Artz, that’s groovy and all, but they are still putting filthy ideas in these kids’ heads.
I like the board buyers guide or board reviews where they want you to pay $1000 and give them a board for them to review it in their mag. Ever notice nothing bad is said about boards in the board buyers guides?
I was being sarcastic(tounge in cheek).
Seems you can complain about the surfing mags, but if you order a board, get shipped something strange you didnt really order(its a custom)
and suffer from bad customer service and complain about it on the interent, then
your a bastard. Holds true for the whole surf industry except for SurfMag bashing especially by a former editor
biting the hand that feeds him. Just pointing out some inconsistencies.
About a week ago, I was at the market buying some beer after having an excellent surf session. I noticed the current issue of "Surfer" on the stand and for the first time in MANY years, I bought a one.
Got home, cracked a coldie and settled into the comfy chair to check it out.
I couldn't get past the Letters section before I chucked it, walked into the house, got on the 'net and ordered a two year subscription to THE SURFERS JOURNAL.
It's no wonder there are so many friggin' kooks out there.
Its a bit like porn. Nice to look at the pretty pictures, when you cant actually be out there yourself. I like to check out the travel sections, when Im sitting on the toilet or on an airplane. As for all the rest of the sections - they’re pretty lousy. I could care less about up and coming pros, or who did what in which contest. Also the “buyer’s guides” are often promotional material straight from the vendor. They never actually have someone try out 8 different wetsuits and tell you the pros and cons of each of them.
Surf vids are like porn too: You’ll probably never find yourself in the situation youre watching, and if you do you will probably not perform as well, but it’ll get you through a dry spell.
it’s not really critical analysis if said industry was not analyzed vis-a-vis the Skateboard Magazine Industry. over the decades, which influenced the other ?
any marketing honcho in said industry with ambition and a multi-year marketing plan would not be worth the surf salt on his back if he didn’t pay attention to skater demographics to sell to just to keep his job longer than industry upstarts hmmm
Board buyers guide is an advertisement … those guys pay to have their products in there. The boardbuilders themselves write the copy … I used to do it.
I’m with artz here … exploring possibility’s is every bit as interesting as anything ever printed.
Something few know is that the surf mags today use journalism students for most of their copy. Interns, who work for free. While some of these kids can write they don’t know anything about surfing and certainly nothing about history, boards, or world surf spots. So you get what you get because it was done for free … good writing with no content. Most surfers are just looking at the pictures anyway and the pictures sell the mags and the advertisers think they’re getting their message out. Anyone who is interested in reading ends up on here of one of the other forums anyway.
BTW, the photogs that work for these guys are holy men. Work their asses off for so little … they deserve ultimate respect for their passionate, creative portrayal of what we all do. And yea … SJ rules … they obviously do it different and have set a higher standard than any other sports magazine covering any other sport. We are the richer for their existence … thanks Pez
I am torn on the issue. While the mags generally have junk for articles and the pictures rarely unique, I do enjoy the competitive aspect of surfing. But not out of the magazines. I spend time watching the contests online and find them fairly fun/exciting to watch. I don’t know why since competing in surfing has never appealed to me. I guess it’s just fun to root for someone whose surfing you find pleasing to watch. Maybe its the waves they have…
I don’t subscribe but have access to surfer and surfing and read them when bored. There are definitely some good articles in them on occasion, but a lot of them kinda make me sick. Julian Wilson article from this summer comes to mind as sickening…
So a lot of people here seem to be vilifying the advertiser/rep/surf company or whatever… The advertisers are usually your run of the mill surf company… Quiksilver, Billabong, Rip Curl exc… So do you guys not buy/wear their gear? No t-shirts, shorts, watch, sunglasses? Do you find small market wetsuit companies that often have an inferior product? Am I reading too much into this? I love a lot of my surfing gear rip curl watch, all of my wetsuits from these companies have done me right.
Well if your stating its not critical analysis and they should be comparing to the Skateboard magazine industry, welll…maybe, it wouldnt hurt for you to know
what your talking about.
Critical analysis vs. compare and contrast
http://www.ehow.com/how_2313458_write-critical-analysis.html
have at it kid!
looks like you missed the point, then again it’s not the first time hmm
Someone tossed out the idea ''why don't the photographers start a magazine?".
