Mr. Magazine

A Mr. Magazine™ “Quotable” Retrospective…

Celebrate Magazines Celebrate Print. The theme for ACT 6 Experience that takes place April 20 to 22, 2016. Painting by and © Laura McCrory.
For information about the ACT 6 Experience email me at samir.husni@gmail.com

I have been a firm believer in print and its power even when many doubted its future and even its role in today’s media world. I have been quoted as saying, “As long as we have human beings, we will have print.” And that quote stands firm and true as we enter into a brand New Year.

Of course, I’m not oblivious to the fact that we live in a digital age…just check the many devices you and I are using on a daily basis, even the platform that you’re reading this on now as we connect. Yet that did not deter my belief in the role and future of print. Nor, will it ever.

However, as an academic and a professor of journalism, I’d rather share with you what others from the field say about the future and the role of print in today’s media world and tomorrow’s; that way it isn’t just my word you’re hearing and reading. Never would I yearn to be lumped in with others who pontificate to high heaven with their opinions and speculations for the condition of magazines and magazine media; be it print or digital or any other platform that may arise before I can finish writing this. The blah-blah-blah disease spreads pretty fast on its own, without any help from Mr. Magazine™

And so without any further ado, here is the ninth installment of the 136 quotes (in random order) that Mr. Magazine™ has accumulated over the last two years through the wonderfully informative conversations I have had with the game changers and the passionate entrepreneurs in the magazine industry.

129. “The excitement that comes and builds on Instagram and all of the posts that we re-Gram, the day the issue arrives; these consumers stage little photo shoots the day their magazine gets there because it is their time, when they’re online looking for recipes, that’s not me-time, that’s family-prep time. They’re working. When they sit down to go through Southern Living magazine that is time that they’ve decided to set aside for them every single month. They really lose themselves in the pages of Southern Living and I can’t think of a better time for advertisers to reach them than during their me-time.” (on the advantage of having a printed magazine in this digital age) Ron King, Publisher, Southern Living.

130. “I think magazines are different; there’s a different creative concept; a different mix of text and graphics. Something that makes one plus one equal more than two and that’s something that maybe magazines can’t do as fast as electronic media can do, but there are things that magazines can do that aren’t just replicated online. And then there’s the more basic answer; you get better writing.” Jack Kliger, Publisher, Tablet magazine.

131. “I think that print has been wildly underestimated. The Internet came along and people imagined that it was a tool to be used for every single thing in their lives. But it’s not a tool for everything in their lives; it’s a tool for some very important things in our lives like news or information, information that we need for our daily lives, but I don’t necessarily know that the Internet is the right medium for deeper reads.” Alana Newhouse, Editor-In-Chief, Tablet magazine.

132. “And how not to burn out at it, if you’re small, just one or two people, how do you keep it fresh? I think that is one of the big challenges with digital media. It reminds me of going to a sushi place, where they have these little rivers and they do their California rolls and put them on floating plates and you sort of grab the little bites as they go by; to me digital media often feels like that. It’s just not sustaining from a reader’s standpoint. And that was a lot of the impetus for wanting to do print, because the relationship between the reader and the words is different. It feels like it sates you and fills you up better.” Steve Casimiro, Founder, Adventure Journal Quarterly.

133. “I am a big believer that there is this turning point now or in the very near future where people are being reminded of the luxury of reading offline. I know that myself, because when I’m online I have this low level of anxiety that comes with reading online because I feel like I can never get to the end of what’s ahead. There’s just endless information and I’m forever bookmarking things and saying I’ll come back to that later. And I do think there is this return to print and what that brings is you’ve invested some money, say $15, it’s not cheap, you’ve invested the money so you’re going to stop and make some time.” Rick Bannister, Co-Founder, Pallet magazine.

134. “We’re also not interested in objects that are just throwaways. We’ve spent so much time in this content and so much of ourselves; the idea of putting that in a magazine that people would toss and not keep around for a long time as something that they cherished just didn’t sit right.” (on why they wanted the magazine’s production values of the highest quality) Nadia Saccardo, Co-Founder, Pallet magazine.

135. “We see the website as just growing into a community for the people who believe in the magazine and in craft beer and who want to find each other. And that’s why I love the fact that the website isn’t just regurgitated content that we expect people to be holding in their hands; it’s something complementary to that content.” (on the magazine’s content and the website’s content being totally different) Sam Calagione, Founder & President Dogfish Head Brewery & Pallet Executive Editor.

136. “I think they both (print and digital) have their own advantages, but with print you feel more relaxed and I have to tell you the truth; I only read news digitally, but I really don’t have the time to read long stories onscreen. It’s nice, but I don’t have the time; it’s tiresome. But in print, I love to read the longer stories. And I think that’s the advantage of print; you just relax. I know that sounds cliché, but it’s true. I’m more relaxed when I have a hard copy; it’s so tactile.” Fermin Albert, Founder, Sabor magazine.

These 136 quotes are from some of the most notable leaders in the industry, who lead some of the most prestigious publishing companies around today. There are also quotes from up and coming leaders whose talent and passion for magazines (ink on paper, of course) knows no boundaries. And that’s why their vision is so important to the industry’s future. Supporting them and the print platform is an obligation that’s paramount to those of us who love the medium.

Until next time – Happy 2016 and remember to Celebrate the Power of PRINT …

All the best,
Mr. Magazine™