Condé Nast Shutters Self Magazine in Print, More Cuts on the Way

That being said, 'Self' magazine was hardly news. It's the kind of self-help mag often found in doctors' offices, and maybe shoved into a purse for a quick flight somewhere.

It's sad for the employees involved and a few die-hard readers, but not a massive loss.

EDIT: My wife is a subscriber, and typically reads it while lying in bed one night out of the month.

From what I gather nobody has any idea how traditional publishing houses are going to dig themselves out of this. Native ads, a quality-over-quantity ad experience for advertisers and premium services (paywalls) are the holy trinity that everyone hopes will save the industry.

After Bloomberg bought BusinessWeek it became better than The Economist. If Condé Nast is in blame the industry mode, or if it's going to start making short-sighted decisions claiming necessity, hopefully someone else can take care of its best properties.

I follow local emergency services on Twitter for alerts in my area. If shit gets real, all I want to know is where to avoid. Don't need to sit and gawk at CNN to get all the gossip.

I reach out to instructors/professors and discuss the work of those that reply (usually in STEM). Occasionally receiving copies of papers that are paywalled after being "officially" published.

Why do we need an aggregator like CNN, where a bunch of paid shills, spin out of context quotes leaving it no more useful than Facebook anyway? If you believe CBS Evening News and the rest haven't been propaganda mills all these years, I know of a bridge...

It's trivial to find the useful information if you want to know what's happening around you. And it can often, if not always, be had straight from the horses mouth.

Over the past couple of decades, I've watched as media companies with legacy business and editorial structures are (largely) unwilling or unable to adapt to new channels of disseminating important information or driving revenue. At the same time they've eroded trust with their audiences through efforts like advertorials in magazines and over-reliance on syndicated national/regional content in newspapers...and pandering in both. The ones that haven't are doing well.

I remember a few years back reading a great piece by the great late writer David Carr who talked about SXSW and the local paper in Austin that spawned it as a great counter-example for how modern journalism as a business can be done well and successfully:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/23/business/media/23carr.html

Those running the big media properties are either going to finally wake up and adapt or die off...meanwhile, there are lots of niche publishers (and I use that term very broadly in terms of channels) will step up and successfully fill the voids they're leaving behind.

I have stopped reading them or watching tv a while ago, and even started to actively avoid mainstream media. My life has not been impacted in any way except having a little more free time.

News is not necessary. It doesn't enrich your life. It's just something to put on and feel smarter than if you put on a sitcom.

Try this, I do it every time I'm home: watch people watch the news, and then ask them what was on. Pretend you didn't hear some segment or just flat out ask them to summarize. Most people most of the time won't be able to tell you. And they're perfectly functioning, intelligent adults.

At best it doesn't matter. At worst it's actively harmful by giving you these easily accessible stories that bear no relation to your life. Good riddance.

Today, I think for major stories at a state, national, or international level, there are still lots of journalists and reporters doing quality work. Even derided publishers like Buzzfeed are doing some really good work among the listicles.

I'm more worried about the local level. Who's going to cover local school board meetings or neighborhood news? Maybe that stuff doesn't need to be covered, I don't really know, but it feels like a loss.

For the first time in about 20 years, I'm thinking about subscribing to my local paper again.

Umm, have you actually read a copy of _Self_ magazine? My wife gets them before plane flights. It's the print equivalent to the listicle. Keep in mind that the print "journalism" you see at the checkout stand and at airports is just targeted advertising. The articles are there simply to draw the target demographic.

The industry may not have been perfect, but on its best days it uncovered important stories, and backed it up with fact checking and an attempt at being fair and balanced.

Which doesn't describe _Self_ magazine at all. Now, if CN was shuttering, say, _The New Yorker_ then we'd have reason to express dismay. But as I read it, CN is getting rid of the crap that we could probably all do just fine without.

I tend to lump magazines in with more entertainment than journalism. The quality ones will stick around. Do we really need teenVogue and Cosmopolitan? There are a lot of magazines competing for a limited number of readers as it is.

However comScore is its own thing so I'm unsure and would guess it includes paid-traffic.

That said, typically I've found Omniture numbers higher than comScore and IMHO are a more accurate reflection...

TLDR; I'd say the growth is genuine.