Its 2018 and I subscribed to a paper magazine today!

[HenryDorsetCase]

I know, right?

But I love paper magazines. I love getting them in the mail and then having a nice read on the khazi in the morning. Or the evening. I love the tactility of it and the frisson of excitement.

I am thinking about re-subscribing to CYCLE WORLD again. Though their subscription department are such dicks. All they had to do was have an automatic debit on my credit card like Netflix. But no - make it difficult and painful and timeconsuming and slow. So after 30 years they can get fucked.

But yeah - I subbed to Classic Racer mag. And I get Performance Bikes too. and I think Built though I havent seen one for a while.

[jasonu]

I know, right?

But I love paper magazines. I love getting them in the mail and then having a nice read on the khazi in the morning. Or the evening. I love the tactility of it and the frisson of excitement.

I am thinking about re-subscribing to CYCLE WORLD again. Though their subscription department are such dicks. All they had to do was have an automatic debit on my credit card like Netflix. But no - make it difficult and painful and timeconsuming and slow. So after 30 years they can get fucked.

But yeah - I subbed to Classic Racer mag. And I get Performance Bikes too. and I think Built though I havent seen one for a while.

Well that is a coincidence. Just yesterday I filled this one out. $15 for 2 years and a free gear bag.

[AllanB]

Still get Cycle World. But it's not monthly any more :( it is a spiffy high quality publication now.

And I get a couple US hot rod magazines. So when I win lotto I know what to buy.

Print is nice.

[F5 Dave]

I like going back to old mags. Only keep the good ones though. But just see electronic ones getting lost into the ether and they charge far too much for that sort of volatility.

I love getting a new one in the post, makes me very happy.

I stopped my PB sub after decades as it went to shit and although it had before it hasn't really recovered enough, I might buy the occasional.

Changed it for Practical Sportsbikes and continued with Classic Motorcycle Maintenance which both cover 70-00 sort of era that interests me.

[Quickrik]

Classic Racer mag.


Best Mag. Ever. Even better than PB. IMHO

[MD]

Agreed. There is something special about holding a newspaper or paper magazine and turning the pages over. I don't buy as many bike mag's these days. Dropped Fast Bikes years ago as I lost interest in sprotbikes. Only buy AMCN and the NZ mags now. Great way to pass time in the loo.

[pritch]

I'm just in the process of changing delivery of a mag from email to snail mail. I have only a few books on Kindle but one was very good.* So good I mention it to people but then can't lend it to them. Frustrating.

Guy I know used to be engineer with the INL newspaper group. Hand him a new mag and he buries his nose in it checking the inks they used. We all get something...





* No Good Men Among The Living - Anand Gopal

[Michael Moore]

Last week a big Chevy diesel van came and took away my 45 year accumulation of bike magazines and weekly newspapers to a new custodian. Photos in this folder

http://www.eurospares.com/graphics/magazines2018/magazines_DSC_1729.jpg

I weighed a few boxes and did some quick calculations and figured it was at least 2500 pounds of paper.
It was about 70 feet of shelf for the magazies plus a 10 foot or so stack of boxes of newspapers. Cycle World from V1#1, lots of years of all the major US/UK publications as well as some Italian/German magazines too.

I'm not doing vintage/dirt bikes any more so they weren't getting touched, therefore it was time for a new home for them.

I'm not renewing Motorcyclist or Cycle World when they come up, there's not much of interest to me and they seem to be more concerned with "artsy/hip/cool" than useful information.

That will leave me one with one subscription to Road Racing World. I'm not a follower of racing (I preferred to do it, not watch it) but the bike reviews have actual dimensions of parts in them and the data panels are great. But even that gets anything good clipped and filed and the rest recycled after one reading.

There were many hours of enjoyment in looking through all those old periodicals, but that was then and the times they are a changing.

The same type of vintage/dirt material is getting purged from my book case. At least I'm not hurting for space now and it appears that the books may have a surprising amount of value, which is nice since about 200 of them will be on their way out.

cheers,
Michael

[roogazza]

Our more Senior guys will remember waiting 3 mths for the Newspaper MCNews to arrive by boat.

As a 15 or 16 yr old , I was following GPs even then (1966 ).
I even followed the TT in those days as well, Hailwood, Read, Ivy and Ago.

