Over the years I have subscribed to various magazines without exception PC related. But as financial circumstances have change or the content of the magazines failed to inspire interest most are now occasional reads. I cam upon a BBC publication in a hospital waiting room called Focus which is devoted to science and technology and is written in a language that you do not need a degree in some science to understand though of course the odd word needs to be Googled. As yet I have not decided whether to subscribe. Computer Active is a magazine I have bought almost from the first edition. Simple stuff but excellent reading for the little boys room as is Webuser. I used to get CustomPC but found that the articles were pretty similar each month it seem to focus on a very small range of PC components. So that is a very occasional read nowadays. PCGamer I stopped this as it seem to be reviewing totally different games than I was playing even if they were the same. I got a distinct impression money changed hands for a favourable review. PCFormat went the same way as CustomPC for pretty much the same reason. It was pretty much the same stuff each month.
I had a CustomPC sub for over 3 years, reading it pretty religiously in the bath. However, once CPC and BT split, it seems that the content is duplicated between the two quite frequently, meaning there was absolutely no need to pay for it any more. I liked the monthly features and whatnot, but I just don't think that was solely worth the money in the end I'm afraid.
Back in the day I used to read PC Gamer and/or PC Zone, then I realised the hardware section of said mags was my favourite part, so I moved onto Custom PC. Nowadays I don’t read any. Magazines don’t offer anything more than what I get on the internet for free. In fact, they really offer less, since most of the content is old by the time the magazine goes to print.
I had a CPC sub for ages too. I didn't mind that they were similar because I only read it on the bog and I'm not the sort to take his phone/tablet into the toilet. In the end I cancelled it and bought a few Viz annuals. Much funnier and better reading for short visits.
Used to have a CPC subscription. Stopped reading it a number of years ago now can't remember the exact reason think it was mainly boredom. Also have had a total Guitar subscription in the past but when i Moved to uni I got rid of it to save some money. get most of the info i would get from most magazines on the internet now anyway, Have a few free subscriptions from various places that I do read from time to time. Like my employer give us all a subscription to the Financial times, BSD mag do a PDF so have that each month and will thumb through to see if theres anything interesting. will buy the odd copy of new Scientist from time to time.
I subscribed to Custom PC from about issue 20 onwards, and cancelled my sub a couple of months ago. As others have said, you can get the same information online these days, and quicker, so paper magazines seem kind of pointless. What CPC was good for was in-depth articles and group tests, but others have caught up and overtaken CPC in these areas now. Another strike against CPC is that it's become quite thin on content, or at least thin on content that I'm interested in. I knew it was time to cancel my sub when I found three months' worth of CPCs, still in their shrink-wrap, sitting in the pile of junk mail next to the front door. I'd obviously put them there without even opening them. Contrast that with days gone by when I'd rip them open and read them from cover to cover
I think, professional writing and good editing are important and there can be a distinct lack of that when it comes to the internet. I think such things are more likely to be found in an off-line publication. But magazines are expensive and I would rarely read one cover to cover, as not everything is of interest to me in a single publication. I used to read customer pc. They could for example do feature on a round up of low tier graphics cards such as a bunch of 960's and their AMD equivalents which in itself could form the main article in an issue. Such a feature wouldn't interest me because I wouldn't buy such cards. With magazines, the value proposition just isn't there for me personally. I also used to read focus. Its not a bad magazine at all. There is something about magazines though, that as a long term thing I just don't stick with them. Maybe its the same format written by the same authors every single month, coupled with the fact that I would end up reading stuff that doesn't really interest me (which could be attributed to the sunk cost fallacy) and eventually going through magazines ends up being a chore rather than something enjoyable and informative. The on demand, no monetary cost nature of the internet is light years ahead of traditional publishing in that respect. You read only what you like and ignore what you don't and there's no penalty involved for not reading most of what a website produces, since you aren't wasting your money by not reading it (no sunk cost fallacy in other words).
None regularly, but I'll pick up a copy of BSH http://www.backstreetheroes.com/ if I see it whilst out and various air gun magazines if and when the fancy takes.
I think this is a problem in specialist media such as pc enthusiast stuff. You basically have new generation of components come out every year or so, with the flagship on release followed by the lower tiered components. Once the flagships have been covered you basically have a predictable set of lower tiers that generally don't throw up any surprises. From all of that your interests are probably only going to lie with one teir of products across a handful of brands and that's about it. The amount of content that can be generated from all of that which would be genuinely interesting would probably fit in a single magazine issue.
