first full-time editorial position I'd ever held. After they hired me I asked them why me out of all the other candidates. The editor-in-chief told me that out of all of the candidates he interviewed, I was the only one who gave an acceptable answer to the question "what is the relationship between Java and JavaScript?" He said every other candidate gave an entirely different answer, and he had never heard so much made-up bullshit in his life.
Unfortunately, on the first week of my job, when I hadn't even really finished arranging things on my desk, I got called into the publisher's office for a meeting. He explained that they were going to be relaunching the magazine with more of an enterprise focus, and he was real sorry about that, but he couldn't tell me before I was hired because it was all confidential. I don't remember how many issues of Web Techniques I contributed to before the relaunch actually happened; it might have been a year's worth, but maybe less. I gave my 100 percent for the relaunched magazine, too (it was called New Architect), but I think it was a better magazine in its original format. Unfortunately, it was really difficult to sell ads against a magazine full of code listings at that time, and I don't think it's gotten any easier. So I do feel for the Linux Journal in that respect.
Breakfast served all day!
I cancelled my subscription because of this. The irony is that I had just signed up - subscription to start Oct 01 :-)
Personally I _want_ a magazine that can sit on the table in my lounge, *cough* or on top of the toilet cistern. I do wonder how many subscribers they're going to lose because of this. Im sure they did a survey and decided the benefit was worth it.
Heh, LinuxJournal deathclock anyone?
Medraut