"Michael Black" wrote in message
...
"CL" ) writes:
"Michael Black" wrote in message
...
Dick (LeadWinger) writes:
The ham magazine was 73. Would you believe that back in the 60's you
could get a life membership to 73 for $73? Would have been a good
deal until the magazine went belly up last year.
Dick - W6CCD
It was far better than that. The original price for life subscription
to
73 was $37 US, chosen because it was a transposal of the two digits in
the magazine's name. Bill Turner who inhabits some of the newsgroups
and wrote many an article for the magazine, bought a life subscription
at that level, and says that yes indeed he did get it for life, with
the last issue being the last issue the magazine published.
I don't know how much the life subscription price varied over the
years.
I do remember much being said about a $73 subscription in 1973.
Michael VE2BVW
On Sat, 28 Feb 2004 13:48:39 -0500, "Edward A. Feustel"
wrote:
I believe that the founder of CQ was Wayne Green (W2NSD) who then
went
on to
found Byte magazine and
another ham magazine.
Ed, N5EI
Though they lived up to their end of the contract until they shut their
doors, I have to wonder if that wasn't part of their problem? Can you
imagine the trade off in costs as all went up, not counting postage?
They
had to have lost some money. I'm not suggesting that was "all" of their
problem, but it had to take a bit of a bite. Sounds almost ludicrous. I
can't recall if the ARRL's "lifetime" operates the same. Been a while
since
I've looked at one. But aside from other issues, maybe that is one of
their
problems too. CL
But any magazine that offers a life subscription faces the same problem.
I have no idea how common they are, perhaps they only exist in the
independent
magazine market, and less so with each passing year. I thought the
National
Geographic used to offer life memberships, but I sure haven't seen mention
of it in recent years.
Remember, $37 was quite a few years of subscriptions back in the early
sixties, and may have been a fair chunk of money, generally. Selling them
early would have gotten some extra money when it may have been crucial,
and some guaranteed subscribers when they were needed to attract
advertisers. It was a gamble on the part of the subscribers, since
it was a new magazine. If it had died after a few years, the life
subscribers would have lost money. And after forty years, likely
a lot of those early life subscribers had died, lost interest in
the magazine and told them to stop sending it, and even people who
moved who simply didn't bother providing a new address. So there
may have been only a handful of subscribers who paid a paltry sum.
I know I was tempted by the $73 in 1973, but I was too young to
have that kind of money then. It is an investment, but it's also
a gamble.
But realistically, having some life subscribers around was
not the problem of the magazine. It had deteriorated tremendously over
the past 15 or so years, and that lessened the readership. And
as the readership declined and changed, that had to change the magazine
further, increasing the spiral. I bought the magazine every month for
about twenty years, and then about ten years ago I started missing issues.
There were fewer articles that interested me, and little that would
justify
buying it then "because I might need an article later". The magazine
started getting skimpy, and full of errors. It started becoming sporadic
on the newsstand here (there were rumors of it's impending death back
then)
and then they cut back on distribution. It had been some years since
I saw a copy. Yes, that was a cost cutting, but it also meant it
wasn't out there for people to know about it and subscribe.
It died because it was time for it to die, though I wish it had
remained like it was in its prime and kept going forever. If the magazine
had been healthy, the subscriber/readership base would have been enough
to
attract advertisers and keep it running. A few old life subscriptions
merely
meant it stopped one month than a few months later.
Michael VE2BVW
Very valid points. CL
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