It seems I only buy a mag these days when hopping over to GP . :mellow:

[pritch]

Our more Senior guys will remember waiting 3 mths for the Newspaper MCNews to arrive by boat.

As a 15 or 16 yr old , I was following GPs even then (1966 ).
I even followed the TT in those days as well, Hailwood, Read, Ivy and Ago.

It seems I only buy a mag these days when hopping over to GP . :mellow:

I often recall the three month wait for a few black and white pics while I'm watching a GP live in colour. I'm still discovering what colour some of the bikes were painted back then. Watching the current TdF though I can see what colour the Bianchi bikes were painted. They still paint their pushbikes the same duck egg colour.

Hailwood, McIntyre, King, and all were Ok but you forgot the commonwealth guys: Redman, Hocking, Phillis, Driver and Hugh Anderson.

[HenryDorsetCase]

I often recall the three month wait for a few black and white pics while I'm watching a GP live in colour. I'm still discovering what colour some of the bikes were painted back then. Watching the current TdF though I can see what colour the Bianchi bikes were painted. They still paint their pushbikes the same duck egg colour.

Hailwood, McIntyre, King, and all were Ok but you forgot the commonwealth guys: Redman, Hocking, Phillis, Driver and Hugh Anderson.

"Celeste" https://www.bicycling.com/news/a20014309/bianchi-celeste/

Oh, and someone needs to buy this for me:

https://www.steel-vintage.com/bianchi-specialissima-superleggera-road-bike-1977-detail

[Cadbury]

I do love a paper magazine as much as the next guy/gal. I have some prized Cycle/Cycle World magazines from my formative years (1982-), plus plenty of others from intervening years.

That said, I am also a sucker for cheap or even better, free. As a super resident of the super city, I can access quite a few magazines for free through the Auckland public library as a digital download to read on my PC or to keep (seemingly forever?) through the Zinio app on my tablet. Included are Cycle World, Motorcyclist, Motorcycle Sport and Leisure, MCN and some dirt-specific titles that aren't really my bag. These are bang up-to-date as well. Not quite the same as leafing through glossy pages, but you can't beat the price (unless you factor in the rates bill...).

[AllanB]

Can you still by 'mens' mags in paper form? Presumably so but surely not for long as on a computer there are no staples hiding the clit (or where you think it may be....) and a laptop screen is really easy to wipe clean.

[FzerozeroT]

As a bit of an aside, does anyone reading this belong to a motorcycle club that still posts a physical club newsletter?

If no, is that something that would be a nice to get every month?

[R650R]

Those were the days....

I remember back when I was first into bikes and Fastbikes was in its heydays... Col Schillers rants, Ian cramps technical articles thenproject lionheart 500cc gp bike.... The emmet brothers, the turbo fireblade project... and eventually a progression into tits on bikes for good garage wallpaper.... Used to bug the hell out of Paperplus and whitcoulls for when next issue on shelf....
Occasionally bought PB...
Did an OE in UK and the weekly newsprint MCN was good for racing news... Then a Glossy Motorcycle Racer mag came out, awesome engine and pitlane/race photos and good articles..
Col Schill' and crew made brief comeback with RPM mag....

Something about sitting in sun with hardcopy or on the shitter that's intrinsically better than digital....
Might photo some and post pics of good articles if bandwidth polkice don't cut me down.....

I subscribe digitally to ADV moto but often forget its there on my phone.....

A trademag I used to write for survives because of its physical edition, think it gets the advertisers more real exposure. We kinda train ourselves not to see digital sidebar ads I reckon....

[90s]

I love a real paper mag but don't like the prices and stopped subbing years ago. But now with Auckland Library (and others around NZ) giving free online access to magazines including about 5 or 6 motorbike ones I'm pretty much skimming through the lot of them of the ipad every week. Love paper. But love free more.

[WALRUS]

Those were the days....

I remember back when I was first into bikes and Fastbikes was in its heydays...

Did you get/see any of the Fast Bikes videos they used to put out?

Duke has released 3 of the 4 on DVD

https://www.automotobookshop.com.au/fast-bikes-show-trilogy-3-dvd-collection/

Really great!