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In lugnet.publish.brickjournal, Allan Johansen wrote:
> The BrickJournal used to be a magazine written by fans for fans; and a
> fairly good one at that. Now, it's a magazine written by fans for money. And
> in my experience, that's where things usually go wrong. How much do you pay
> the writers? How much do you ask for the magazine? What happens when some of
> the writers suddenly decide that they want more money? Do you raise the
> price? Then the writers want more, the price must be raised again. It's a
> spiral that you're never getting out of again. Been there, done that.
When I look at the transition of BrickJournal from free to pay I always try to
keep in mind the disaster of Bricks magazine. In order to get to the point of a
printed magazine (1) Joe had no choice but to start off free. He had to get
people used to the idea that a LEGO hobby-related fan magazine could work, and
could work on a regular basis.
And I think he's done that. We're at issue 9 now, and it's so long it almost
could have been two issues. :)
But from the beginning people have been asking for a printed version of the
magazine... I know I'm certainly one of them. And printing a magazine is
expensive; no way around that.
My feeling is that if a person had been interested in BrickJournal from the very
beginning then they've probably already downloaded all of the free files. So
they already have many/most of the free versions. And if someone just discovers
the magazine as it's become a pay-to-read enterprise then they'll have to buy
back issues. That's not at all uncommon in the magazine industry. But to go
forward, to get to the level of a printed magazine, Joe had no choice but to
look at ways to raise funds.
I know that he's very much responding to a desire (for a printed magazine) that
has been raised over and over. He's trying to keep it reasonably priced and
trying to make sure it reaches as many people as possible. There will be
mistakes, there will be the need to change gears from time to time, there will
be decisions that aren't popular with 100% of the readership. But this is the
only magazine like this (2) available to LEGO fans (and potential fans) and I
personally feel it's worth supporting. I know that I have put a lot of hours
into copy editing articles for the last five issues of BrickJournal. But those
hours don't even come close to the HUGE number of hours that Joe has put into it
from the beginning. I think he deserves a lot of credit for the effort he's put
into making BrickJournal a sustainable entity.
> I'm not saying that it's going to happen to you. In fact, I hope it won't.
> But sadly, once you start mixing money into volunteer fan-based work,
> things, in my experience, tends to go wrong.
If you have experience you feel would help avoid pitfalls, maybe you and Joe
could talk privately. He might benefit from the knowledge you have and perhaps
that could be used to make BrickJournal as successful as possible. :)
All the best,
Allan B.
(1) The importance here, in my mind, is that the LEGO building hobby NEEDS a
printed magazine to be the document of record. There is so much going on and so
little being written about this hobby. I'm hopeful that many fans will see the
positive growth that BrickJournal is going through and will come along for the
ride! :)
(2) Meaning a magazine about the entire hobby. This statement is not in any way
meant to disregard RailBricks magazine.
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