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Do you buy magazines?

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09:26 / 05.05.04

I am going through a travel magazine phase at the moment, so recently have been reading Wanderlust and the National Geographic travel magazine.

I occasionally read Adbusters, New Scientist, Wired, Believer, random Linux magazines, and some other magazines that I can't remember.

My favourite magazine was Amiga Power, but that has been dead for many years now.

Goodness Gracious Meme

09:32 / 05.05.04

Don't really buy mags for money reasons mainly....

Grab various freebies regularly:

Schnews, Pink Paper, Boyz, G3, local listings things.

If i had more splashy cash, regular buys/subs would be:

Bitch
Mute
Another (I *love* this, but... *how* much?)
Bust
Smash Hits

and i'd almost certainly buy

The Wire
Frieze
Parkett
Make

occasionally.

Oh, and occasionally buy

The Big Issue, Diva.

11:04 / 05.05.04

Mute is online by the way. Not the whole thing, but the archives are pretty damn sexy. I'm defintely going to snap up the next issue of this the moment I see it.

Regrettable Juvenilia

11:34 / 05.05.04

I honestly hadn't realised that I don't buy magazines anymore until I read this thread. And I used to read quite a few. Huh. I guess I don't hate the internet after all.

Goodness Gracious Meme

11:58 / 05.05.04

oh, and occasionally
Counselling, the BACP journal, which I really should subscribe to.

11:59 / 05.05.04

Jst spent all morning reading a lengthy interview with artist Steve Willats on that site., Fantastic stuff.

Goodness Gracious Meme

12:02 / 05.05.04

I honestly hadn't realised that I don't buy magazines anymore until I read this thread. And I used to read quite a few. Huh. I guess I don't hate the internet after all.

Thass interesting, Fly. As I think I would stil read alot of magazines if I had the cash, as often I just like them as objects (Another and Parkett, esp.) and I don't like reading long articles on computer screens, find I don't concentrate very well.

12:07 / 05.05.04

I rarely read magazines, I'm not really sure why. I used to read Jockey Slut, though I haven't picked it up in years. I sometimes read X-ray, Empire and the Idler, depending on what's on the cover and how flush I am.
Squirmelia, Amiga Power truly was the greatest magazine ever, I mourn its passing greatly.

Goodness Gracious Meme

12:11 / 05.05.04

Oh, used to read Raygun pretty regularly.

And Sinclair User is surely the greatest computer title ever.

12:31 / 05.05.04

Shtuff I read:

New Yorker (about 1 of every 4 issues; most of the "good" articles eventually make it to the web for a limited time (and in the google cache).

Atlantic/Harpers/TNR - I used to have subscriptions to all of these, but I dropped 'em because there seem to be only 1-2 lenghty articles in each I'm really interested in, and because Atlantic/TNR's editorial politics are too conservative for me ("even the liberal New Republic" is a joke.). TNR has some of the most entertaining arts coverage (that's not to say I *agree* with them all the time), though, with house critics Stanley Kaufman, Jed Perl and Dale Peck (infamous for a Rick Moody review last year, roommate of Gawker's Choire Sicha, and - according to Maisonneuve (see below) is at work on an "origin of Magneto" miniseries) handing in hatchet jobs on a regular basis. Most of that stuff makes the web for free, eventually, but most of TNR is subscribers-only now. I think a fair amount of Atlantic Monthly articles are on the web.

SPIN - i will buy this every now and again, but in general I refuse to buy magazines mostly made of lists. BLENDER, of which I just picked up my first issue (C. Love!) seems to me to be surprisingly good for a Maxim mag publication.

Artforum, Modern Painter - quarterly. I'll buy Artforum when they're concentrating on painting, but not every month. They've got articles on the Web, too.

The Believer - when they've got an interview with someone I like, or an article by someone I like.

Time Out New York - I usually just steal a friend's the look at what's playing at movie revival houses and make fun of the personals.