That's true to a certain extent: there are only so many "build a PC" guides that CPC can publish before it gets seriously old. However, there's also a lot of stuff in CPC that isn't "new tech" related that I've got little interest in reading - for example, Gareth's Hobbytech section is 3 or 4 pages and of minimal interest to me: I might skim it very briefly but more often than not I don't read it word-for-word. Similarly, the section on Folding is of absolutely zero interest, so that's another two pages that I don't ever read. The Elite list is interesting every so often, but I don't read it every single month (this one is probably "new tech" related, to be fair, as things are quite static just now) and there's another 8 or so pages that I don't read. That makes over a dozen pages (a significant proportion of the mag's printed pages) that I don't read. Add in a couple of the regular columns (particularly Tracey King's, but thank god they got rid of Robert Whatshisname) and there's not a massive amount of content left that I want to read. I don't want to sound as if I'm bashing the magazine - it's just not for me anymore. As I said earlier, CPC used to set the standard for technical analysis, in-depth reviews and group tests. It still does these things well, but unfortunately there are sites out there who do it better and more immediately.
Whilst I on the other hand, liked Gareth's Hobby Tech feature. It's definitely something I would read were I still purchasing the magazine. I thought it gave a bit of novelty and life to the magazine as well. Therein lies the problem with magazines and general media. You simply can't please everyone even if all of your consumers are within a similar demographic. I think its why the format will eventually die off. The internet allows the consumer to pick the content they enjoy with laser precision. Often it lacks the polish of traditional media, but that is typically made up for by having content that is just not available in traditional media.
This pretty much sums it up for me, especially the final paragraph. If CPC went over a fully digital format, there would be zero downtime in getting articles out the door, and it could compete and best the likes of Hexus, Tomshardware etc, while at the same time going down the niche avenues such as folding and hobbytech.
Used to subscribe to quite a few: Custom PC PC Pro PC Gamer Retro Gamer Linux Format I transitioned to digital copies of the above for a while but one by one I cut them and once my PC Gamer digital sub ran out last month I haven't renewed. Hadn't actually read it for a few months so decided to just leave it. I dont know whether this was down to it being a digital copy and just forgetting or if I'm just not interested in it any more. If I got a physical mag through the post I would always give it a customary flick through but sometimes wouldn't bother going back to read it properly. Other times I'd make a note of features that interested me and just read those. I do miss reading my monthly magazines though, somehow despite the internet there would always be something new I'd find out because of them. Got to know the writers styles and looked forward to certain people's reviews/features - this grew when the magazines also did podcasts on the side. But these days I just use the internet for gaming/tech news - youtube for video reviews of products. Sometimes I might have to go digging a bit more to find something unique but for the most part it hits the spot.
I think some content is just fundamentally better-suited to the internet than to print media. Take the Folding section - it's basically just a big collection of leaderboard tables, updated every month, that take up at least two pages. This is the sort of thing that should really be online and updated in real time. I mean, by the time the leaderboards are published in the mag, they're already out of date It might have sounded like I was bashing Hobbytech, but I'm not at all. I like the fact that CPC are publishing some of this "niche" content, and it's great for those that enjoy it. It's just that I don't personally have much interest in it, so that entire section is superfluous to me. I do like some of the editorials and columns, but they do vary in terms of how interesting they are, and most of the interesting columns would benefit from being longer. Due to printed space limitations, they can't be, unlike if they were online. There are also a couple of columns that I really dislike (as mentioned above) Absolutely agree with theshadow's post #11 above, too. You can't please all of the people all of the time
Custom PC Banzai Japanese Performance DSport Cars and tech, pretty much the two things I'm into the most. There's photography and gaming too but I have no intention of subbing to photography and gaming mags. I pick up the occasional one now and then.
PC Pro PC Advisor Computer Shopper Micro Mart Web User Top Gear Classics Monthly F1 Racing What Car All About History BBC History Total Guitar plus access to around 100 others. I get all of these free on my Tablet using Zinio app for Android through my local library. If you have a library card it's worth checking out whether your local one also gives access to them. The only downsides are that the Zinio app for Android is crap and the developers are lazy and also it doesn't allow storage on a MicroSD card. You can also access the magazines through an iPad, Kindle or PC, not sure if it is also available on Macs. Edit: Full list of available magazines here
I used to be a Micro Mart guy. It's still my preference but I can't say I've bought it (or any mag) for quite some time.
Back when I was into music in a big way it was Modern Drummer and Rhythm, but that's a long time ago now (over 10 years). Nowadays because of my studies and passion for art it's usually ImagineFX, and if there's something in it really worth checking out, Advanced Photoshop. Generally I don't buy magazines, because there's so much stuff online for free. But I have to admit it's really nice to sit down with a "real" magazine once in a while.
Since I first got broadband, about thirteen years ago, I have not had any magazine subs and, I think, buy less than one magazine per year. Used to subscribe to PCAdvisor and Car and buy random others.
Wired (UK edition) There's plenty of very well written articles and it gets me away from a screen during my lunch break, I get through the mag in about 2 weeks of 30min lunches.