Well, almost twenty years ago, Tom Dugan and Dick Meseroll did just that. Eastern Surf Magazine is by far the longest-running and most successful east coast US mag in history. It's an ad-supported publication (free to consumer), so there are a lot of ads. But they've also supported many up-and-coming lensmen and writers, and stay grass-roots by publishing virtually anything that comes in to their desk via lengthy ''gossip columns'' (logically named blah-blahs).
The current state of the ''big mags'' is driven by their ownership and market realities. It has sadly forced them to become something akin to "Tiger Beat'', but with surf pics.
Tim Baker’s rant was very refreshing, I agree with his comments.
I am so lucky to have lived at the peak of soul surfing.
From 1970 until the mid 80’s surfer was a great magazine.But then so was the surfing culture. The mags are only reflecting what surfing has become.
I still read them because I want to stay in tune with our culture of surfing even if I don’t agree with bias. It takes about 1 hour to read a complete one these days.
The comment that Tim made about the art directors making articles unreadable hit home the most. Can’t read most of the material due to hacker art that has taken over the publications.
Surfers Journal is the best Mag and captures the history of the culture of surfing that made it so unique in the first place.
Thanks OTIS for posting.
Yeah I found that article as the most authoritative criticism of the surfmag industry.
A couple of things, text obscured by graphics was occuring in the 80’s with odd fonts blending in with
background art that almost created the effect of black text on black background splattered here and there.
Harkening back to the early 70s, 71’ 72’, if memory serves me correctly, who can forget the ad of the buxom topless woman wearing an Oneill wetsuit
exposing her bosom. For minors, the vast majority of subscribers ,it was Playboy by mail. Parents complained
and policies changed.
Furthermore, lets us not forget how the surfing mags created the myth of the surfboard shaper/guru
and guided the majority understanding of surfboard design through their inane articles on the subject(apologies to Barnfield).
Frequently at the time, I was engaged in discussion and debate about surfboard design where you could tell the other
participant was just parroting line by line what was in a disinformative surf mag article but not backing up an inch with substantially inexperience incorrect idea about
hydrodynamic theory . Whereas the real information was circulating in and amongst circles of surf friends who were involved in shaping and passing around the ‘Barnfield methods’.
This website is a blessing and I do thank Mike Paler.
MY basic premiss when i read/look at -ER/-ING is that they are not aimed at me but rather at the 13 to 18 year old male who has lots of mommy or daddies $$ to spend. i am sooo far out of their demographic that i’m not even on their radar! the glory days of the mags ended in the early 90’s when the Ad page count took over the from the editorial side. I still enjoy the porno side of the pretty pictures, but i would rather save my$$$ to make a trip or two a year…
SNIP
Aloha Otis
No apologies necessary. I don’t think that in past times they so much “created the myth”. They were just more effectively and honestly reporting on what was actually happening. These weren’t “myths”. In todays world that has changed. Advertising dollars are spent to create or sustain myths and the magazines in deferrance to the economics involved support it. It is harder for readers or consumers to distinguish between what is really happening or what has been advertised into existence. Maybe it doesn’t matter so much for the consumer who is shopping at this level anyway. But it does hurt the guy in the background who generated the design, construction technique or other notable achievement and never gets the credit cause someone with more advertising dollars uses them to bury that truth… and create a mythical alternative.
Regarding surfboard design info in the magazines… When I did my series of design articles for Surfing Mag back in the 80’s. Their editing messed up the accuracy from time to time. One of the magazines complaints was that the material was “over the heads” of many of their readers. They would send me letters from readers, saying that “the words I used were too big”. On the flip side, I would get a lot of positive comments from knowledgable people saying how refreshing it was to have something written intelligently and of substance. But eventually the kids and advertisers won out.