Readymade - great fun! If I had a house, I would be doing all sorts of these projects.

Maisonneuve - apparently a Canadian publication. Read an issue last month, liked it very much indeed. Like Harpers but "younger." There is supposedly another Canadian mag aimed at the young nerd demo but I can't recall what the name is. It might not have been launched yet.

Freshwater and Saltwater Tropical Fish Hobbyist - another thing the web does better.

12:38 / 05.05.04

I've supposedly got a New Statesman subscription, but they have probably cancelled it due to my inability to pay any money to anybody. Either that or one of my flatmates keeps on stealing it.

I buy Prospect each month, and occasionally grab New Scientist/Scientific American. I also read a paper almost every day - either the Times, the Guardian or the Independent.

12:51 / 05.05.04

Thank heavens, as the crap jingle used to go, for magazines. My pathological fear of being even momentarily bored is such that I'll frequently pick up any old crap just to avoid finding myself at a loose end on Underground journeys. When Xoc and I lived apart and every other weekend was spent commuting between London and Edinburgh, the need was even greater.

Subscriptions: the British Medical Journal and the British Journal of Psychiatry. The latter, in particular, can be terribly dry, and has often remained in its wrapper. I've taken to skimreading the online versions at work, though.

Buy daily: the Guardian.

Buy weekly: Time Out, The New Statesman; used to buy Heat religiously (when it first came out, it was superb). The Sunday supplements: Observer and Sunday Times.

Weekly freebies: the 'gaypers' - The Pink Paper, QX, Boyz.

Buy monthly: Attitude and Gay Times, the latter more out of old-skool loyalty than anything else, really; a whole loooad of male fashion mags, although I don't automatically pick 'em up the way I used to (still look forward to the doorstop fashion specials); go through phases of buying Elle Decoration and other interiors glossies (will probably do this more regularly once we've got our own flat again).

Pervery: occasional Skin Twos (although I now flick through it in Borders first, to assess the fetishblokes:women ratio); I went through a phase of buying motorbike mags (which did more for me than the intentionally fetish stuff...) and know a ridiculous amount of two-wheeled trivia for someone who's never owned a bike; occasional Dive magazines, partly for the Men In Rubber! element, but also a half-hearted interest in One Day, Getting Back Into Scuba.

Occasional: all sorts of stuff; I'll buy virtually anything once; particularly shallow tendency to impulse-buy film mags based on whoever's on the front.

Fallen by the wayside: NME (years ago), The Face, The List (because, er, I don't live in Edinburgh any more), Fetish Times, 2000AD (just went off it), Judge Dredd the Megazine (ditto), Q (which means, scarily, I'm not reading any regular music mag), Comic Review (got bored with it) and all the late-80s/early-90s comics magazines that quietly (or not so quietly) folded.

Goodness Gracious Meme

13:29 / 05.05.04

I read this as

occasional Diva magazines, partly for the Men In Rubber! element

13:48 / 05.05.04

Nah, you're confusing scuba with muff.

13:58 / 05.05.04

i totally forgot, i have a subscription to reader's digest. it was a gift, but i love reader's digest, i'm not kidding. i grew up on it! i've been reading it since i was, like, six. i even think the jokes are funny. and if i read it while premenstrual, at least one story in there will certainly make me cry.
i also like entertainment weekly a lot. it has a bad rep for some reason, but i think it's largely smart and funny.

15:06 / 05.05.04

Is it just me, or has Q become increasingly shitty recently? (And by recently, I mean, in the last year or so...)

Regrettable Juvenilia

16:04 / 05.05.04

Nah, you've just come to yr senses.

Matthew Fluxington

16:21 / 05.05.04

Ugh, I deeply loathe Artforum. It just makes me shiver just thinking about that awful magazine. I've never found an art world magazine that doesn't make me want to burn out my eyes, but I have a special kind of hate for those hacks.

