05-22-2015, 11:54 PM
(05-19-2015, 03:14 PM)Silver Wrote: The forum does not have enough traffic to make it anything more than an archive, thats true. I was one of those saying you will be burned out maintaining a momentum with the magazine as you did, but it was not the frequency alone I argued, rather the volume: It was huge, 120 pages total? You are correct about the frequent publication, the build up, the momentum etc. If you ask me, it would have been much more successful with 3-4 pages every day, than 120 once a month, but is that possible?
Short, small, frequent articles in the form of news that would timely reach the audience would be the best approach, with some short reviews and advertisements included. Does not have to be acrobat format, could just be a newsletter. Those are the times, news fly fast. But can you support this, do you want to do this, or is there any point to your effort? Most of us probably find what we need from various websites anyway, I personally read a deal too many. To give a honest answer if you send magazines/newsletters/fliers out I will happily read them, but I am not really missing them when they are not coming.
It was neither the frequency (monthly) nor the volume (page count) that were why the magazine ceased publication. It wasn't burnout. Rather, once the deadline was missed on the last issue, the more that it got pushed back, the less of a priority that it became. Deadline discipline and page count were both instrumental in giving me more of a reason to keep publishing, rather than less.
There's no way that a daily publishing schedule of even just a few pages would be feasible for me. Articles that I wrote for the first nine issues were typically (though not always) written on the last day or two before publication.
Some might not prefer PDF format, but personally speaking, I do. I likely wouldn't have any interest in publishing a magazine or a newsletter in non-PDF format. It's not an ideal format for a mobile device (primarily cell phone) audience, but not using a cell phone, myself (I used to, for a number of years), I'm more inclined to leave that focal point to others to explore and exploit.
I always prefer honest answers. It's the only kind of feedback that is useful to me.
I can appreciate the perspective that you're not really missing them, when they're not being published. To a degree, I feel the same way. But, at least as far as the PBM medium is concerned, in the absence of Suspense & Decision being published, what's now filling that void?
The forum's current traffic flow, I agree, makes it little more than an archive. Traffic flow can be increased. It waxes and wanes, depending upon other factors.