I know exactly what you mean. Oh, the stories I could tell… and should be told…
Some problems at the magazines are…
#1. They don’t have any capable “technical” editors to insure accuracy in design or materials articles or stray comments. And… they really don’t care what anyone says or espouses because accuracy is not a valuable commodity there. Advertising dollars are. There is no right or wrong in the “marketing” world just effective hype or ineffective hype. Say anything you like to sell your product or the drive the surf scene forward. No one is watching or going to criticize you as long as what you say jacks up the momentum and hype that leads to consumers buying more stuff and advertisers placing ads to let consumers know about their stuff.
#2. The writers and reporters aren’t “investigative reporter” types. I won’t go so far as saying they are lazy… but it is way easier to collect data for your stories from press releases that are faxed to your office, then to get out in the field and find real stories. This is why on the Shapers Tree thingy, I am listed under Brewer’s branch. Of course know Dick, he is a legendary shaper, but I have never worked with him or under him and he was never of any particular influence on my career. I don’t know how or why I was put under his branch. But I can tell you why they didn’t get the correct information… It is very simple… NO ONE ASKED ME! So how lazy is that! I am probably the easiest guy to get ahold of. I have a listed telephone number and it has been the same number since the 70’s. My shop has been in downtown Haleiwa since the 80’s and I am there almost every day.
#3. The economic need for every issue of the magazines to produce as much money from advertising dollars as possible, drives everything. I wish I could share specific examples but I am still too involved in the industry to stir up all those dramas. But people should know and others should be held accountable. A lot of mean and nasty stuff happens because of that quest for maximum dollars per issue and the quest for fame and fortune by those who want to be or need to be in the magazines. A lot of good people get driven off course and do less then stellar things to others to get there or stay there. Just like some surfers drop in on others because they “just had to have that wave” or think they are “entitled” to it cause they are “famous”. Sadly, Drop Ins… happen in business too!
#4. Those in the industry in So Cal, live in a special bubble. Because so much of the industry is compressed there, I am sure it seems that it is the totality of all things surf. There is a tremendous amount of self importance that gets instilled from this over time. Maybe it is deserved maybe not. But it can easily skew perceptions of what is happening out in the rest of the (often more real) world. If it is perceived true in So Cal and a magazine prints it, it is absolute truth. Incorrect history gets repeated over and over because the writer thinks it’s true cause he read it in the magazine as did the writer before him… and so on and so on. Changing these errors are pretty much impossible, as over time, the lies become much more comfortably familiar, then the awkward and unfamiliar truth. It was once said in a surf magazine that “started out” glassing at Channel Islands". Not accurate at all. I don’t know who told them that (but I could make a good guess) … Still, I know why the writer didn’t get the truth… it is really simple … THEY NEVER ASKED ME!
So this is the state of affairs these days. The magazines like porn ones are attractive to some. But for those with lives busy with real things, there is little interest in such editorially fabricated illusions and worlds.
Yup Swaylocks fills a very special place!
Let us not forget plegarism also.
About 10 maybe 15 years ago when either -er or -ing was giving away free Spyder surfboards to the letter-of-the-month winner, I wrote a letter about treating your surfboard right and taking it to bed and all. You know, pull the covers up over it, a/c on, nice music, on and on about kisses and sweet talking about the dawn patrol the next morning.
Well, not only did I not win the Spyder surfboard, or letter of the month, or even my letter printed, but 3 or 4 months later it had been changed slightly into a dating your surfboard article and all I got was the middle finger.
Wow Ozzy. That is a good story… well bad really. Like I said, some mean and nasty things happen by those who want or need to get in the magazines. The quest for fame and fortune tests the strength of moral fibers in ways unexpected.
To those that don’t read them anymore, why are you still complaining about them? I like the commercialization of surfing to an extent. Let -er/-ing sell the hell out of the new potato chip/design of the week they want. What you will find happening (it already is) is that these companies that place these ads are going to try to squeeze out as much money as they can. That means, the product will get cheaper and not last as long; causing the consumer to go buy it again and again. Either that or they will rehash old/new technology over and over again, to get little readers to buy into the idea that they need to have the latest thing. It’s the perfect model from the big companies point of view. While all these groms are out buying cheaper, inferior products that break, the guys in the know (and on the Internet) will be riding what works and probably having more fun doing it. At that point groms will either give up or adapt. They will see the mags for what they are (just like everybody here has) and follow in the steps that so many here already have.