| A Kick up th Rs 07:35 - Jul 21 with 10893 views | davman |
Clive - sticky?
As with all printed media, sales of our beloved fanzine are falling to around 1/3rd of its peak a few years back. I found myself a lapsed subscriber and only re-discovered my interest on a few occasions last season, mainly through seeing Julie every home game outside the Lower Loft, rain or shine, selling, both before and after the game.
Clive and daveb are regular contributors (or they were last season) and there is rarely a dull issue (with our club and it's curse, there is always something to write about).
Anyway, Dave Thomas had a choice to make this season and has, thankfully decided to continue, even though it appears that he is running at a loss.
AKUTRS is such an institution around our club and has been around for about 30 years now. If you haven't looked at an issue recently, you should do; it is professionally produced and is a damned good read with content around a subject close to all of us.
I intend to re-subscribe for this season and I urge you all to think about doing so to get the numbers back up.
If interested, details are at http://www.akutrs.com/subscriptions/4593974993 |  |
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| A Kick up th Rs on 10:46 - Aug 10 with 1240 views | francisbowles |
| A Kick up th Rs on 17:06 - Aug 9 by DaveClayton |
Hello - I would like to chime in here in defence of Dave.
"In the spirit of constructive criticism...
Design is pretty dull - from uninspiring covers to poor text layout worthy of a parish newsletter - a better designed magazine would help attract advertisers." - that's like "i don't mean to be rude, but..."
So, AKUTRs started over 30 years ago. As a fanzine. Always put together by Dave over more hours than I can believe he puts in. On a very old Mac and a very old version of Quark and Photoshop. And that is still Dave's set up. Still making a fans 'zine. Not FourFourTwo or the matchday magazine, put together by a team.
Over the years the existance of fanzines has become less popular and 100s have fallen by the wayside, so much content and opinion is online. Dave is also not a web designer nor a graphic designer. He has made everything that exists with the best of intentions and the lowest resources.
Sales have dipped, Dave knows that, he not only has to manage print costs but he drives from Bolton to all home games and most aways to watch QPR and sell the fanzine wherever possible to make a scrap of a living and cover costs. The older fans know what AKUTRs is about and have grown up with it. Yes, it would be amazing to produce full colour, slick design and with a fully responsive website. But that all costs money and Dave is not a designer, he's a fanzine editor who relys on support, articles and people recommending it. This is and has been his life for 30 years and he still keeps going. Luckily he does have people helping him. The "uninspiring covers" are often put together at the last minute to keep with the tongue in cheek format of every edition, a poke at something related to QPR news, sometimes funny, sometimes tenuous but done in a fanzine frame of mind.
My reason for defending this - I have helped Dave with design and done all the cover images over the past 10 years, trying to keep it fanzine looking and not matchday programme looking - in fact one year the AKUTRs was done in a font that the programme also chose - we changed. It's meant to have that Private Eye feel or When Saturday Comes.
I am a also graphic designer of 25+ years, I design, teach and write for design and training platforms internationally and for book publishers - Dave knows this and yet we often talk of ways to improve design that's manageable for Dave's setup. We also discuss sales avenues such as social media, I would love to switch Dave to InDesign, Creative Cloud and a brand new iMac and fully responsive website options but it's Dave that makes this with his own hands.
So really in defense of Dave's commitment and his progression given the circumstances, I and others know we get a rough and ready, skin of his teeth and flying by the seat of his pants editions but its made with love, passion and commitment. I will take that over anything else for as long as he keeps AKUTRs going. Kids don't know what fanzines are and are still more likely to buy the matchday programme, so its us older fans and our grown up kids who know its relevance in 2018. Dave has always tried to keep it advert free but finally relented to keep the mag going but he still doesn't want it full of ads.
What Dave needs is more articles, people speaking well of the mag, sharing its existence online and appreciating why it even exists.
Sorry for the rant but it's easy to belittle 30 years of hard work with no solid, achievable solutions to help Dave and not demoralise his efforts. I am firmly in his corner and have his back, that may show in my response but it's all too easy to criticise and not know how that makes him feel - he's read this post.
