Blogger, GTDer, and digital fellow traveler Howard Robson has posted on his blog a very interesting response to my comments about the end of Mygazines.com. Howard makes a strong case for why magazine sharing through a site like Mygazines is detrimental to the magazine business even beyond the outright piracy issues, noting that the circulation of these journals can't be audited. That, in turn, can erode a magazine's advertising base -- and even drive it toward bankruptcy.
He also points out that magazines are different from both time-driven news stories and evergreen music files in that they have a timeliness, but don't last forever.
These are good points, and I'm very sympathetic to the arguments, being a copyright holder and magazine writer myself. There's no doubt in my mind that copyright violation is wrong, and I have seen firsthand how dwindling ad revenue can break a magazine.
But, as a digital cheerleader, I have to ask: Wouldn't it be smarter for publishers to change their model to meet the needs of the age than for them to protect a dying approach that can't be secured?
Rather than comparing magazines to newspapers or music -- although they obviously share some attributes of both -- I'd argue that a better comparison is with commercial television. Most magazines -- at least ad-supported ones -- operate much as commercial television does, by presenting a product that attracts and holds a reader's attention long enough to expose them to advertising images. But, unlike television, magazines charge both the advertiser and the consumer for the service. Ironically, rather than creating two income streams, this has left magazines doubly vulnerable -- as readers abandon ship for other information and entertainment options, advertisers are willing to pay less to reach smaller audiences.
My sense is that publishers ultimately will have to choose what business they're in: Are they creating content that readers value? If so, they need to find new ways to monetize the value -- and limiting access probably won't work. Or, are they selling advertising opportunities? If that's their business line, they face even bigger challenges, since the very platforms where they propose to place the ads are rapidly disappearing.
Tough business to be in, Howard...
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5 comments:
Kal,
It's interesting that another service, offering to reduce the cost of sending magazines to publishers' customers has popped into my inbox today (via the Seybold Bulletin).
I've blogged about it here: http://howardrobson.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!2E7E8ACD81C54AC!149.entry
I'm still not sure the auditing angle is on these people's radar...
Hi Howard,
I think the auditing angle probably ISN'T on most readers' radars, and that's probably appropriate -- after all, that's a business function in the magazine industry, not a reader concern.
Ultimately, I think the notion of keeping reader data the way publishers do today will be abandoned to a different model anyway. Publishers are going to have to start thinking in terms of monetizing click-throughs (or the like), much as websites do.
kal
Kal, I was meaning that the providers of these services to publishers and the publishers themselves don't seem to be concerning themselves with audits, rather than the readers. The readers don't care about the audit figures.
I think when it comes to electronic publications, the publishers need to look at much richer content for both the editorial and advertising, including adding value for the advertiser by linking their advertising to related editorial. Care has to be taken to show editorial independence, but much more can be done in the online world to facilitate linked content.
However, most of these 'e-publishing' vendors have just stuck some sort of fancy page turning on the front of a PDF, without thinking about how these synergies could be achieved. There's still some way to go, I think, but the current recession will certainly focus minds...
Howard --
I couldn't agree with you more. I think the best vehicle will come from someone who captures the best qualities of the paper magazine reading experience and merges them in an elegant way with web-based reading.
This is something that's true of many applications, not just magazines. Electronic approaches will work best when we leave behind the vestiges of paper and find ways to "free" data so end users can manipulate/flow/use it in ways that make sense to them.
kal
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