Cycle World goes quartely, 4 issues/year

[Ulvetanna_imp]

Would everyone who is cancelling their subscriptions to the very publications that cover (perhaps imperfectly) their most cherished passion, motorcycles, be willing to pay per article for the work of journalists that is currently published for free on digital platforms? Are you really saying that, even at 4 or 6 issues per year, you’re not willing to pay $10 or so a year for them? Is there an alternate model that would make you happy? Just asking for some friends.


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Capo, I was pretty early into networking computers (early 1990's) and thus early into the Internet motorcycle magazine game. I stayed very involved for about five years and was asked to start the first website for one of the big three national magazines, but by that time, it was too late. Had they asked me to do it a few years earlier (which I suggested), I'd have jumped at the chance, as the salary was quite generous. But by the early 2000s, with the advent of myspace and so on, the Internet had become saturated with everyone's junk. Even mediocre journalism was non-existent. I knew for a fact these magazines, and their johnny-come-lately, half-baked websites, were doomed.

And they were. Sport Rider, Cycle World, soon Motorcyclist, and so on. Rider has a heritage from which to draw and stuck to the classic design. But there is only room for one book in that genre, and Rider is it.

I was once told that my approach to journalism was very similar to [url=http://www.motorcyclemuseum.org/halloffame/detail.aspx?RacerID=379]Cook Nielson's, and I am sure it is obvious I took that as a huge compliment.

But no one gives a rat about Cook Nielsen, or decent journalism, any longer. The lesser lights of the pseudo-journalism world (please read Lance Oliver's column on Common Tread, "[url=https://www.revzilla.com/common-tread/why-motorcycle-journalism-isnt-journalism]Why Motorcycle Journalism Isn't Journalism" where he comes right out and admits there is nothing resembling real journalism on that site) are people who I personally watched become so entranced with their own egos and imagined stature in the industry that they flushed it all away. The baby is about to be thrown out with the bath water. I have been moved to a hiatus and reset from even this modest website because of a highly-variable signal/noise ratio, and have only returned out of pure cussedness. So I would hope one can see that professionals completely avoid motorcycles, and move into the automotive side of things, where the real money is.

You are in that game, right? You recall [url=http://www.motorpressguild.org/remembering-friend-founding-mpg-board-member-eric-dahlquist/]Eric Dahlquist? I knew him when I was in the Motor Press Guild. A very good man; he took me aside and gave me some excellent advice. We need more like him. Like Dan Gurney, he recently passed away. Yes, I knew Dan Gurney, too. And many others of the golden age of motorsports who have left us. It's a legacy really impossible to duplicate but there are some lessons there. I am INCREDIBLY fortunate to have learned so much from men like those. Another great guy who reached out to me was [url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Considine]Tim Considine, who has a surname synonymous with great writing for decades. These guys offered to help me because, believe it or not, I humbled myself and made it clear I was willing to learn something. That guy was so modest, so humble himself (and he was a TV star with a huge family name) that I couldn't help but just shut up and listen.

The management at the aforementioned failed paper publications rested on its very dubious laurels and did nothing, paid no attention, and have suffered the consequences. I can clearly recall being mocked some 20 years ago for being an "Internet writer" (surprise, surprise, right, guys?) but I knew what was coming. And here we are, and there they are, out of work and pretty much unemployable.

Some may have noticed I infrequently quote or mention Jack London, one of the greatest of all journalists and writers. That's the kind of quality we need to restore motorcycle journalism.

Jack always personally did the things he wrote about. Did he ride a motorcycle? No, but he was an avid bicyclist, circa 1900, and would ride 80 miles each way to visit his girlfriend on weekends, 160 miles in 24 hours. And on the bicycles they had then, that was beyond grueling (I did a 110-mile day once and it knocked me flat for about a week).

He could write about sailing and world travel because he did it; more than that, he broke new ground. He nearly died in the Yukon as part of the Gold Rush in 1897. He spent two years sailing with a tiny crew on a 42' ketch all over the Pacific. And so on.

We need writers who shut up about how fast they are on the latest superbike, or what to have for dinner when on a tour, or what is the hippest gadget for one's idiotic digital entertainment center. We need writers who will "[url=https://quoteinvestigator.com/2011/09/21/inspiration-club/]go after inspiration with a club" if necessary, and "[url=https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/2851-i-would-rather-be-ashes-than-dust-i-would-rather]would rather be ashes than dust."

There are other examples of great journalists: Charles Lindbergh, Ernie Pyle, Walter Cronkite...

But these days any orifice with a computer can create a website and write anything, and if it sounds right, many will figure it's right, and anyway, it's free.

The issue (pun intended) is that few people know anything about motorcycles. They have become a lifestyle choice. Most people who ride these days have no idea whether their bikes are liquid or air/oil-cooled. They have no idea how to remove a wheel, or adjust a chain or cables, or do anything useful.

