Niche, it appears, is king when it comes to successful magazines. According to the people at Magazine Publisher, “poor magazine focus” and “lack of focused editorial concept” are as fatal to a title’s chances as overestimated circulations and a lack of financial backing. But it would appear that, sometimes, you can be too niche. Space […]
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Old Dictionaries
I’m a word geek; on occasions I can be an annoyingly pedantic one, especially when it comes to definitions, although I accept I’m prone to inconsistencies when it comes to changing usage. Thankfully, I’ve been lucky enough to fall into a profession where it’s useful to be interested in words. That said, I can still […]
Genres, hurrah!
The writer Matt Haig hates literary fiction, according to a recent blog entry; or, to be rather more precise, he hates “the idea (my italics) of literary fiction”, most particularly of it being thought of, or promoted as, a “category”, a “genre”. Well, I’ve news for Mr Haig. He’s far too late. It is a […]
New Ways to Make Journalism Pay II
Saturday, 17 November: it was raining outside the London Welsh Centre when I arrived for New Ways to Make Journalism Pay II, a one day conference organised by the London Freelance branch of the NUJ. Quite apt, really; after all, the event’s subtitle was: “A freelance lifeboat in the perfect storm”. It was certainly a […]
Enquiries within…
The timing is certainly apt; Enquirer, the new “rapid-response verbatum work” being put on by the National Theatre of Scotland, is a much-needed opportunity to explore the stark choices facing the UK’s newspaper industry at a time when it’s under innately hostile public scrutiny and the financial rug of its traditional economic model is being […]
