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SFReader Forums > Book, Magazine, and eZine Publishers > Flashing Swords > Flashing Swords, Vol.2, Issue 8 is now online.  Forum Quick Jump
 
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Daniel
Carl Jung's Waterboy



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  		   Posted 11/2/2007 2:49 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
Plus, when you are doing a quarterly, it easily allows people to see right away whether the quarterly issues are being published on schedule.

"Art is the celebration of the ego's destruction."

Daniel

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Bill Ward
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  		   Posted 11/2/2007 2:52 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
Well, useless only in the sense that it doesn't need to be part of the cover designation of the volume, as it doesn't actually 'modify' the issue number. Nobody says 'check out my story in volume 2 issue 7 of FS.' they just say issue 7.

If it has an archival use I can understand using it in some unobtrusive way, although I'm still not convinced its *that* useful even to reviewers: why can't they just refer to or search the issues like most people do already, ie. just by looking for or talking about issue 7.


It does help with quarterlies on schedule, but that's two edged: what if FS slips an issue or two out of whack? What if they want to change their schedule in some other way, like release a special issue, or switch to a different format, etc. I think losing volume would give them more flexibility for the future.

billwardwriter.com

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Daniel
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  		   Posted 11/2/2007 2:53 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
useless volume designations aren't a part of a contemporary vision in my opinion.

***

Dude no-one who isn't looking for these numbers is going to pay any attention to them. And they are far from useless.

Having *only* a whole number is useless because it doesn't show anything to the observer about the 'zine being quarterly or whatever. I mean collectors and reviewers, mainly.

"Art is the celebration of the ego's destruction."

Daniel

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Daniel
Carl Jung's Waterboy



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  		   Posted 11/2/2007 2:55 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
why can't they just refer to or search the issues like most people do already, ie. just by looking for or talking about issue 7.

***
 
Apparently you've never been a short fiction reviewer! When you are inundated with hundreds and hundreds of zines and pubs and issues, it really helps. At a glnce I can recall: this is a quarterl zine, the issue I am referring to is from yyear 1 or year 2, etc. I want something before or later. Whole issue numbers don't tell me that: I'm saying: is this bi-monthly, quarterly.

And, in fact, any publisher should make it as *easy* as possible for reviewers to work with their pubs. Any little bit helps.

Additionally, it is usually wise to put enough info: short story synopsi, author info, and even partial reviews in easy grab n' get mode for reviewers.

Who are some of the most overworked and undervalued peeps in the biz.

"Art is the celebration of the ego's destruction."

Daniel

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Bill Ward
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  		   Posted 11/2/2007 2:59 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
OK, it doesn't show it as a quarterly, but as I say what if that changes?

As far as no one looking for them paying attention to them I agree for the most part (and I also think the issue isn't tremendously important, despite the words we are expending on it), but I think they have the potential to confuse people who are wondering where the first four issues in volume two went, etc. that don't realize how the system is set up.

billwardwriter.com

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Bill Ward
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  		   Posted 11/2/2007 3:02 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
Daniel said...


Apparently you've never been a short fiction reviewer! When you are inundated with hundreds and hundreds of zines and pubs and issues, it really helps. At a glnce I can recall: this is a quarterl zine, the issue I am referring to is from yyear 1 or year 2, etc. I want something before or later. Whole issue numbers don't tell me that: I'm saying: is this bi-monthly, quarterly.


OK, those are good reasons I hadn't considered. But wouldn't a less obtrusive volume designation serve the same purpose? Also, is it only quarterlies that utilize 'volume?'

Furthermore, I do still think the ability to change from quarterly to something else in the future is something to think about.

billwardwriter.com

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Daniel
Carl Jung's Waterboy



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  		   Posted 11/2/2007 3:05 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
Technically you should remain faithful to the calnder. Or why have a quarterly. If you miss an issue it will show up in the whole number by contrast with the volume/issue number.

So if you missed an issue, you could have, say, Vol. 3.3 #10, rather than #11. But if you just scrap the calender and call the issues "quarterly' no matter when they come out, no number system will be meaningful at all.

If you just want to use whole numbers and not designate quarterly issues, then your pub is not a quarterly: it is 'irregularly" published.

I think that's an important distinction for readers, collectors, reviewers, and potential submitters.

"Art is the celebration of the ego's destruction."

Daniel

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Daniel
Carl Jung's Waterboy



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  		   Posted 11/2/2007 3:17 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
Plus you can keep track of subscriptions and subscribers can keep track of issues they are due by whole numbers and see whether issues are coming on a quarterly or irregular schedule. instead of tracking how long someone has subscribed you track the whole number issues they are entitled to....