03:54 / 06.05.04

Todd wrote: Maisonneuve - apparently a Canadian publication. Read an issue last month, liked it very much indeed. Like Harpers but "younger." There is supposedly another Canadian mag aimed at the young nerd demo but I can't recall what the name is. It might not have been launched yet.

Maisonneuve is based out of Montreal... the new mag might be 'The Walrus'? The publishers say they're trying to make a Canadian version of Harper's with it.... the third issue of it should be out this month or next.

13:05 / 06.05.04

I buy Sleaze and Zembla sometimes. Is the Fortean Times worth £3.20, anyone?

14:03 / 06.05.04

I'd give you.. about a quid for it.

It provides a modicum of entertainment and is occasionally actually interesting.

17:34 / 06.05.04

New Scientist
Creative Review
Grafik
2000AD
Mojo
Sleaze
Zembla
Times Educational Supplement

18:14 / 06.05.04

I don't buy magazines but my boyfiend reads (brace yourself) heat.

It provides the occasional giggle and nude photo of Bruce Willis. So it can't be all bad.

Can it?

VonKobra,Scuttling&Slithering

11:15 / 08.05.04

While submerged and playing a dark game of cat&mouse with the Convoy Escorts, I will often be found reading...

Vanity Fair
Q
Alternative Press
Punk Planet
FHM

In olden times (before the Type XII Unterseeboot was even wetly dreamed of) I would read:

Viz
Popsmear
Maximum Rock'n Roll
Rolling Stone
Kerrang!

And I've always read comics. At present I read:

Lucifer
The Punisher
The Filth
Anything by Moore

Whisky Priestess

18:56 / 08.05.04

Thanks for the Idler tip, Jefe. I was momentarily nonplussed but then I realised I had got it confused with former Private Eye editor Richard Ingram's retirement hobby, The Oldie.

14:51 / 09.05.04

Is it just me, or has Q become increasingly shitty recently?

I had thought so as well. Then again, the only magazines I don't consider to have 'gone a bit nu-metal of late' are Private Eye and The Economist, and I'm not even sure I've read the latter recently enough to make a judgement call on its nu-metal or otherwise status. So chances are my judgement of such things is skewed...

15:38 / 09.05.04

i agree private eye is still blisteringly hott.
the economist i always catch myself reading in my dads voice, so i doubt if one could call it nu-mag just yet.

is anyone still reading new scientist on any kind of a regular basis? i had a sub, but i let it lapse when i realised i wasnt actually reading all of them.(this was especially so when i found one still in the cellophane the other day. it was from december last year, i think.

to mr VK...
do you really still read PP? i mean, i have a few issues still kicking about, but is it worth the asking these days?
it went through a phase of being really fucking lame a while back, and i was under the impression that not much was gonna change.
do they still have the boring-as-a-bag-of-sawdust columnists? and the useless reviews? have they got any writers on board from anywhere else on the punking planet? any ozzies or brits? germans? french?

17:07 / 09.05.04

I used to like Private Eye until I met someone who works there. He was a sleazy old man and he hit on me, hence, perhaps unfairly, putting me off the whole shebang.

Similarly, since the Punk Planet forums crashed and burned, I can't bring myself to buy the zine anymore...

All very unfair, I know, but there you go

VonKobra,Scuttling&Slithering

06:43 / 12.05.04

Yeah well about 2\3 to 1\2 of PP is actually READABLE per issue.
I kind of like it in a Trainspotter-ish way just to see what's becoming of all the people from good bands that broke up. New projects etc.
I get awful urges to burn the goddamn thing when I read JD's cloying cardiganpunk articles and reviews though, I must admit.

08:13 / 12.05.04

cardiganpunk!
woolcore!

angora-beat.

dude.

No star here laces

13:36 / 12.05.04

Is that for readers of Golf Punk magazine?

Golf Punk should be a gay subculture actually, or something that happens to you in prison. It certainly shouldn't be a magazine about fucking golf.

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