"Make" the magazine... or is that "mook"?
There is a way-cool new journalism vehicle - out there in
publishing-land, which is considerably more than a popular
magazine but less than book. They are actually calling it a
"mook". Maybe they didn't know that this word was already in the
slang vocabulary. It has little advertising, few lightweight
fillers (which is 9-% of 'Popular Mechanics'), lots of neat
pictures, and several hundred pages of detailed off-the-wall
science projects and great ideas, so it is definitely
nerd-oriented - aimed towards the guy (maybe there is one female
subscriber) who like to 'make' things.
Thus the name "Make".
It is only slightly oriented towards robotics and computers... as
expected, given the number target audience. And guess what. In
issue # 3 there is a way-cool story on Ed Storms including many
photos of his home-lab. Undoubtedly Ed's is the one of the few
home labs in the civilized world with its own electron microscope.
I started to say 'only home lab' but remembered visiting Ken
Shoulders a few years back when he lived up the road in Freestone
Valley. I'm not sure if Ken's rig is actually in the same genre,
but that is beside the point. Both of these guys have way-cools
labs and many techno-toys.
Anyway, "Make" the "mook" is definitely something unique in the
media world these days, and one which I thought would only be
available over the internet due to the cost of this kind of thing
in print (it is available online for subscribers) but at least it
is in-print now and easily accessible for the modest price of $15
an issue (a bargain really)... at least it is in print for however
long it takes them to burn through their venture capital... but
naturally I hope it succeeds.
Yet, how could anything this wonderful (from the warped
perspective of something which actually "matters" ) ever succeed
in a world of "fluff" and frivolous content ?
Ed - how come you never mentioned this great mook before (or did
you?).
Jones
