I received a renewal notice today for MRR. I was hoping to go to the digital format, but noticed it is $12 more than home delivery. I don't understand why. To me, the magazine saves money in ink, postage, and paper costs by offering it digitally. This should be able to be passed on to the consumer/subscriber. Furthermore, this being Earth Day week, it seems publishers would be encouraging digital formats, not discouraging them.
I have reached out to Kalmbach for an explanation. I apologize if this has been discussed before on this forum.
Brad
I just checked and the paper version is $42.95 for 12 issues. The digital only version is $42.95 for 12 issues. The $12.00 charge you are seeing is to add digital to a paper subscription, for a total of 54.95 for both. Hope that helps.
Edit: For what it is worth, I had both for a year and am now digital only, and love it. It is definitely a matter of personal preference--there are many who have to have paper--but for me, digital is the only way to go. I have even bought a couple of the Kalmbach books in digital format and have been very pleased with their format, though disappointed with the lack of digital titles.
Richard
RideOnRoad I just checked and the paper version is $42.95 for 12 issues. The digital only version is $42.95 for 12 issues. The $12.00 charge you are seeing is to add digital to a paper subscription, for a total of 54.95 for both. Hope that helps. Edit: For what it is worth, I had both for a year and am now digital only, and love it. It is definitely a matter of personal preference--there are many who have to have paper--but for me, digital is the only way to go. I have even bought a couple of the Kalmbach books in digital format and have been very pleased with their format, though disappointed with the lack of digital titles.
i asked them them to just have a "digital only" subscription. It should be way cheaper than the snail mail version as kalmbach saves on paper, ink, postage, and labor. Might even encourage more subscribers and renewals (like mine).
brad
My subscriptions are currently out of sync ebcause I added Digital halfway through my print subscription, but when my print runs out, I'm sticking with digital only. I get my digital edition a week before the print copy, and I haven;t even cracked the covers on the last 3 or 4 print copies, I've already finished reading it by the time the print copy arrives. I only hope they make updates available to the 75 year DVD set so I can clea rmy shelves even more.
--Randy
Modeling the Reading Railroad in the 1950's
Visit my web site at www.readingeastpenn.com for construction updates, DCC Info, and more.
brad,
As was already noted, Model Railroader offers a digital only subscription. I know, because I converted mine from paper to digital a couple of years back.
Yes, it does cost the same as the paper subscription. Yes, printing and postal costs do make up a significant portion of the costs that eat away at the revenues from print subscriptions. But not all or even half. If we still want all the content, then who pays for that? And how does a business like MR stay financially healthy if it doesn't maintain enough income to support itself.
It's possible that once enough readers convert and new ones added, a small price decrease might be possible. More realistically, the digital subscription will probably stay close to what it is and not rise, like I expect the paper subscription to do.
Mike Lehman
Urbana, IL
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mike et al,
sorry I misread the reply. I'm ok with it being same cost for either/or Print or digital. There's got to be more profit in digital though (which is fine, I want businesses to be profitable). Didn't realize you could do a digital only format. Cool.
If a digital subscription expires, will you still be able to read back issues?
Dave
Just be glad you don't have to press "2" for English.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQ_ALEdDUB8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6hqFS1GZL4s
http://s73.photobucket.com/user/steemtrayn/media/MovingcoalontheDCM.mp4.html?sort=3&o=27
Do you download a PDF to your documents file?? If so, then you will have an archive copy.
If it is online only, then i guess you only can view it while subscribed.
James in Texas
Joe Staten Island West
I'm digital only for MR, Trains, MRP, and Classic Trains. While I love the ability to rapidly call up back issues, I do wonder what would happen if Zinio were to go out of business. I hope Kalmbach has a backup plan that could restore our purchases.
Zinio is a service that handles electronic distribution for a bunch of magazines. An app goes on your iPad. You get an email that lets you know when the new issue is available for download. Simple and painless. The older issues you've bought and read show inside the app, as well as any you've yet to download. I presume once you bought it, it's yours just like a paper copy, don't see any reason why that wouldn't be.
The cost issue reminds me of the way banks got rid of live human tellers (and their employee-related costs, such as health insurance, employer payroll taxes, workers comp, etc.) in the early 1980s as they installed ATM machines as kiosks in the front of their buildings. The costs of already-paid for computers were "recovered" by charging withdrawal fees that never existed when the transactions were made with human tellers, and those fees have stayed with us some 30 years later, rising ever higher. The ATM computer and the kiosk machine had no insurance, social security, or other employee costs, just electricity and two humans to have to pay- the IT software operator and the mechanical technician repairman.
Given the high costs associated with printing a magazine, despite the "digital" revolution having come and gone, one would think that an online service would end up being cheaper to produce than 250,000 magazines a month (if they were entirely digital at this point).
Also, in a related vein, why does the MR archival DVD (1934-2010) cost so much as a retail item ($200.00), when I can buy a recent movie dvd for far less?
Cedarwoodron
There also comes into play things like quantity discounts. I have a feeling enouhg rolls of paper to produce 250K magazines is priced less per roll than the number needed to produce 50K magazines - so costa will initially rise as more people go digital.
The archival DVD is CHEAP at any price - it's less than 23 cents per issue! You can't buy single article reprints for that. And copies of the first years? Good luck even finding one of those - original OR the reprint they did in the 40's. Even when selling old magazines at train shows, people wanted 50 cents or more per issue. Only time I got even close to the per issue price of the DVD was once at a train show and I was picking and chosing years I didn't already have, and the guy said, tell you what, $10 and you can have them all. After carrying 5 years worth of MR out to the car in batches, I was almost too tired to walk the rest of the show.
Sure, you can buy a recent movie for less, but they also sell MILLIONS of those. And a good chunk of the money to pay off the movie was already earned at the box office. Look how many millions they take in is just 3 days, for a hit movie. Of course, look how many millions they pay the actors...
$200 is too much to have every issue of MR ever, but heck, $300 is nothing to drop on the latest locomotive. Guess I don't get it. Most of my locos have been in the $50 range with careful and patient bidding on eBay. But I do have the DVD set. And the Classic Trains one. I wanted the Special Issues one but it was sold out. Lots of good stuff in these DVDs, and really only the very oldest techniques are obsolete these days (like using asbestos cement for scenery). The CONCEPTS though - why you would make a certain landform in a specific place, for example, are just as valid today as when those early pioneers came up with them - you just use different materials.