Motorcycles used to be, of necessity, hands-on vehicles. That was part of the attraction. No longer so.

Thus, the business model for the TYPE of journalism has changed.

The OLD GUARD who have recently failed were still going by the "I'm faster than you and I am going to tell you all about it" along with the "I got to go to Spain and test ride Yamaha's newest superbike, and I'm gonna tell you all about it. And I'm gonna amuse you with my cute, clever antics and maybe how drunk we all got at the hotel the night before."

The great men of motorsports journalism whom I've mentioned earlier, I mention to emphasize the lessons they can bring, and the great things they gave us in the past. I AM HONORED to have known them.

To your query: I know what business model would work and it involves having a respect for, and clear appreciation of, what Millennials think about and how they see the world.

However I am retired and not the least bit interested in that game, which, BTW, is extremely political when you get to the level of the MIC, AMA, and FIM. And that level kicks in the instant one publishes his first word.

You had better tell your friends to keep their day jobs, because unless they possess a keen sense of adventure, have an unusually well-developed ability to turn a phrase and find humor, irony, insight, and above all, HUMANITY in their written work -- along with a good grasp of the technical aspects of motorcycling today (and the relationship between digital and analogy technologies), they will fail.

Capo, I was pretty early into networking computers (early 1990's) and thus early into the Internet motorcycle magazine game. I stayed very involved for about five years and was asked to start the first website for one of the big three national magazines, but by that time, it was too late. Had they asked me to do it a few years earlier (which I suggested), I'd have jumped at the chance, as the salary was quite generous. But by the early 2000s, with the advent of myspace and so on, the Internet had become saturated with everyone's junk. Even mediocre journalism was non-existent. I knew for a fact these magazines, and their johnny-come-lately, half-baked websites, were doomed.

And they were. Sport Rider, Cycle World, soon Motorcyclist, and so on. Rider has a heritage from which to draw and stuck to the classic design. But there is only room for one book in that genre, and Rider is it.

I was once told that my approach to journalism was very similar to [url=http://www.motorcyclemuseum.org/halloffame/detail.aspx?RacerID=379]Cook Nielson's, and I am sure it is obvious I took that as a huge compliment.

But no one gives a rat about Cook Nielsen, or decent journalism, any longer. The lesser lights of the pseudo-journalism world (please read Lance Oliver's column on Common Tread, "[url=https://www.revzilla.com/common-tread/why-motorcycle-journalism-isnt-journalism]Why Motorcycle Journalism Isn't Journalism" where he comes right out and admits there is nothing resembling real journalism on that site) are people who I personally watched become so entranced with their own egos and imagined stature in the industry that they flushed it all away. The baby is about to be thrown out with the bath water. I have been moved to a hiatus and reset from even this modest website because of a highly-variable signal/noise ratio, and have only returned out of pure cussedness. So I would hope one can see that professionals completely avoid motorcycles, and move into the automotive side of things, where the real money is.

You are in that game, right? You recall [url=http://www.motorpressguild.org/remembering-friend-founding-mpg-board-member-eric-dahlquist/]Eric Dahlquist? I knew him when I was in the Motor Press Guild. A very good man; he took me aside and gave me some excellent advice. We need more like him. Like Dan Gurney, he recently passed away. Yes, I knew Dan Gurney, too. And many others of the golden age of motorsports who have left us. It's a legacy really impossible to duplicate but there are some lessons there. I am INCREDIBLY fortunate to have learned so much from men like those.

The management at the aforementioned failed paper publications rested on its very dubious laurels and did nothing, paid no attention, and have suffered the consequences. I can clearly recall being mocked some 20 years ago for being an "Internet writer" (surprise, surprise, right, guys?) but I knew what was coming. And here we are, and there they are, out of work and pretty much unemployable.

Some may have noticed I infrequently quote or mention Jack London, one of the greatest of all journalists and writers. That's the kind of quality we need to restore motorcycle journalism.

Jack always personally did the things he wrote about. Did he ride a motorcycle? No, but he was an avid bicyclist, circa 1900, and would ride 80 miles each way to visit his girlfriend on weekends, 160 miles in 24 hours. And on the bicycles they had then, that was beyond grueling (I did a 110-mile day once and it knocked me flat for about a week).

He could write about sailing and world travel because he did it; more than that, he broke new ground. He nearly died in the Yukon as part of the Gold Rush in 1897. He spent two years sailing with a tiny crew on a 42' ketch all over the Pacific. And so on.

