Sorry for my lack of knowledge but why is model railroader doing what they do? Why dont they mix it up? This cannot be the only forum or discussion on model railroader, they have to have an idea that many of there subscribers do not like the direction that model railroader took! Are they doing this because of the lack of competition, so they feel necessary to gear the magazine towards newbies"?
I miss the 150-200 page model railroader magazine you could get in the 90s...
I personally think they should have more hands on projects that they havent published a year ago
I dont hate the magazine, i actually look forward to the new issue every month but once i get it im kinda let down.
I know im kinda off topic talking about model railroader but.it was brought up jn this thread and i would like to know why from the more experienced modelers who have been around this hobby for quite sometime now.
Joe, yours is a multifaceted question, but a number of specific factors basically govern the current situation.
In regard to page count, this is largely a matter controlled by income from advertisers. As the digital age matured the advertisers came to realize that a small monthly ad in MR including their web address, as opposed to a former full page printed ad, saved them a great deal of money. So, less big ads, less income, less pages of content.
The dumbing-down of content arose with the drastic change over of staff about 2000 and the assigning of a tinplate/toy train enthusiast to head up MR, which they did yet again with the latest editor, plus the rise of RTR. The replacement staff itself were for the most part seemingly journalism-degreed folks with some passing interest in the hobby. Yet they were replacing the highly experienced, talented and creative model railroaders the magazine had been famous for for years. Only David Popp demonstrates any real ability as a real modeler and inventive author and he has been spun off to MR's new, extra cost, video section.
With our hobby progressively shrinking in numbers MR, like so many other publications, felt it necessary to attempt to expand its scope and appeal to the broadest audience possible. Doing so meant writing about the most basic subjects involved in the hobby and illustrating modeling techniques of such low standards that anyone could replicate them, together with pushing RTR trains that required no talent or skill on the part of the modeler. The great kitbashing and scratchbuild features of the past were felt not only beyond the new hoped for readership, but probably beyond most of the staff as well. This situation is often reflected in the truncating of instructions offered in the few remaining construction articles to appear in MR, which are sometimes so fragmentary the project can not truly be replicated correctly by the reader.
As has already been pointed out in this thread, MR accepts no criticism about itself, nor its content. As a result virtually all the accomplished hobbyists have left the MR site and it has shrunk in membership by around 50% over the past 5-7 years, populated now largely by mediocre hobbyists and dabblers. Likewise, the magazine itself is in dramatic decline, its subscription numbers falling by 90,000 since 1994. Draw your own conclusions as to where that will lead given time.
So, from my perspective, there you have pretty much the major elements governing the hows and whys of MR's current situation.
NYW&B