Publishing e-zines

Ross Woods, rev. June 2011

Postscript. E-zines were emailed magazines. This was first written before the time of the on-line blog, but describes it fairly well.

Here are some notes for a best practice guide on publishing and editing e-zines. The better the job, the more time it will take.

Defining the e-zine

  1. Have a clear purpose, and let the title reflect it.
  2. By clearly defining the e-zine, you will attract and keep a particular target audience. People won't unsubscribe because they're disappointed.
  3. Identify the e-zine's role on the commercial continuum. At one end are those publications that readers expect to get for free (chat groups, newsletters, discussion papers) while at the other end are publications that people expect to pay for (glossy magazines, professional forums, research forums, and research journals). An e-zine's place on the continuum determines its monetary value.
  4. Just like a regular publication:
    • You need to specify length of articles and of the whole publication. The shorter it is, the more frequently you can send it out, but it's just spam if you send it too often.
    • You need to specify your deadlines for copy for each edition. When the timeliness of articles is important, you can turn articles around faster than paper competitors. there is the trap that fast will become shoddy.
  5. The kind of delivery must suit the kind of publication. Free e-mail might suit a chat page or a newsletter, while a more substantial publication needs an equally substantial publication format, such a locked pdf or other e-book layout.
  6. The further to the research journal end of the continuum, the more valuable it is to put past editions on a website. A searchable knowledge base is ideal.

Layout and etiquette

  1. Identify the moderator and give email address.
  2. Give subscribe and unsubscribe information.
  3. Do not send spam. It might be acceptable to send out an introductory copy to a mailing list you already have. Otherwise, do not spam lists of other subscribers. People may subscribe on behalf of others, just as they buy a magazine subscription as a gift.
  4. Include a privacy statement. Subscribers should be able to remain anonymous unless they submit articles. It's illegal sell the list of subscribers unless they agree.
  5. Separate commercial ads from subscriber's articles. If authors recommend commercial services, they should as a courtesy state that they have no conflict of interest.
  6. Presume that writers have good intentions. Email is notorious for easily creating misunderstandings because people usually write without the benefit of a delay between drafts or an independent editor. Give them the benefit of any doubt.

Editing

  1. Layout should resemble a paper publication, so follow your style guide rigidly.
  2. Put similar articles together in the same edition so that it has a theme.
  3. Avoid in-house abbreviations that new subscribers would not understand.
  4. Identify all authors and perhaps give their email addresses. Their organizational titles might be preferable in some kinds of e-zines.

Inclusive or focused?

Should an e-zine editor publish everything he/she gets or specifically select the best? Not an easy question, but it really depends on the kind of publication. Here are some guidelines:

  1. If readers pay a subscription, you must select the best. You can have a "To the Editor" page for readers' comments, but they are not articles. On the other hand, a chat publication can publish a wide variety of relatively ephemeral comment.
  2. Allow a forum of opinion, especially those with which you don't agree.
  3. You obviously can't include cranks, personal chat, etc.
  4. The meanings of some submissions are unclear, and you may be unsure whether to publish them in present form. If the paper has little potential, you should reject it. However, if it is basically very sound, you should ask the author to clarify his/her opinions with further discussion or examples. In a few cases, you can use the article to stimulate reader discussion.

Some articles are borderline as to whether they fit in the topic; they might be suitable for a longer e-zine but clearly miss the mark for a shorter more tightly focused e-zine.

Publishing and paying the bills

How would somebody make enough money to pay the bills? Although a great deal of it is automatable, there are still significant costs in infrastructure and in maintaining the system.

The biggest issue seems to me to be quality of content. E-zines at one end of the scale are little more than personal chat or advertising junk mail, while a long way up the other end of the e-zine market, some have the potential to become credible research journals with payable subscriptions. It would be good to see whether other kinds of e-zines (e.g. mass popular entertainment) could play a role.

As a publishing analogy, it might be better to align publication policy with e-books, which people expect to pay for. People generally presume that websites and email are free.

On the plus side, it seems to me that specificity of content is a major strengths of e-zines. It is possible, perhaps easy, for an e-zine to become the major international publication in a field by being very good at something very specific, and distributing material more quickly than paper publications. E-zines are already the best way to pick up obscure but valuable information. The corollary is that the most specific e-zines will then probably have a very specific (read "small") target audience.

E-zines could become truly mass publications with very high advertising profiles if they make bridge the gap to portable information technology, but they will probably need to have significant promotional strategies in place.