A year ago, magazines were dropping like flies. However, over 2010, the ndustry stabilized enough for more magazines to launch than to fold – with a total number of 169 launches and 167 folds.
- State of the Media Report 2011, Vocus Media Research Group
That's a big turnaround, and the Vocus report, subtitled "Adapting, Surviving and Reviving" is encouraging reading for anyone in the media.
After the above quote Rebecca Bredholt, managing editor of magazine content at Vocus writes “I think publishers have figured out how people want to consume which types of content.”
In particular it will be interesting to see the continuing progress of AOL's offshoot, the Patch.org Foundation. This started almost 700 "hyperlocal news websites" and at least some of the staff are paid
There were 13 new weeklies and 5 new monthlies in the print side of the newspaper category. On the other side of the ledger, there were closures of 6 dailies, 109 weeklies, 12 monthlies, 9 online and 15 "other".
Of course all the above figures are for the USA. However, it does seem that the outlook generally is good for specialist publications at the expense of generalist. There is a good argument for putting some sections of print publications online, especially tabular material (one wonders why many daily newspapers still print detailed sports results and share prices).
You can download the Vocus report from:
http://www.vocus.com/resources/state-of-media/index.asp
(You do have to fill in a form first which asks details of name, job, email, etc but it does not seem to do any serious checking of what you enter),
Details on the Patch Foundation are at:
http://www.patch.com/foundation
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