Publishers must be giving away magazine subscriptions. In a given week, five or six different magazines arrive in my mailbox, from the useless (Esquire, FHM), to the “meh” (New York) to the worthwhile (TapeOp, Wired). I don’t know why; I don’t pay for them. I’m not about to call anyone and question them. I’ve never received a bill, and TapeOp is free.
Without the subscription to Wired, I wouldn’t know that the magazine’s editor keeps a blog where he touches on themes explored in his book. I started reading it every now and then because, well, my website was (for a while) related to my book (before it got boring), and because I’ve helped spawn a few online magazines in recent years. His blog entry yesterday explored something I have previously written about and explored. In six steps, he lays out a plans for altering media to allow for optimal participation from both producer and consumer.
The bylines that I wrote after co-founding QRO Magazine are eerily similar to what the guy from Wired states are the pivotal steps for creating a seamless publication with equal participation from staff and audience. His ideas include processing content as it arrives in real-time, granting readers the ability to tinker with the product, from article layout to headlines and editing, and determine what stories are most interesting. When I finished reading, I was disappointed that a year has passed and I haven’t been proactive about implementing my ideas, or motivating my co-editors to help see them through. Our magazine sits dead.
The best example of parity in our ideas is his stating, “Why not give comments equal status to the story they’re commenting on?” The most important idea that I pushed for in the creation of QRO was, “Create a portal where music fans can discover new music and provide their own ideas or thoughts through implementation of feedback and comment fields, which will be open to all and will be weighted equally with the article to which they are attached.” My goal was a communal magazine, one that would “lift the veil of pretentiousness that surrounds most online music magazines, and provide readers with completely objective reporting.” It never happened.
I hope it doesn’t sound like I’m touting myself as some kind of genius. I got absolutely nothing accomplished when I tried to do this. If anything, I failed miserably. His ideas are way more informed than mine, and he’s actually in a position to implement them. All the tactics he describes are viable, and I imagine the transition to such a format would be relatively easy. If Wired isn’t the first major publication to begin using this format, the media outlet which first applies these principles will be the one to revitalize the magazine industry, and perhaps set in motion a series of advancements that completely alters the way we interact with our media.
