Had a very pleasant evening last night at the launch of the final print version of Masthead. Caught up with some old friends, made some new. And of course a common topic of conversation was the state of the world and the state of the magazine industry. Everyone seems a little nervous – it's tough. And I just wanted to ask you how you're doing? How are you holding up? Whether you've lost work, have seen cutbacks or have managed to hold on, it's all a little scary. Even those who feel secure in their jobs can't help but feel that maybe they should be worried, even just a little, because hey, you never know.
So how are you? What's on your mind? What are you thinking? Leave your comments or just send me an email (vangerwen at gmail dot com). I'd love to hear from you.
3 comments:
I work at an independent, privately-owned trade publication. We had a big company meeting at the beginning of the year where the company owner got up and, essentially told us to always think about ways to be making money, optimizing content, and to never say, "That's not my job."
He's taking the good approach, I think, of keeping all staff, and even gave us our (small) Christmas bonuses. They did suspend the cost-of-living raise for the spring, but he said we'd revisit it later this year.
It seemed like a really good way to go about doing things: honest, generous, and frank.
Better than the slash-and-burn tactics of some publications. (Although I, for one, would kinda love to take one of those forced unpaid weeks off. Sounds pretty nice to me, even if you're short a few bucks!)
Yes, an interesting time, Corinna. So far I haven't experienced any fallout from the economy -- I have assignments, but having mainly finished some work I'm just now sending proposals for the coming months -- but I'm sure it's coming as '09 rolls out. One eyeopener: the most recent ROB magazine seemed little bigger than a Dell flyer. It wasn't even saddle-stitched. Sure, it's February-March, which aren't the biggest issues, but still... (And one of the features I'm finishing up is for ROB magazine.)
My job is secure, but the bad economy means that I'm probably stuck in the job -- and I'm not terribly happy here.
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