In the meantime, this article on niche magazines will be a good starting place. Read it. We'll talk about it Monday, in connection with John Vivian's chapter on magazines in "Media of Mass Communication."
The article is titled "Niche magazines: who reads what, and why?" It's by Amanda Lerner, and it appeared April 25 in North by Northwestern, which describes itself as a "daily newsmagazine of campus life, culture and entertainment for Northwestern University in Evanston." [Northwestern, by the way, has one of the top graduate programs nationwide in journalism and integrated marketing communications. It's called the Medill School of Journalism, and you might want to keep it in the back of your mind when you start thinking about grad school.] Lerner says:
Niche magazines are not just small, bi-monthly or quarterly magazines that target fishermen or knitters. According to Medill professor David Standish, the category encompasses “all magazines look for a specifically targeted audience. I guess niche . . . kind of depends on how small that target is.” In these tough economic times, some niche magazines are hitting a much larger target audience than others, leaving them in the proverbial dust in terms of readership.That's the money graf*, but, really, you should read the whole thing.
“In terms of print product, those that are going to survive are going to have to do something really useful for their readers.” Standish said, “I think the whole media landscape is in upheaval right now. And I think that what’s happening with magazines, the area that I know best, is that there is going to be a considerable shake-out.”
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* Jargon alert: In newspapering, "graf" is short for paragraph. No, I don't know why it's spelled with a "f." But it is.
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