1. Journalism Principles and Practices
Magazines
Journalism Principles and Practices

2. Magazines are volatile businesses...
Lears
Wired
Car Wash News (???)

3. Volatile right from the start
Ben Franklin went out of business with General Magazine
Bad roads, not a local medium
Not until late 1800’s when became viable...
Larger population
Sophisticated postal system
Cash, literacy, people living in cities

4. Magazines Were First Investigative Medium
Harper’s -- Boss Tweed
Ladies’ Home Journal - Patent Medicines
McClure’s - Ida Tarbell and Rockefeller
Muckrakers - Led to anti-trust laws, reform in meat industry

5. Magazines developed in climate of the times
Literary...
Harper’s McClure’s published fiction
Dickens, Poe, published in magazines
After WWI, less parochial view of the World - New Yorker, Algonquin Round Table

6. Climate of times, continued...
News...
Time in spun off Fortune, SI< Life, People
Time started as digest - solution to “information crisis”
Time developed its own writing method

7. Climate of times, continued...
Picture magazines...
Life, 1936
Look, 1937
High-quality photography showed war, poverty, birth of a child

8. But TV threatened to kill industry...
Television became mass entertainer
General-interest media declined
But almost by accident, magazines looked to...

9. Lifestyle Playboy, 1953... Girl next door MM pictures
Focus on what was NOT in magazine
Through 1960s, tighter focus on lifestyle...
Strength and Health, Flex
Modern Maturity
Ebony

10. Magazines Today
About 7,000 print according to best guess, but hard to define. Usually...
Bound
High Quality
Cover

11. Categories... By content... Consumer Trade Institutional Newsletters
By circulation method...
Newsstand and store
Distributed free
Paid circulation (in advance)
Controlled circulation

12. Magazine economy...
While many magazines go digital, industry is hurting
According to some surveys, only one in three Americans reads a magazine regularly

13. Circulation trending downward, says Pew (http://stateofthemedia

14. Still, magazine has some advantages...
Narrow demographic
Very durable
Customizable
High CPM

15. CPM is really basis for all media advertising...
As audience becomes more narrow, it is generally more attractive
Magazine CPM could be $45, network newscast $5

16. Finally, remember... Limited universe of advertisers means pressure
Some, but not all, sell “adjacencies,” or show copy in advance to advertisers
As a source of “news,” sometimes distorted