I would add to this that most magazines do not offer anything even worth being on paper, something which my boyfriend and I observed while flipping throuhg a recent issue of Spin. News is not perceived as having value; information, communication, and social interaction are things we take for granted and understand they should be free. (Side note: all that recent hilarious traditional journalistic brouhaha about the need ban linking to save the ‘exclusivity’ of news. Let’s ban talking while we’re at it! Everyone! Lock yourselves away and subscribe! Now!) But I digress — CD reviews, information, and stock press photography are available elsewhere for free and in more convenient format (or even a crowdsourced one - I trust Metacritic and Last.FM to define taste better than Rolling Stone.) I don’t need a catastrophe of graphic design and uninspired photography and bored writing on crinkly-noise paper taking up space in my life.
But then why am I willing to spend $10-25 on an imported, oversized fashion magazine with thick matte paper and hundreds of pages of stellar photography and design? Because it feels like something valuable, because it seems like ‘art,’ because it looks nice on my theoretical coffee table (okay, my floor), because I want to tear out the purtiest pages and keep them, because I feel that the object of the magazine itself has a value beyond the information that may or may not be contained therein, and often because I relate to or want to associate myself with the magazine’s brand. So, basically, pretty similar reasons to why I purchase vinyl even when I download music — because we’re willing to pay for things only when we perceive them as having value.
[thanks to batteryinyourleg for the link]