We need writers who shut up about how fast they are on the latest superbike, or what to have for dinner when on a tour, or what is the hippest gadget for one's idiotic digital entertainment center. We need writers who will "[url=https://quoteinvestigator.com/2011/09/21/inspiration-club/]go after inspiration with a club" if necessary, and "[url=https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/2851-i-would-rather-be-ashes-than-dust-i-would-rather]would rather be ashes than dust."

There are other examples of great journalists: Charles Lindbergh, Ernie Pyle, Walter Cronkite...

But these days any orifice with a computer can create a website and write anything, and if it sounds right, many will figure it's right, and anyway, it's free.

The issue (pun intended) is that few people know anything about motorcycles. They have become a lifestyle choice. Most people who ride these days have no idea whether their bikes are liquid or air/oil-cooled. They have no idea how to remove a wheel, or adjust a chain or cables, or do anything useful.

Motorcycles used to be, of necessity, hands-on vehicles. That was part of the attraction. No longer so.

Thus, the business model for the TYPE of journalism has changed.

The OLD GUARD who have recently failed were still going by the "I'm faster than you and I am going to tell you all about it" along with the "I got to go to Spain and test ride Yamaha's newest superbike, and I'm gonna tell you all about it. And I'm gonna amuse you with my cute, clever antics and maybe how drunk we all got at the hotel the night before."

I know what business model would work and it involves having a respect for, and clear appreciation of, what Millennials think about and how they see the world.

However I am retired and not the least bit interested in that game, which, BTW, is extremely political when you get to the level of the MIC, AMA, and FIM. And that level kicks in the instant one publishes his first word.

You had better tell your friends to keep their day jobs, because unless they possess a keen sense of adventure, have an unusually well-developed ability to turn a phrase and find humor, irony, insight, and above all, HUMANITY in their written work -- along with a good grasp of the technical aspects of motorcycling today (and the relationship between digital and analogy technologies), they will fail.

You must have been a nightmare to your editor!


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Believe it or not, because I did all my own legwork, and did a very careful job of editing, the guys in top management (who also rode motorcycles and columns) like me and my work. I was very thorough and took great pride in leaving very little for the proofreader to do.

The good people are fewer and further between these days. They want it yesterday, and don't care if it's accurate. Lance Oliver said it well.

No, I wouldn't pay a nickel for that. The journalists are usually beholden in some way to manufacturers and so I don't trust them to be objective; moreover, generally they have some slant in their writing (for example, they really only like sport bikes or Harleys).

I'd much rather get the opinions of people on a forum like this, who tend to be self-selected in their tastes (so pretty much everyone on this site likes CB1100s). And they're not doing it for the money . . .

That is EXACTLY right. That's why I'm here. I figure someone will get something useful, truly helpful, once in a while.

So I tangle with the moderators or a member or two once in a while.

I don't care. Until I'm banned (lol), I do this for the 4,000 members because it's an excellent platform and well-managed.

I have huge respect for Bob Guthrie and what he's done here, but he's always got final call on things. If I get too far out into left field, he'll reel me in. But so far, so good.

And yes, if that sounds altruistic, it is. Perhaps masochistic as well, but when even one member says he got something useful out of anything I've learned, I like that. That's more than adequate compensation.

No, I wouldn't pay a nickel for that. The journalists are usually beholden in some way to manufacturers and so I don't trust them to be objective; moreover, generally they have some slant in their writing (for example, they really only like sport bikes or Harleys).

I'd much rather get the opinions of people on a forum like this, who tend to be self-selected in their tastes (so pretty much everyone on this site likes CB1100s). And they're not doing it for the money . . .

'The journalists are usually beholden in some way to manufacturers and so I don't trust them to be objective; moreover, generally they have some slant in their writing.' That's a pretty broad brush statement. And patently false, but regardless, if you're saying you don't want opinion, POV, or perspectives, then, yes, you are not a likely customer for any form of journalism, other than perhaps spec sheets and pictures. And yes, the feedback loop of a model- specific forum can be comforting.

I'm going to continue to prod this, as we are at a serious inflection point in media. Nobody seems to want to pay for anything, everyone apparently wants precisely what they want, and nothing else, and nobody trusts anyone unless they agree with an already formed point of view. A la Carte but free. Not sure if anything moving forward will satisfy that. But yet, we do all want to have access to professional content of some sort.

It's not patently false, but certainly it is not utterly true, either. Some journalism is more objective than others, but all journalism is subjective.

Please, anyone who is reading this, take a look at [url=https://www.revzilla.com/common-tread/why-motorcycle-journalism-isnt-journalism]Mr. Lance Oliver's column on this very thing. The new business model is that the manufacturers control the game, almost entirely. And he has a bird's-eye view, working for Revzilla, owned by Cycle Gear.

No one's gonna buy Internet journalism of any kind, not for a very very long time, if ever. Someone'll figure out what's next, just like rock bands with tube amplifiers and real drums are starting to make a comeback.