"Gun Rags"

[Hmac]

I think the advertising component of gun magazines, snowmobile magazines, motorcycle magazines, R/C airplane magazine, bicycle magazines etc all tended to follow the same arc....competition heated up, advertising became more intense, the magazines became more reliant on advertising dollars as their costs increased and they increasingly sold out to their advertisers. Over that same 35 year period, I got older, smarter, and less tolerant of the bullshit those mags pumped out. No offense meant. I've never read a magazine article that you've written.

I dig out my own information now, getting a consensus opinion from a variety of blogs, message boards, articles and websites across the internet. I don't trust any one source no matter who it is, or where he's written it.

[rob_s]

No offense meant. I've never read a magazine article that you've written.

None taken. If you haven't read anything I've written you can't possibly be talking about me.

In all seriousness though, I started this thread and want to hear feedback. Even from people that have read my stuff and take issue with it.

[rob_s]

- Have you ever had anything printed that when you read it in a magazine, you weren't "proud" of or thought was lame? What was it?

I'm intentionally ignoring your other question for the moment.

I've never had an article printed where I was ashamed of the copy from an integrity standpoint. I've had some portions I'm not proud of from a grammatical standpoint but that's likely just me being picky.

I have had two instances where I was less than thrilled with the way the publisher handled things on their end, from photo captions to wording/placement on the cover.

[Redmanfms]

Since someone above asked what writers get paid, I'm curious to hear what the group thinks they are paid, and what kind of expenses they incur and how those costs are covered.

What's the point of this question? I'm sure writers get paid a lot less than most people think. Most of the small time writers I know have full-time day jobs and write on the side. Expenses are usually unpaid. They aspire to staff writing jobs or syndicated columns. Of course, the writers I know aren't gun writers, so things will vary a tad.


I've only been reading gun mags since the early '90s, but I've not noticed a real difference in the reviewership. The mags then were the same as they are today, I just got older and owned more firearms, shot more, and as a result learned that a lot of what was/is written in gun mags about firearms is bull. For that matter, much of the reviews about various trainers/schools is junk too, but not quite as bad.


I'm not much of a blog reader so I can't comment on the quality/trustworthiness of blogs. I'm sure some are better than others. Mostly I read discussion boards and note range reports, problem threads, etc.


On a personal note, I find most of your contributions (at least the ones I've read) on this site valuable and reliable. The "chart" in particular. That alone is an achievement beyond what most gun writers will ever accomplish. But don't let any of that go to your head.

[Watrdawg]

Over the years I read various mags and have had various subscriptions. One thing I've noticed is that mags have gone from being mostly article based to mostly AD based. As everyone has said 99% of the content in articles seem like sales pitches. The content of the articles are all basically the same. Very few negatives about an item show up in the articles. For the most part I pick the mags up off of the rack and scan through particular article instead of buying the mag itself and taking it home. One thing that is really pathetic is the covers of most of these mags. They have whatever weapon on the cover so tricked out that it starts to like some type of nerf gun toy. Stuff hanging here, stuff hanging there, stuff hanging off all over the weapon. There's so much stuff hangin all over the weapons you almost have no clue what the weapon itself even looks like.

I would love to see a gun mag that is published with the same mentality that M4C has. Straight forward, real world, no nonsense, drop the BS, information you can bet your life on content.

My biggest pet peeve about any magazine is all of the post card type subscription cards that are stuff all through out the magazine. You open the mag up and 50 of those things come falling out. They are a royal pain the the behind!!

[rob_s]

What's the point of this question?

Because I want to know the answer?

I'm trying to build some idea of some metrics in my head, and having some idea what people think writers get paid, or should get paid, will be helpful to that end.

Also, someone above asked what they get paid and I was simply turning the question around to ask what people *think* they get paid.

Seems pretty straightforward.

[TOrrock]

I picked up my first SOF when I was 12 or 13 when they broke the story of the Soviet AGS-17 and smuggled out the first AK-74 from Afghanistan back in the early 80's.

I stopped reading when they changed formats and Kokalis left.

Over the years I read most of the gun magazines, getting more and more disgusted and disappointed as time went on.

New hope was found in Machine Gun News/Small Arms Review, but even they are running out of good articles. I stopped reading when articles about airsoft replicas started appearing.

I tend to follow authors rather than publications. To be honest, I don't really get anything out of articles on new firearms and equipment. I'm too jaded, too cynical. Even if the author did a good job and wrote honestly about his experiences, the editors are going to spin it so that it's the next best thing, and strategically place the ad for said piece very near the article.

Now, having said that, there are some authors who I really enjoy who write about historical firearms that I get a lot of knowledge from, who write excellent articles. Paul Scarlata is one of these guys. He is a RKI on pre-1950 firearms, and his articles are well done and informative.

Kokalis can write a great article, when he's not trying to sell you the latest crap from Century Arms that his bosses at Shotgun News tell him to pimp out. When he's writing about historical arms, he's spot on, the old SOF Kokalis is back. He wrote an excellent article in SGN about the Bergman MP-35 subgun that the Waffen SS used in WWII. He also pimps out Century Cetmes and sub par AK kit builds from Century.

Fortier is particularly bad about it.

I guess I'm just a grumpy, grouchy old guy now...

Rob, I did read your article explaining why a piston AR is not a good choice for most applications and thought it was well done.

[Rider79]

Those of you that used to read them but don't anymore, do you think that something actually changed in the magazines, or did you simply get older/savvier/more experienced?

When it comes to most gun mags, I stopped reading because I've changed and become more knowledgable. I'll still read American Handgunner if I happen to be at B&N, but only for Ayoob's column that goes over a past shooting. I still enjoy SWAT for the columns, but I feel some of the articles have become lacking, examples like the one I cited earlier are becoming more prominent. The "zombie gun" article from a couple months ago would be another one.

[Lumpy196]

I look at American Handgunner once in a while because it has lots of pretty pictures of 1911s.

I at least read a couple articles out of SWAT and Small Arms Review.

[orionz06]

Followup questions.

Those of you that used to read them but don't anymore, do you think that something actually changed in the magazines, or did you simply get older/savvier/more experienced?

In general, do you believe online blogs/reviewers/websites to be better or worse than print? More honest or less honest? More "on the take" or less?

Since someone above asked what writers get paid, I'm curious to hear what the group thinks they are paid, and what kind of expenses they incur and how those costs are covered.

I will buy a magazine that appears to have an article that is interesting, but over the past year or so I have grown a good bit as a gun owner and shooter to the point that there is very little interesting any more. Anyone worth reading posts here (Templar, JW777, etc), so why not spend the money on beer.

I will say that as you post the articles that you are writing I have pursued them a little more, but I cant say I drove across town for them.

I will also add that the interest in the stuff you write is most likely a product of this forum and others. If Templar had an article in a magazine and posted about it, I would make the same effort to obtain it to read.

I also think the interest I have taken in some stuff you are doing now should be obvious anyway.



Now one thing I have noticed, and it is based on a limited window of time, is that it seemed like a few magazines "got it" and had a few decent articles on a few good guns and they were very fair and objective. That well dried up fast, so now it is just a repeat over and over, showing the groups of a DPMS bench rested with XM193.