Paizo to Discontinue Dragon and Dungeon Magazines 82
An anonymous reader slipped us a link to a page on the Wizards.com site marking the end of an era. As of September of this year Dungeon and Dragon Magazines will cease publication. Dragon has been in continuous circulation since 1976, while Dungeon will be marking its 150th issue at the end of its run in August. Paizo Publishing, the current printing house for the magazines, is offering several options for what to do with your ongoing subscription. From the announcement on the Wizards site: "'Today the internet is where people go to get this kind of information,' said Scott Rouse, Senior Brand Manager of Dungeons & Dragons, Wizards of the Coast. 'By moving to an online model we are using a delivery system that broadens our reach to fans around the world. Paizo has been a great partner to us over the last several years. We wish them well on their future endeavors.'" I've looked forward to my issue of Dragon every month for over a decade. It will be sad to see it go.
Re:First InfoWorld, and now Dragon and Dungeon (Score:5, Insightful)
It seems ironic to me that you can be sitting here, an ostensible geek, utilizing slashdot, and making this statement.
Anyone who has been following the climb of the internet's popularity knows that it is destined to destroy most types of media. The only difference between them being momentum and thus the length of time it will take the 'net to wipe them out.
The reason is obvious. Moving physical things around is costly and slow compared to the cost of transmitting data. If the ISPs in the USA had not been permitted to fuck us around this long (and of course it is continuing daily) then it would be much easier to get a useful connection and more of us would have the bandwidth to move huge files around. And then physical media would REALLY be in trouble.
In fact, I'd go so far as to say that the only reason it hasn't happened already is due to DRM. DRM is the reason why I don't buy digital media, I go out and buy the physical media, because even though it has DRM, at least it's not likely to be revoked remotely. Of course, that protection doesn't apply to either HD DVD format... But then, I don't have an HDTV, I probably won't for quite some time, so I don't give a shit. And an upscaled DVD really does look quite good.
I prefer magazines. (Score:3, Insightful)
Websites can vanish. But magazines give you the evolution of the concepts. There's also something about being able to hold the magazine that a monitor doesn't give you.
Re:First InfoWorld, and now Dragon and Dungeon (Score:3, Insightful)
Furthermore, books don't give me a headache; but reading from a monitor for a long time does. I also like the feel of the book in my hands, the sound made by the pages as I turn them, and the way it looks on a shelf beside my other books. Here's hoping physical books are around for a long time to come.
If the nearest ISP is long distance... (Score:3, Insightful)
History Repeats Itself... (Score:2, Insightful)
It went from a huge subscription to barely on anyone's radar overnight. And content - it sucks.
Sad. The end of an era. Just when role-playing games and the like are beginning to make a strong comeback. Talk about short-sighted.
Re:I actualy know several people who subscribe... (Score:2, Insightful)
As for $10 a month, only if they have a local pop and your telco has compatible equipment. Not every local little telco can support dial up. Modem traffic ties up a full channel and doesn't deal with range extending technology very well. So if you don't have a local pop, you're up a creek. For about a year, all I did was help little telcos figure out how to increase their interconnects to larger ones so they could support more bandwidth (i.e. pass through modem traffic). It was a great, always a challenge. The big companies don't care about smaller areas (not enough density/return on investment) and don't really want to help out the independents. No reason for them to either, they are still a rival company. And dial up equipment is so expensive or rare, depending on your locale, that even setting up a local pop there can be next to impossible.
As for your water and sewer comment... I hate to be the one to break it to you, but roughly half of the county doesn't have public water, and slightly over that doesn't have public sewer. Oh, and two of those telcos did have public water and sewer, but not a powerful enough multiplexer. I guess that means they live in "Bumfuck" then. Or that they are "living on the north side of a north-facing cliff."
But I digress, my whole point is that it Dragon's online coverage is not as universal as one might think. The company has gotta do what it has gotta do to continue make money. Be that as it may, there will be gamers going without.