introducing myself

Hi I'm Nola. I am so glad to find others interested in the same topics as me. This Space Age Magazine is such a great idea.

Unfortunately (sorry Rick!) I've never actually read the magazine, but this forum is excellent

Well, even if you wanted to read Space Age magazine, you couldn't because it doesn't exist yet!

I edit a magazine called Philosophy Now, which has been going for years and has a reasonably big circulation. The webmaster of Philosophy Now, who is called Bora Dogan, is also a space enthusiast, so the two of us have been talking sporadically for a long time about setting up a magazine called Space Age, which would be a sort of "cultural magazine of the space age", focusing on the human aspect of space travel and life in space. However, life is busy and we haven't got very far with that yet. But we (ok, mainly Bora!) created this forum because we thought we could at least chat with fellow enthusiasts here, kick some ideas around and that gathering a like-minded community might be a step on the way to eventually creating the magazine.

Ah, well you have my support for it! Bora doesn't seem to be as chatty lately?

Well you wouldn't want to produce a traditional print magazine anyway... their days are numbered.

But you could build a variation of the "e-zine" model around this forum, blogs, space related news feeds, and contributions (like Intranaut's fiction) fairly easily, quickly, and for low overhead.

I dig it, but perhaps this should be somewhere besides someone's introductory thread? lol...

Haha yeah what are your thoughts Nola?

Ah, well you have my support for it! Bora doesn't seem to be as chatty lately?

Yes, Bora made a few postings here last year but nothing recently. In the end, he's just not that much into using internet forums (though he is very good at creating them!) Also he keeps taking on new projects which keep him busy. As well as web design, philosophy and space travel, he's also become interested in artificial intelligence, and is going back to uni soon to start a Master's degree in the subject. At the moment he's working like crazy to finish off some website projects for Philosophy Now before he starts his degree.

Well you wouldn't want to produce a traditional print magazine anyway... their days are numbered.

I think print mags will continue for a bit longer yet, but increasingly with online editions running alongside. Eventually the print editions will be dropped, but I think that is still a few years away. It's true though that starting a print magazine is expensive and risky, and probably the majority close before ever reaching any kind of financial break-even point. Big magazine publishing groups can take that into account in their planning - they know that not every new mag will succeed. Small independent publishers have to be very careful, however.

But you could build a variation of the "e-zine" model around this forum, blogs, space related news feeds, and contributions (like Intranaut's fiction) fairly easily, quickly, and for low overhead.

Yes, perhaps you are right - that might well be the way to go. No pressure, very low expenses, and the project/online community can grow slowly and organically for however long there are people interested in it. (Which given that this is space exploration we are talking about, will probably be either for a VERY long time or else until our civilization crashes!)

I agree that Intranaut's fiction is exactly the sort of thing such an e-zine needs.

Just tell me if you ever want to post it
If you hold me to it once my exams finish I could probably serialise it weekly.

But with or without me, I'd love to see your e-zine or magazine!