Indie Publishing Stories, Part 2: The New CRAFT!

You may be aware that our beloved CRAFT just re-launched as an online magazine. And although there is a company behind it, I still think it’s a great indie publishing story.

As a print magazine, CRAFT was the bomb-diggety. It always featured a wider variety of making than I’ve seen in any other printed craft magazine, and it showcased new and unique crafters. And each issue was packed with great projects.

When CRAFT ceased publication back in January, it was a sad day. But at least its excellent blog continued.

Now, the newly-revamped website is something of a hybrid between blog and online magazine, and I’m very excited about this format. It allows CRAFT to continue showcasing the wide variety it does so well, and it provides an organized home for all kinds of media: downloadable PDF patterns, videos, interviews, an event calendar, and an online store.

I do miss CRAFT on paper, but this new online version can stay so much more current and offer vastly more content. In an era where it’s harder and harder to sustain a print magazine, I think this is a fresh new direction.

Not only that, with an online outlet, CRAFT can feature past pieces from the print magazine – like the article above I did for Issue 10, about making your own bitters. It’s really cool to see that shared with an online audience!

And, perhaps most importantly, CRAFT has always been extremely community-minded, seeking to promote independent crafters and share lots of useful information for free. (All the content on this new website, by the way, is offered for free.)

There’s lots of festivity this week to celebrate the launch. If you haven’t already, pop over and give CRAFT some well-deserved love!

fanieart

I am in love with their new design! I was wondering what they would do as they did say that they would come back online. I'm glad with the approach they took.

Maybe it could be interesting if they'd print "Special issues" with their "best of" or with a theme? I'd still love to get a little print in my hand once in awhile. :-)

cinderellen

The new layout is stylish and attractive, although I got a bit turned around on it. I suspect that is because I came over in the middle via Twitter rather than starting at the home page. I miss the nice list of links from the old site, though. Like you, I am still mourning the demise of the print version. Obviously it could never be as up-to-the-minute current as a web only publication, but it was a great resource and so easy to take along.

fuzzydragons

I think I could spend a lot of time there, lots to look at :)

tortagialla

I love following CRAFT and definitely very sad that it's not in print. It's a bit depressing that a lot of great magazines have not been able to continue printing. I admit online has it's advantages of speed in dissemination and response to community...but everyone loves to own beautiful hard copies, touch and feel the paper as you flip through. It's a whole different experience. I wish there was a way to do both and somehow have them compliment each other - figure out how to keep both alive and thriving...

SisterDiane

I agree with you - it's definitely a hard moment in magazine
publishing. I believe print mags will eventually come back but I see
two evolutions needing to happen: first, publishers will hopefully
grow to operate in a leaner, more profitable way. They'll have to find
other ways to monetize besides print advertising. And I think they'll
have to evolve their content so that it's more distinct and special
when held up next to online craft content. (Which, for the record, I
think CRAFT did extremely well.)

And then, we (the magazine-buying public) need to evolve, too. We've
had a pretty easy ride with content for a long time - because
advertisers were footing most of the bill. But, buffeted with ads for
decades, we're all pretty good at tuning them out now. If we want to
avoid so much advertising in our lives, then we have to pay more to
support the people who create the content we consume.

It'll be chaotic for a while, but I think good things will come from
it eventually.

tortagialla

Thanks for the response! I suppose advertisers have been footing the bill for too long and we the public do have to pay for content more consciously than ever before. I've certainly changed a bit myself in that paying $15 or $20 a magazine isn't too much when I really want the content. It does bring up an interesting issue of online versus print content - it costs less to buy the PDF version versus print version of some content...but sometimes I'm not sure the pricing is accurate. To me anyway, it seems the value of the content tends to get skewed...or more often than not undervalued.

SisterDiane

BOY, are you correct there - the value of content is an enormous
discussion!

And we are in a total frontier moment with the pricing of digital
material - which is really in some ways "pure content." It's hard to
find a price point people will readily pay - and still challenging for
people who buy digital content to find out in advance whether the
content is of good quality. You can thumb through a magazine on the
newsstand and see if it's something you want to buy, but that's a lot
harder to offer with an ebook.

Anyway. I could go on about this stuff all day. :-)

tortagialla

You're right, perhaps there's another forum for this discussion, because it's definitely a growing and changing subject, the value of content and how does one go about selling it. Thanks for your thoughts, nice to know people care about all this, especially since so many of us are content producers at the heart of it...

Chris

oh, I love CRAFT. If I would keep up better, I would have known about this...

...well, earlier today.

knitgrrl

Definitely brilliant -- I'm loving it! (Can't wait to see some of the things I wrote for the print edition pop back up online!)

Indie Publishing Stories, Part 2: The New CRAFT!

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