Thanks for reading ;) |
Well said Dave.
As the first home game is about to happen, let's keep this item at the top of the forum so that we can remember our pledges to look out for it, buy it and help to keep it going. |  | | |
| A Kick up th Rs on 11:21 - Aug 10 with 1216 views | peejaybee |
| A Kick up th Rs on 10:46 - Aug 10 by francisbowles |
Well said Dave.
As the first home game is about to happen, let's keep this item at the top of the forum so that we can remember our pledges to look out for it, buy it and help to keep it going. |
May I ask is the problem with keeping AKUTRs going a monetary problem or something else.Just asking like. |  |
| If at first you dont succeed, pack up and f**k off home. |
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| A Kick up th Rs on 11:52 - Aug 10 with 1195 views | francisbowles |
| A Kick up th Rs on 11:21 - Aug 10 by peejaybee |
May I ask is the problem with keeping AKUTRs going a monetary problem or something else.Just asking like. |
It's mainly about having enough purchasers/readers to keep it viable.
There is also a concern about a lack of contributors. | | | |
| A Kick up th Rs on 12:08 - Aug 10 with 1177 views | peejaybee |
| A Kick up th Rs on 11:52 - Aug 10 by francisbowles |
It's mainly about having enough purchasers/readers to keep it viable.
There is also a concern about a lack of contributors. |
Thanks for reply. | |
| If at first you dont succeed, pack up and f**k off home. |
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| A Kick up th Rs on 12:19 - Aug 10 with 1168 views | Ashdown_Ranger |
David - sorry if you took my constructive criticism as personal criticism of Dave and AKUTRs. That wasn't meant at all - although I will admit it was pretty blunt, possibly too much, for which I apologise.
You say AKUTRs is 'made with love, passion and commitment' - of course it is and that clearly comes across in the the magazine. Dave's 30 year of service to the QPR community is astonishing and utterly praiseworthy. AKUTRs is a much-loved and valued QPR institution, and long may it last.
But the original post clearly stated that AKUTRs was in trouble and I posted my feelings as to where I thought the problem may lie, as well as suggestions of how to address those problems.
I made those comments from my viewpoint as a designer who's worked on many magazines in my time in Art Editor and Art Director roles and, though I say so myself, I know something of what makes not only magazine titles sell - but also specific issues. Taking the quality of content as a given, the thing that makes magazines sell off the shelf is design.
You will always have loyal subscribers - but 'impulse buys' are very much down to the visual impact and appeal of the front cover. Never was a saying so untrue as 'You don't judge a book [or magazine] by it's cover' - people do al the time. Publishers have approx one second to persuade a potential buyer to buy the magazine.
Patting Dave on the back for a job well done for 30 years isn't going to help him the situation he finds himself in at the moment. He needs to find new (younger) customers/subscribers and has to find a way of reaching out to them and attracting them to AKUTRs.
As the old truism has it, 'if you do what you've always done, you'll get what you've always got'.
My comments were not to (in your words) 'belittle 30 years of hard work with no solid, achievable solutions'. In the spirit of helpful and constructive criticism I put forward what I thought was the problem and solutions to that problem.
And good design isn't more expensive than bad design - and it doesn't need new state-of-the-art computers or software to achieve it. It needs an eye for typography, visual design, art direction. If it's of any interest, I run a 'legacy' version of Quark (version 8) and would be very happy to put together some new design ideas. I would also happily get some comparative print quotes together from a few tame printers I know, to see if he might get the production costs down.
It's a very harsh world for everyone involved in paper publishing these and it's heartening that Dave has friends like you to in his corner who help and support him. And yes, I know Dave's seen my earlier post, as I emailed him a copy of it directly, for which he thanked me - but perhaps he was just too polite to tell me to f*** off! |  | | |
| A Kick up th Rs on 13:59 - Aug 20 with 934 views | BrianMcCarthy |
Got my Issue 340 through the letterbox this morning. Looking forward to reading it later. |  |
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