Magazine Subscriptions - why pay?
 

I just sent letters out to two of the prominent flying model airplane hobby magazine publishers asking them for reduced annual subscription fees. Here's my basis from a recent April 08 issue:

Total pages 162
Full ad pages 91
Product Reviews or New Releases 34
Partial page ads 4
Modeling Journalism Pages 33 (what's left)

I score a Product Review or New Release page as 75% advertisement. In my opinion, a Product Review is merely an ad presented in article format. For pages with partial advertising (regardless of actual area used), I simplify the tabulation by scoring those pages as 25% advertisement. So you can see that this magazine is only 20.4% hobby journalism. Other industry magazines are scoring greater than 71% (i.e., Flying Models, Model Aviation).

A second publication had a score of only 14.1%!!

I offered this – They're asking me to renew a one-year subscription for $27.95 each. I offered to pay a percentage of that based directly on how much reading material they provide. Let's see what they say.

RE: Magazine Subscriptions - why pay?
 

I'll be watching this one. Good work!

RE: Magazine Subscriptions - why pay?
 

Excellent topic! I gave up on all the mags years ago for that exact reason. Some are better than others, but with so much info available on the web, I couldn't justify the need for even one single subscription. I get my fix online now....the cost is next to nothing and think of all the trees I'm saving. :)

RE: Magazine Subscriptions - why pay?
 

Good analysis. That's exactly why I don't bother with the mags any more. I hope you get more than just a form-letter response to this - should be interesting.

RE: Magazine Subscriptions - why pay?
 

What are you going to do, sit on the toilet with your laptop?:D

RE: Magazine Subscriptions - why pay?
 

OK, you got me there. But if I had a laptop, you bet I would. The wife would just LOVE that. :)

RE: Magazine Subscriptions - why pay?
 

Somebody been peakin in my bathroom?

RE: Magazine Subscriptions - why pay?
 

Hey now, a lap top and Real Flite G3.5 in the toilet is called nothing but quality time. I do agree on the magazines. They have gone up in price to where your average folk can't afford to buy one and they are jam packed full of ad's. Nice research and Good Luck, Dave

RE: Magazine Subscriptions - why pay?
 

That mag your talking about;-- It wouldn't suprise me if it was the AMA Model Aviation !!!! If it didn't go with my membership, I SURE wouldn't pay for it.

RE: Magazine Subscriptions - why pay?
 

Agreed. MA is the ONLY magazine that I pay for. Thats only because I'm FORCED to pay for it with my membership.

Here!! Go to the AMA and take their survey. It's a survey about the magazine. Tell 'em how ya REALLY feel. I made it clear that I do NOT like being forced to pay for the magazine. I'd much rather take a discount in my yearly dues.

http://www.modelaircraft.org/news/survey1107.aspx

Scroll down the page and click the button that says:
Click here to take the survey

RE: Magazine Subscriptions - why pay?
 

The other day, a club member brought out a stack of magazines, that he was done, with for anybody to take. I took two of the glossies as i have never read them before. I realized VERY quickly why i don't subscribe to them. I got thru both magazines in less than thirty minutes (mostly just looking at pictures). I quickly learned that all of the reviews were written from the same template with blanks left in there for the author to insert the model name. Along with the redundancy of the "reviews," comes the endless amount of advertisement...unreal.

I read R/C report once, and called the next day to subscribe. They demonstrate how a magazine should be written and at a fair price to boot!

RE: Magazine Subscriptions - why pay?
 

Have you considered that the magazine people are charging you for the content and including the ads as a free gift?:D Or maybe the reverse is true. [>:]I notice you mention Flying Models and Model Aviation as having higher percentages of content. I think Flying Models is the best general model aviation magazine going. Flying Model ads include a lot of small interesting ads, I think.

RE: Magazine Subscriptions - why pay?
 

Well put.

The biggest negative I've seen in a model review was that the box it came in had a bad spot on it somewhere, or the graphics were tired looking, or some such thing. Who cares, I'm going to pitch the box very first thing anyway. Tell me HONESTLY what you found wrong with the parts, or assembly, or materials, or deviation from scale, or just how big a toad it was when you flew it. The way the articles are written though, each and every one is the best new plane to hit the runway; positive advertisement if there ever was any.

RE: Magazine Subscriptions - why pay?
 

I quit reading Model Airplane News a LONG time ago since finding these types of websites. You guys give the most honest review of any R/C product there is. If it's good, it generates a lot of threads, many good, some bad. If it just flat out sucks, you all are ruthless! :D Funny thing is, I have some 20+year old magazines, and they have WAY more useful articles and less adds. Anyone noticed they got cheap on the "Hints and Kinks" submissions? They used to give you a free, one year subscription to MAN if they published your idea. Now all they do is mail you some crappy baseball cap.

RE: Magazine Subscriptions - why pay?
 

I dropped MAN about 4 years ago and RCM about 6 or so years ago. RC Report is the rag I willingly pay for. Happy with it. And you're right, the most honest, brutal reviews are here.
Edwin

RE: Magazine Subscriptions - why pay?
 

I subscribe to one car mag and one boat mag. The car mag used to be good. The boat mag was an experiment. The boat mag is rubbish and the car mag has deteriorated to the point that its almost one big add and I will not be renewing either.
IMO the car mags are the worst, some plane mags are not too bad but they are all getting worse.
I am sick to death of reading the useless reviews. I understand that reviewers are not to keen on upsetting the companies that advertise in their mags but there is a very, very easy way around this.

I'll use said boat mag as an example. In every review they say stuff like, handles the waves like a champ, carves big S's, blah blah. This tells me absolutly nothing!!!

What they can do is state the facts. Just state the facts and let the reader decide. They are not bagging a product and the reader get useful information.
State information like

Top speed
Turning radius at WOT
Run time on xxxxmAh packs
Temp after a continuous WOT run
acceleration
etc
etc

This is good information. Telling me that "boat xxx is an excellent addition to my collection" is not.

RE: Magazine Subscriptions - why pay?
 

Not to add fuel to the fire, but check out the new feature on the RCR web site:

http://www.rcreport.ws/

and scroll down to "Meet Miss R/C REPORT and other models"

RE: Magazine Subscriptions - why pay?
 

R/C Report rocks! :D[sm=thumbup.gif]

RE: Magazine Subscriptions - why pay?
 

Is that Gordon's answer to the folks that were fussing about the ladies in the mag??:D

RE: Magazine Subscriptions - why pay?
 

ummmm....time to leave work and go home to the wife...nuff said!

(R/C report just gained a customer!)

RE: Magazine Subscriptions - why pay?
 

My vote goes to Courtney! [sm=wink_smile.gif]

RE: Magazine Subscriptions - why pay?
 

Well, sex sells. :eek:

Not a one of them looks over 16yrs of age. I have no lewd or disgusting comments.

Actually, IMHO -- shameful.

Wouldn't be AS bad if they were over 18 or 21yrs of age. But those girls look like teenagers to me.

Maybe I'm, just old? :eek:

RE: Magazine Subscriptions - why pay?
 

Or just prudish.

RE: Magazine Subscriptions - why pay?
 

Or old AND prudish :)

RE: Magazine Subscriptions - why pay?
 

Dick, Didnt see Kim in there.
Edwin

edit - I think they look so young cause we're so old!!!