Virgina Postrel has an interesting post regarding the role of magazines in a digital media age. She refers to another article written by Warren Ellis, who asks, “If your concept of a magazine is something designed in one-page bursts, or three pages that only carry 500 words due to the mass of images, then, really, you’re not doing anything the web can’t do better, are you?”
Virginia argues that medium-sized articles often get chopped to bits, or blown out or proportion to a book. Magazines are still the venue for those who want to consider serious ideas. She writes, “I’ve often said that if I were still editing Reason, I’d redesign the magazine to put all the short stuff on the Web and just run long features in print.” Interesting idea.
