BattleGrip Magazine Poll Results
With the first issue of BattleGrip available as a free PDF — download the free PDF — I wanted some feedback on what you guys were thinking when it came to the question of magazine or website. Thank you to those of you who voted on the poll, I appreciate you taking the time to help me figure out how best to proceed.
Unfortunately, the number of responses was very low and has me now wondering just how many have given the magazine a try. Maybe the age of magazines — even free PDF magazines that can be downloaded and installed on various readers — is dead. I’m now trying to decide exactly what happens next. If I was certain the website was safe I’d be more excited about adding significant content, but my technical skills are too poor and I now know everything posted here could vanish in an instant.
I hate computers.
Philip, I missed the chance to vote in the poll, but if I had, it’d be for both the website and the magazine. I really enjoyed the first issue of the magazine and look forward to more issues. there’s such a dearth of content out there these days that it’s a welcome change to flip through something that’s been curated.
on the flip side, it’s also nice to have something to look at more often than you’d be able to produce the magazine, and that’s where the website comes in. the website can be the daily fix, while the magazine can be the best of the best.
I’m sorry that battlegrip got hacked, but I wouldn’t want you to be discouraged from continuing the site. there’s some easy things you can do to make the site more secure – hit me up if you think I can help.
Ron, thanks for the support and for the very kind words. It’s sounding as if I just need to find a better way to protect the site; Dreamhost has been no help at all in running the site and I am at the point I need to stop spending money with them and find someone who actually cares about the service they provide.
Hey, have you considered contacting your website host for help? Mine (for a non-nerd site I admin) provides (some level of) spam protection to guard against nasty code from being uploaded to the site. That might help alleviate current issues at least.
Dreamhost has no interest in me beyond taking my money. Every answer they give me demands I know more about programming than I ever will.
I really enjoyed issue 1 – reminded me a lot of the old ToyFare magazine but (in many ways) better. I would love to see more issues but I understand they are a lot of work and if readership is low it might not be worth it. I don’t know what the answer is. I enjoy visiting your site but I don’t do it daily… maybe once every three days unless a tweet really draws my attention. If you want to do the magazine and want to increase readership because you feel passionate about it, maybe offer article-related companies some free advertisement space at the end of the magazine PDF in exchange for their pimping. It’s a no-cost win-win for everyone who takes advantage of it. Just a thought. As for the web-only idea… I’d love it if there was a way to subscribe to topics since I might forget that I ever posted this ramble and never see any follow up responses. 🙂
Philip, I thought the magazine was great, and think you should continue to make them if you enjoy them, however often you feel like it. But I have to admit, these days I’m more likely to just read blog posts for toy-related content.
Thanks, Kevin! I’ll try and find a good balance between the site and magazine. All of these comments have really helped get me excited again; I cannot thank you guys enough.
Your magazine did take me back to the fond days of Toyfare and Lee’s Toy Review. I know Toyfare is gone, but is Lee’s still out there? Their website is down but is still listing a phone number for subscriptions. However, I haven’t spotted that magazine on the shelves in ages.
Speaking of Toyfare, and as a guy who creates a LEGO Space photocomic, maybe you could incorporate something like a Twisted Battlegrip Theater into the magazine, something funny and exclusive to the magazine? Your expansive, artistic photo layout is definitely a strength of the magazine that can’t really be replicated like that on the blog. I’ll look forward to seeing in which directions you take the visual aspect.
I really liked the issue. I would be sad to see the website go as it is a daily stop for me. I enjoyed everything you covered in the 1st issue but I would greatly miss the things you didn’t put in there if you didn’t have the site anymore, especially your travel logs. Getting to see the places you go for work and the toy-related trips you make is always a highlight for me when visiting the site.
Phil if you want some free technical help, hit me up after the weekend as i am on a vacation kinda.I love the site and if you need the help let me know.
MM
I haven’t read the .pdf yet, but what I’ve seen looks great. I’m with Kevin up above, though – I’m more likely to read blog posts than full magazines these days.
Phill, here’s the host that I use, along with some of their security features: https://secure.fatcow.com/product/sitelock/
Not sure if this would help with your issue, but might spark some ideas. Also, my father in law uses (brace yourself) Go Daddy and they supposedly have a fairly robust security platform (for the price). Then again…it’s Go Daddy! 😉
http://www.godaddy.com/security/website-security.aspx?ci=72978
I enjoyed the magazine, though I do miss seeing more content here on a daily basis. I was happy to see that the links in the pdf were clickable.
I loved the magazine. The pages were gorgeous and it was really nice to sit for a few and relax reading it however I too would hate to lose battlegrip.com, its one of the few sites I regularly check. Some of my favorite things to come here for are actually things like random stuff you find out in stores or glasses and off the wall non-toy stuff. I honestly really like that you review a lot of toys I don’t collect. I don’t buy Transformers but I really like looking at them.
Hey Philip,
Rather than abandon a magazine format (low response vs. labor intensive to make) – why not continue posting review/articles and such as you are, but make a quarterly .pdf archived edition in of the ‘Best of BATTLEGRIP’ content?
Perhaps you could take the reviews/writeups that have the best response (or you like the most) each quarter, and instead of reinventing the wheel – just use your existing photography and text with a bit of background masking/polishing.
It would serve the function of an archive in case of future ‘hack-attack’/web server failure, but wouldn’t be as time consuming as a monthly magazine.
What Blayne says is right on. Maybe make blog posts on Battlegrip with only one picture, or a “short” version of the text, and follow up with the full articles in the PDF.
I am a huge fan of the site, I try to come here every day, and I haven’t found the time to read the magazine yet, shamefully.
August/early Sept is a tough time of year for me with work, travel, I don’t get to really read online much; maybe you got low responses due to people being busy this time of year?
Awesome suggestions and feedback, guys! I like the idea of some duplication of material across the two formats and will be experimenting with that for the next issue.
Thanks for all of the encouragement!