New Editor for MR

"Bruce Favinger" wrote in news:qorFh.326$ snipped-for-privacy@newssvr14.news.prodigy.net:

We'll have to see how it turns out... I didn't think Terry Thompson was all that great as an editor, but it might have been growing pains. It had gotten better before my subscription ended, though. (I did renew it, I just took 3 months off to decide if I missed it.)

Puckdropper

Quite honestly, I suspect that MR might be a lot better off if they'd choose an actual HO or N scale modeler to be editor instead of these tin-plate guys. Likewise, continually switching hats on existing personnel, rather than looking outside for a really suitable candidate, doesn't give me a lot of faith in the appropriateness of their recent selections.

CNJ999

IMHO, and hey, it's worth what you pay for it, they've lost sight of the fact that they 're a hobby magazine instead of some kind of entertainment rag. If you get a copy of the magazine and then purchase a half dozen of their .pdf files, you have just about what used to constitute a monthly issue. When each month had a month's worth of meat and ideas, it was fine. Now, it seems the articles are shorter and often have some kind of additional info on the web that may or may not be free. Why subscribe at all if half of the stuff you want or enjoy is in a separate downloadable file on their site, free or not? Just check the website and get anything you think is worthwhile. I think the web emphasis amounts to shooting themselves in the foot. Reference materials, compilations of articles, stuff like that may be worth a fee to download, but when you get six Acrobat pages for half or more the cost of an issue of the magazine, it's pretty clear that they want the maximum bucks not the maximum publication quality.

It reduces my enjoyment of a hobby subject to go after part of it on the web. Maybe that's just me, but the web and the computer are in the top five things I want to get away from when I pursue my hobby.

Regards

I pretty much feel the same way about the above. However, I've seen some magazines (mostly homeowner/remodeling-related) that have articles in the magazine that stand well on their own merits, and have

*additional* related materials available on their Web sites that is free and available only to subscribers. Sort of a perk for being a subscriber as opposed to buying a single copy off the newsstand.

I agree with the first statement here, when you have to go to the Web for stuff that should have been in the printed article in the first place. But I use my computer and the Web as tools to enhance my pursuit of the hobby, so like any other tool I keep them handy and will grab them when I need them.

Stevert

However, I've seen

This was one of the things I told them in the poll about the Pdf's, I also think 5-6 dolaars for a 5-10 page Pdf is a lot of money compaired to a printed magazine that reads a lot easier. I also think that if they would ask say 1-2 dollars for a Pdf they would please their subscribers and at the same time probably make more profit because they'd sell more ( the cost price of a Pdf is of course the same at any amount of copies ).

I couldn't research anything ( as I live in Holland ) without the computer and internet, heck I wouldn't even be aible to find the books I have purchased on model railroading and prototype.

Just got Santa Fe The Railway Gateway volume 2 and The Chief Way reference series yesterday, these would have been almost impossible to get here in Holland

I do think that MR is on the border of a good ratio between advertising and content , maybe over the border if you consider the new products part as cloaked advertising.What I truely find annoying are the coupons every 2 pages ( it seems this much ) to become a subscriber when you already are one. Would it be that much work to make separate batches for subscribers and single copy sales?

greetz Jan

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"Rashputin" wrote in news:yswFh.57$B7.38@bigfe9:

*snip*

I usually *don't* go after something on the web. I've now started flagging articles in a different magazine that I might want to look at later, but thought and opportunity don't often collide.

One magazine I subscribe to offers free PDF downloads of the entire magazine. You can get the printed copy and the electronic copy (or save about $10 and get the electronic copy only). I'm a big fan of this distribution method, it lets me read and enjoy the printed versions while having the electronic versions for my archives.

Puckdropper

snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com wrote in news:1172793641.577529.23100 @v33g2000cwv.googlegroups.com:

*plonk*

(Just attempting to set an example by adding this moron to my kill file.)

Puckdropper

We added you as you are a moron. They fired Beldar?

------

Steve

Huh? You just wrote that Neil Besougloff will be editor of MR.

The publisher can be a different individual than the editor.

He is an idiot that is why he did it.

------

Steve

Terry Thompson was brought in from outside.

While I don't take MR there was an editorial (last month?) by Terry that stated DCC would probably die because now the engines were sounding so good on DC. I had to get it word by word from the hilarious laughter of the person who was telling me. When everything quieted down it was stated here is a person who just doesn't get it. But to replace Larry with Moe is not going to help!

He most certainly was not. Prior to becoming editor of MR, Terry was an associate editor with Kalmbach's Classic Toy Trains magazine.

Swapping positions around internally has become a standard senario with Kalmbach in recent years...as has been loosing virtually all their seasoned associate editors. Among the replacements, it seems to me that only Dave Popp has any real abilities has a modeler, where once the staff was composed of all highly talented model railroaders (although still carried on the mastheard, talented oldtimers like Sperandeo was "reassigned" to run WGH years ago and Hediger supposedly a while ago).

CNJ999

That final line in my post was supposed to read: ...(although still carried on the mastheard, talented oldtimers like Sperandeo was "reassigned" to run WGH years ago and Hediger supposedly retired a while ago).

CNJ999

Is this true? How could somebody that clueless be the editor of a model railroading magazine? The editor needs an editor! :)

I haven't bought a new copy of MR since it stopped being of much interest to me as someone who primarily scratchbuilds. But there are 50 years of issues prior to that. I buy a few occasionally, and they're new to me, even if they were first mailed out in 1940.

Sorry about the burst of posts from me (especially the really poorly typed ones :), but I'm trying to contribute some model railroading content to increase the signal/noise ratio here as of late...

Dale

Perhaps a naive view...and perhaps not. After 15 years or more of DCC's presence in the hobby, no poll or survey has been able to demonstrate that DCC is in use on more than perhaps 25% of all layouts and its growth factor continues to be quite slow. There seems to be a majority of longtime DC'ers with existing layouts that have no intention of making any change or upgrade. And while DCC may be a favorite among younger/newbie hobbyists and those building entirely new layouts, the appeal is far less for those well established modelers with lots of existing DC equipment. If I were to speculate on the matter, I'd have to say that not until the Boomer Generation, most of whom are today quite satisfied with their DC operation, passes from the scene, is it likely that DCC will gain any majority percentage in the hobby.

CNJ999

CNJ999:

Or unless the industry really pushes it like they seem to be doing. I may be wrong but it seems like going DCC would, despite the benefits, be like getting your first Personal Computer. Society pretty much assumes you have or should have one, so you spend the money and if like me (and from stories heard, I'm not alone) you go through a season of frustration trying to get the thing up and running and then figuring out how everything works. Eventually it's all fine but getting there...

The last time I was at the hobby shop a guy had brought in his DCC loco because it wasn't working right. The owner put it on a test track and said it needed to be programmed (when it went forward, the reverse lights came on and vice versa). I have no idea how you program a model engine or what the outcome of this situation was. I just know I don't like to program things and went in the back to look at On30 kits.

Another time was in favor of DCC: The owner showed me a new N Gauge loco that had just come in and demonstrated the sound system. Wasn't expecting much from such a tiny unit but wow. Sounded like the real thing. Impressive.

Still, maybe later. I'll stick with the old DC for now.

~Brad fd64

p.s. I didn't realize that DCC had been around for even a decade. Shouldn't prices be lower by now or is it because it hasn't become the dominant system?