"Art is the celebration of the ego's destruction."

Daniel

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Daniel
Carl Jung's Waterboy



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  		   Posted 11/2/2007 3:23 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
My last thought here: coming out ON TIME is the most important thing for any periodical. Especially a quarterly. You HAVE to go by the calendar. If the issue is not ready by the calendar date, better to miss an issue than screw up the quartlery schedule. That is the whole point of the numbering system; to easily demonstrate whether quarterly issues are being fulfilled. Whole number contrasted with vol/issue allows this at a glance.

It is far better to miss an issue completely than to publish one off-schedule.

"Art is the celebration of the ego's destruction."

Daniel

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Jordan Lapp
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  		   Posted 11/2/2007 3:26 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
Daniel said...

It is far better to miss an issue completely than to publish one off-schedule.
Really? Why? Just curious.

Jordan Lapp
Managing Editor
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Daniel
Carl Jung's Waterboy



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  		   Posted 11/2/2007 3:31 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
There's lots of reasons, Jordan. I'll just scratch teh surface here:
 
To begin with the whole idea of a periodical is that it is fresh. If you are late it is like delivering stale cookies to a party that's already over. People are thinking: "I want the *latest* stuff." If they are subscribers part of the reason they subscribed is to get 1st class treatment. Late issues are like getting a table next to the dumpster, in dining terms. Or coach in flight.

Secondly, if you forsake adherence to the calendar and still call yourself a quarterly, you look really unprofessional. And it gets extremely disheartening to everyone involved feeling the sustained paucity of lag.

America loves winners not Johnny comelately's.

As far as commerciality goes: quarterlies are a scholarly format for a *reason* it is a non-commerical mode. You are dealing with a format which is so slow compared to the rest of commercial entertainment you are going to be "scholarly" whether you want to be or not. The quarterly is a risky format for fiction magazines in commercial terms.

I mean "hot and slick adncommercial" every 3 months?

A whole new *product* every 3 months, maybe. That would have enough acceleration to be considered slick and commercial. I don't believe the slick and comemrcial quarterly has ever found much traction.   

A pub like FS doesn't have to be afraid of its format or what have you -- there is great potential for it, but I wouldn't say slick and commercial are the only -- or even prevailing -- elements that will make it work.

 

 

"Art is the celebration of the ego's destruction."

Daniel

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Daniel
Carl Jung's Waterboy



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  		   Posted 11/2/2007 3:44 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
On the flip side: when you miss an issue every subscriber's subscription is extended in time further down the road and they can but a back-issue or antho to hold them over (you offer 'em a rock bottom discount or even a freebie as an apology for missing the issue). You'll still be fulfilling your subscribers' orders eventually. You'll still be getting good word-of-mouth. You can save expenses if you really need to. You just: miss an issue. No big deal as long as it doesn't happen very often. That kicks the expenses down the road allows for a rallying time.

Lagging will kill suck at your soul. Trying to catch-up will kill you.

"Art is the celebration of the ego's destruction."

Daniel

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crystalwizard
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  		   Posted 11/2/2007 3:50 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
Daniel said...
My last thought here: coming out ON TIME is the most important thing for any periodical. Especially a quarterly. You HAVE to go by the calendar. If the issue is not ready by the calendar date, better to miss an issue than screw up the quartlery schedule. That is the whole point of the numbering system; to easily demonstrate whether quarterly issues are being fulfilled. Whole number contrasted with vol/issue allows this at a glance.

It is far better to miss an issue completely than to publish one off-schedule.


Yep. And that's why we went live with the new issue as close to midnight on Nov. 1 as posible. I have every intention of following that pattern. The idea of publishing off schedule makes me shudder. I don't want that kind of unreliable reputation.

I'd miss the issue if I had to, but I don't want to have to.
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Daniel
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  		   Posted 11/2/2007 3:51 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
You are doing great CW!!! Let me admit: I had no vision for FS -- but also admittedly no time to prepare one! -- and it showed. Your vision is spectcularly cool. I am like a kid in a candy store over there lately.

Thank you so much for rescuing this venue.

"Art is the celebration of the ego's destruction."

Daniel

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Jordan Lapp
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  		   Posted 11/2/2007 3:56 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
Here here!

Jordan Lapp
Managing Editor
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TRtheJ
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  		   Posted 11/2/2007 4:06 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.

