The PRINT version of Interestment has arrived! (and probably disappeared already)
Look out for it! (you might have to look VERY hard)
Print is dead man, over half of the magazines I’ve worked on (which is LOADS) have stuttered, spluttered or imploded. Some have walked slowly towards a light switch on the wall, turned and whispered “thanks” to an empty room before awkwardly shuffling off in no particular direction – their tribe long gone, no longer paying attention, dazzled by a much hotter chick. It’s not an easy time to be in print, not with all of these bleeping sounds and flashing buttons. Not with all of these websites and blogs, these watch-movies-on-the-bus portals. Add the fact that most editorial teams are now forced to work with one hand tied behind their backs while advertisers bark orders at them, and just getting a magazine out of the door is an obstacle course that makes Tough Mudder look like fairground teacups. AND YET at some point soon I’m convinced we’ll go a full circle, and like the recent upsurge in vinyl sales, magazines will become so old-fangled, so tangible and lost in romantic folklore that we’ll yearn for them. They will come back, perhaps not with the same confident swagger, but with the power back in the right hands – with writers who have great ideas that don’t need to be diluted and passed through numerous filters, with editors who aren’t held over a barrel and forced into fighting pointless battles with dullards in suits.
In the meantime, I thought I’d fulfill one of my all-time ambitions and swamp London with a print copy of Interestment – a nine-page blunderbuss of haphazard editorial ideas, all unfiltered and unfettered. A few lists here, a couple of self-indulgent trips down memory lane there, some wonderful work from great friends of the site and a magnificent short story to finish things off.
I shouted “GRAB AN ALTERNATIVE READ FOR THE TUBE” outside Brixton Underground and most people quite sensibly ignored me. I tried to hand a copy to a bloke in a coffee shop but he looked at me like I’d propositioned his girlfriend and I slowly backed out of the door without breaking eye contact. Despite this, all I asked was that if people enjoy it, they resist the urge to chuck it on the pavement and hand it on to someone else to read instead. There will be no sudden upsurge in print, this drop in the ocean doesn’t even warrant the analogy, it’s a droplet within the drop heading for the ocean. It’s a string of hay in a needlestack. BUT with a little bit of luck a small ripple will add to other small ripples and one day turn into a bigger ripple, and punters will flock back to print, and young writers will be free to express themselves unshackled.
Enjoy this sneak peak…
Give me a shout on Twitter @joshburt76 to let me know what you think