Well Steve, as you already know, I'm a graphic designer myself, and one of the latest project my studio (means my associates and I) handled was the creation of a paper magazine. It's something about local culture scene (dance, movies, theatre, graphic arts and such) and is distributed free. It's only 28 pages (for the first issue at least) but it allowed us to follow the birth process of a "real life" magazine.
So here's my point of view : it's hard, it's expensive, it takes time, but it's not impossible. The hardest part is no doubt the commercial one : selling ad spaces is a full time job, and not an easy one !
Though, thoughout all the posts here, many good ideas are to be kept :
I definitely think the e-zine format would be a good way to get started. Would let you time to judge the number of potential readers, would give the opportunity to have advertisement (=$) space to sell, and most of all, would dramatically reduce the cost of the whole process. Printing, you know it as much as I do, is really expensive, and so is distribution (and you can't have such a specialized magazine running locally).
As for the time it takes, I'm sure, now I know a bit of this forum, that just in here you'd find enough good will and involvement to get it done, and well.
I mean, a few of us can write articles, a few other can layout pages pretty well and give the magazine a nice identity, and many of us can now and then contribute a picture, a story or a show coverage...
I got lots of work, a business to run and a family to take care of, but I find time to do a few things for the community, and give a hand where I can. I know for sure I could take like a coupla days every two months or so (maybe in short time spans) to layout a few pages, design a cover or take care of some website related stuff.
And I know I'm not the only one.
The only thing that's missing here to get the project started, in my opinion, would be a head. Someone that would gather the content, organize it a bit, submit it to a few-people commity and all. And I'm pretty sure that with all the means of communication we now have at hand, we might just work it out as well, with all of us dispatched all over the world (could even be a strength).
And now the commercial aspect : the e-zine format helps a wider distribution, a wider commercial approach, and I'm sure lots of specialized vendors would prefer advertizing on their mail order services throughout an worldwide accessible e-zine than a printed magazine that goes out in like 5000 copies or so.
And since the costs for an e-zine are so low, the eventual $ would almost be a bonus. Might even help paying the head of publication and some contributions, but who would do that for money ??
Well, I could keep writing on that subject for a few more hours... so I guess I'd better stop now...
And by the way, I only have 2.5 Go Ram in my (old) G5 and a dual 19" display, but I can pull out pretty good jobs, when I really want it ;-)
oh yeah, and I also have that nice blackBook, cs3 and I should get my leopard roaring next week too
:lol: :lol: :lol: