Rabble.ca again taps its community for support

Rabble.ca, the online news site with a magazine sensibility, is holding its annual membership drive to help build audience and pay for providing progressive stories to it. As it points out, it receives no government support, has no parent company, no endowment and survives on community support for their 100% free site. We particularly like their wacky banner for the campaign that says "If you can't trust a sock monkey, your soul is dead."

Small cultural mags were cut adrift because they're not businesses

It was an interesting presentation this week at the MagNet conference in Toronto by Scott Shortliffe, the director of periodical publishing and programs from the Department of Canadian Heritage. He probably gladdened the hearts of publishers large and small by saying that they were only a couple of weeks away from receiving cheques under the new Canada Periodical Fund (CPF). Almost 1,000 titles have qualified under the Aid to Publishers component, which represents the merger of the former Canadian Magazine Fund (CMF) and the Publications Assistance Program (PAP -- commonly known as the postal subsidy).

I should say upfront that Shortliffe should be commended for his frankness and openness in showing up when asked and answering questions from publishers. He has demonstrated himself to be a sympathetic voice in Ottawa and a sensitive student of the magazine business and its economics.

Something he said last week seemed new, at least to me. That was that the Canada Periodical Fund and the periodical program in general is basically an “industry support program” and that his department made the decision (he used the term “rationalization”) that the programming was intended effectively to support magazines as viable businesses. He said that Heritage had made a departure from normal practice and may have made a mistake (under the  CMF) in funding small arts and cultural publications in the first place since success for them is more often judged on artistic merit rather than their business models.

The costs of servicing very small arts and cultural publications (roughly 50 of them are now ineligible under the CPF if they sell fewer than 5,000 copies a year), he said,  outstripped the benefit to Canadians of their tiny circulations (I am paraphrasing). I even thought I heard him refer to these as”micro magazines”.

He pointed out that the Canada Council was in the business, unlike Heritage, of deciding on funding based on artistic merit and was the appropriate place for small arts and culture magazines to go. Of course the shunting of these small magazines and their tiny but important business and circulation issues to the Canada Council is not likely to help those magazines, since no more money seems forthcoming for the Canada Council to offset this increased need.

Small arts and cultural titles which are seeing their postal costs go up 3 or 4 times with the end of the publications assistance program had come to count on the very valuable Support for Arts and Literary Magazines (SALM) funding which met a very real need and had made some very real differences in the audience-building capacities of those magazines. Surely if costs of administering this relatively small portion of the Heritage periodical budget was the problem, streamlining and simplifying the program would have been a better response than cutting its smallest clients adrift. (I have heard from more than one source that the principle reason for the floor on funding was to cut out academic journals, who tap other sources of funding such as SSHRC, and that the small literary and cultural magazines were collateral damage.)

Shortliffe also said that, at least for the next two years, relatively small arts and literary magazines (between 500 and 45,000 circulation) would be eligible for support under the business innovation portion of the CPF. Some of this funding might go to publications that are just under the 5,000-circulation-per-year minimum for the larger fund and could apply for a project to boost their circulation over the threshold. However they will be assessed on the basis of just that -- their innovative ideas -- and they will be competing with much larger publications for this portion of the pot. Many of the challenges facing small cultural magazines, however, are relatively prosaic ones of fundamental audience development or business planning.

Paradoxically, he said he had no problem with his staff making judgements about the innovativeness of particular applications under the business innovation program. This in answer to my question about whether they would be calling in advisors from the magazine industry to determine what was truly worthwhile and innovative – just as the Canada Council does with its peer review panels who determine if a magazine's artistic merits should be supported.

Shortliffe was unable to say if this transitional arrangement (access to the business innovation component for small arts and cultural titles is only approved for two years) might disappear after the 2011-12 year. 

New rules make for winners and losers in the new Canada Periodical Fund

MastheadOnline has compiled a good and interesting rundown of the winners and losers (actual and potential) under the rules for the new Canada Periodical Fund, finally announced this week.

Radical journal keeps stoking the flame of activism

Interesting Q & A recently on rabble.ca with one of the founders of the radical journal Upping the Anti. In it, Tom Keefer told Jenn Watt that the twice-a-year journal began in April 2005 and is created by a loose coalition of activists from across Canada and around the world who have been working together in various capacities for the past 5 to 15 years.

"Mainstream culture devalues both reading and thinking. It’s therefore not surprising that people might find the kind of content we run to be 'difficult.' However, I think we need to be clear that this doesn’t make it “academic.” In today’s context, I actually think a little difficulty can be a good thing. We shouldn’t fetishize difficulty. However, we should recognize that confronting the scope and implications of capitalism and devising an effective response is going to be hard work.

He says the biggest challenge is not money (though that's always a challenge) but gathering and editing the material into a 200-page journal, twice a year. The journal prints 2,500 copies and generally sells half of those (for $5 each) before the next issue comes out. They also have a brisk trade in back issues.

"In addition to sales, we also enjoy extensive informal circulation through photocopies, Internet downloads, and lending libraries of various sorts," he said. "This is flattering, but we need to remind people that there will be nothing to photocopy if they don’t buy the journal."

Way cooler location for spring Toronto Small Press Fair

[UPDATE: Apparently all is not sunny and positive yet at the Toronto Small Press Book Fair. The editor of Taddle Creek, Conan Tobias, has asked us to remove his magazine from the list of participants -- taken from the book fair's website. He is boycotting the event because he is unhappy about last year's problems. And, although this isn't his reason for boycotting it, thinks the move to the JCC is a "bad idea".]

Cooler heads have (literally) prevailed this year for the spring Toronto Small Press Fair, which is taking place at the Miles Nadal Jewish Community Centre, 750 Spadina Avenue (cor Spadina and Bloor) from 12 - 5 on June 7. The space is bigger, with more room for exhibitors. plus it is air conditioned.

Among the smaller literary and cultural magazines taking part this year, according to the fair's website are Taddle Creek, Maisonneuve, broken pencil, The New Quarterly, Carousel magazine (that's Carousel editor Mark Laliberte pictured at last year's fair), Descant, Existere, Kiss Machine, Misunderstanding and Public.

Readers may recall that last year's fair provoked a certain amount of controversy. This year, organizers say that they have got things together, according to a post on Torontoist.

Last year’s fair was the subject of some controversy, with a few of those involved claiming that Villegas and her co-organizer Myna Wallin hadn’t done enough to advertise and promote the event. A spat broke out on Facebook, but now all of that has been cleared away for this year’s more cheerful announcements.

“People were used to the old ways of postering all over town, and it upset them that there weren’t posters,” says Villegas of last year’s outcry. “But it’s ecologically crazy to do that, and posters get ripped down.”

Instead, they have focused on promoting via Facebook, radio announcements, and other media. This year they have also been able to buy an ad in NOW with additional funding from the Toronto and Ontario Arts Councils. With the move to a larger venue and over 70 exhibitors, Villegas says they’re hoping for a much better turnout.

Small Press Book Fair spat deteriorates

The old joke is: Why are fights at university faculty meetings so vicious? Because the stakes are so small.

This is apparently the case concerning the Toronto Small Press Book Fair, an event that in recent years has provided an outlet for a good many specialty and smaller magazine publishers. An earlier post reported on what at the time appeared to be a transitory spat between the current organizers and one of the participants and a founder of the fair. Well, according to a posting on the Quillblog (from Quill & Quire magazine), things have deteriorated in the way things can only when lawyering is threatened...

Trouble stirring at the Toronto Small Press Book Fair

The mags and books may be small but the controversy is certainly getting fierce surrounding the Toronto Small Press Book Fair. The fair featured a number of small magazine presses.

According to Quillblog, one of the fair's exhibitors, Stuart Ross, who is also a co-founder of the fair, has made his displeasure with the fair's organization and organizers known on his blog and the organizers, Halli Villegas and Myna Wallin, have fired back on the fair's Facebook. Ross says the organizers did a poor job of promoting the event; the organizers say they did a lot and they wish he'd talked to them before going public.

If you think this sounds like it’s getting personal, well, you’re probably right. Angry wall posts have been flying on the Facebook page, and Ross says Villegas and Wallin have been censoring his comments. Now another Facebook page, “Friends of the Toronto Small Press Book Fair,” has been created, and comments are flying there, too.

And Ross has even taken his grievances to his personal Facebook page’s “status update,” which as of this writing reads, “Stuart Ross thinks the Toronto Small Press Book Fair coordinators are using the tactics of dictators and repressive regimes. Censorship, exclusion, disinformation.”

Small but provocative, little magazines sparked debate about architecture

Nice piece in the Sunday Toronto Star by Toronto freelancer Ryan Bigge about little architecture and design magazines. The article is focussed on a show at the Canadian Centre for Architecture in Montreal. It's called Clip/Stamp/Fold 2: The Radical Architecture of Little Magazines 196X — 197X and runs until Sept. 9. It's a travelling exhibition that originated at Princeton University; its also on view in Kassel, Germany.

The exhibit features about 70 little magazines that were published in the 60s and 70s to provoke debate about architecture and design. Original copies of the magazines are available for viewing, and complete facsimiles for browsing.

Breaks for small mags at MagNet

Small magazines who are members of Magazines Canada are being alerted that there are bursaries available to them to attend MagNet, the industry conference being held June 13 to 15 in Toronto.

A release from Magazines Canada says there is assistance available for titles with less than 50,000 circulation to get up to 50% of tuition or travel costs covered! Further information can be obtained from Claire Pfeiffer, Membership Manager & Small Magazines Project Manager at 416.504.0274 x238.