I have never been "confused" by the Volume 2, Issue 8 on Flashing Swords cover. Admittedly, it is different from any other magazine I read, but what's confusing about it? We're, by issue number, reading the last issue of Volume 2, which designates Flashing Swords "second year" of publishing.

Though I know it's not an option, again, on the cover should by only Issue 8 and inside either with the copyright or on the contents page Issue 8 Vol. 2; No. 4. Since I last visited the forum I have found this in every magazine I've looked in. And it's been that way as far back as I can remember. The purpose: At the end of each year, magazines collect every issue of that year and have them bound into Volumes for themselves and libraries. Or at least the used to 'cause I remember seeing such volumes when researching papers in school -- a while ago.

By the way, even comic books used Issue Vol.;No. and probably still do.

Anyway, as Daniel said, most readers don't even pay attention to such things. So while I'm a stickler and would like to see it done properly, if it continues as -- Volume 2, Issue 8 -- on the cover that's fine. I vote leave it as is, even though... ;-)

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TRtheJ
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  		   Posted 11/2/2007 4:08 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
Daniel said...
You are doing great CW!!! Let me admit: I had no vision for FS -- but also admittedly no time to prepare one! -- and it showed. Your vision is spectcularly cool. I am like a kid in a candy store over there lately.

Thank you so much for rescuing this venue.

I agree.
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crystalwizard
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  		   Posted 11/2/2007 4:12 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
Daniel said...
You are doing great CW!!! Let me admit: I had no vision for FS -- but also admittedly no time to prepare one! -- and it showed. Your vision is spectcularly cool. I am like a kid in a candy store over there lately.

Thank you so much for rescuing this venue.


:) You're welcome Daniel and thank you for the compliment.

It's not just me though, remember, there's a team behind this and I depend heavily on their input. The pats on the backs to go all of them too.
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Daniel
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  		   Posted 11/2/2007 4:14 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
Cheers to (and for) the FS staff!!!!

<CW, being the big-wig there's like being a quarterback, you'll get all the props and heckles, too from bystanders lke me who don't have enough of an attention span to actually read the FS masthead ;-)

"Art is the celebration of the ego's destruction."

Daniel

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crystalwizard
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  		   Posted 11/2/2007 5:27 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
Daniel said...
Cheers to (and for) the FS staff!!!!

<CW, being the big-wig there's like being a quarterback, you'll get all the props and heckles, too from bystanders lke me who don't have enough of an attention span to actually read the FS masthead ;-)


:) and I don't mind taking the blame, but I do want my staff to get recognition for their work as well. There wouldn't be a magazine without them.

Never meddle in the affairs of a wizard unless you are soggy and hard to light!



Managing Editor of Flashing Swords

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Bruce Durham
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  		   Posted 11/3/2007 11:58 AM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
crystalwizard said...

:) and I don't mind taking the blame, but I do want my staff to get recognition for their work as well. There wouldn't be a magazine without them.

Indeed. The entire staff of FS has to be commended for relaunching this great publication.

Come visit the Community Forums of CPI's Official Site of Conan author Robert E. Howard

Recently published: Marathon in Issue #10 of Paradox, Kalini Steel in Freehold: Southern Storm, Fool's Treasure in Freehold: The Protector and Old Havana in When the World Runs Thin

Upcoming: Night of the Meld in Flashing Swords #9 and Valley of Bones in Return of the Sword

Some people dream of success while other people live to crush those dreams.

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TRtheJ
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  		   Posted 11/4/2007 3:41 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
I just finished reading this issue. A very good read indeed. Good stories, good action with a little good poetry to spice it up. Two good interviews and a touch of history.
 
Did I mention it was good?
 
Anyway, I enjoyed it. Thank you. I look forward to future issues. :-)
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Despiciblus
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  		   Posted 11/4/2007 6:03 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
The new issue of FS was fantastic, and is clearly a labor of love. I’m looking forward to the next issue. burger
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jonesha
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  		   Posted 11/4/2007 9:33 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.

hello all,

I just got back from the World Fantasy Con and saw that the new issue had posted! Congratulations! I look forward to reading it.

Best wishes,

Howard

Managing Editor Black Gate

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crystalwizard
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  		   Posted 11/4/2007 10:16 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
Welcome back :) how was the con? Thanks for the congrats and I'm looking forward to hearing what you think of the issue after you get a chance to read it.

Kelly

Never meddle in the affairs of a wizard unless you are soggy and hard to light!



Managing Editor of Flashing Swords

Visit my art gallery on art wanted
All my books in print

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