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Railway Herald: Will you pay?

Will you subscribe £20/year for Railway Herald?

  • Yes

    Votes: 1 4.5%
  • No

    Votes: 15 68.2%
  • Maybe (wait and see)

    Votes: 6 27.3%

  • Total voters
    22
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yorkie

Forum Staff
Staff Member
Administrator
Joined
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67,439
Location
Yorkshire
a recent e-mail to Railway Herald subscribers said:
Well I am delighted to be able to formally announce and confirm several rumours that I know are currently being beaten regularly by the jungle drums! Railway Herald IS changing and in my opinion it is definitely for the better! As many of you will be aware over the past three years I have also been the Steam Editor and subsequently the Assistant Editor of Railways Illustrated magazine, published by Ian Allan. Both myself and the current editor of Railways Illustrated, Colin J. Marsden, are leaving the title following the production of the April dated issue.

RAILWAY HERALD IS CHANGING!
With effect from then, Colin will be joining me as Co-Editor of Railway Herald, with both of us sharing the same aim of steering the title to be one of the key railway enthusiast magazines, bringing instant and informative news to readers desktop.
However this news has not been well recieved by all enthusiasts, with some predicting the RH's demise.

Richard Tuplin hit back at the "people [preaching] on a subject about which they know very little" and urged people to wait and see.

The following was posted to news://uk.railway

Richard Tuplin said:
Firstly, I am not about to get into a full-blown debate on the subject. Secondly, there are few people who know the full details of the 'new' Railway Herald and thirdly, I find it excellent that people can preach on a subject about which they know very little!

Yes Railway Herald is changing; yes it will become a subscription-based
product at £20 a year (which works out at 38.5p an issue) and yes ALL
contributors will be paid for photographs used in the new look magazine. Initial reaction from the existing readers of Railway Herald
has been very positive.


But I would urge you all to wait and see the new product before casting
dispersions and your own views on whether or not it will be worth subscribing. It will be different to the current version and bigger. We'll announce the full details when WE are ready to do so and you will get to see what the new version looks like and the full extent of its coverage BEFORE it goes subscription only!
In the mean time, to everyone who currently reads the magazine, whether you intend to subscribe or not, thank you for your support over the
past twelve months.

So, will you pay £20/year for Railway Herald or will you 'wait and see'?

Personally I'd rather put the £20 towards a paper mag, and if I want online content there are many other sources of information.
 
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ChrisM

Member
Joined
14 Aug 2005
Messages
716
As a subscriber to the free version for a few months i find that the content is not great and most of the stories and photos have been published on other sites/forums beforehand.
But i will wait and see what the 'new look' is like and then decide if it's worth paying for although i doubt i will carry on and pay for it.
I can't see it being a great sucess as they are bound to add a lot of adverts and after it being free then most probably won't pay.
 

AlexS

Established Member
Joined
7 Jun 2005
Messages
2,886
Location
Just outside the Black Country
It's a good magazine from what I can see, even if it is online. 39p is also very reasonable for a magazine when you usually pay at least 1 quid 50 or 2 pounds for one in the shops.
 

Coxster

Established Member
Joined
9 Jun 2005
Messages
9,244
I signed up to it because it was free. 39p is reasonable but a lot of it's content can be found elsewhere and it isn't exactly large at just 10 pages or so. The stories and more info about them can be found in other magazines anyway, aswell as many more stories not included in Railway Herald. I wonder what they mean by 'bigger'. If it get's too big it will kill dial up users! ;)
 

theblackwatch

Established Member
Joined
15 Feb 2006
Messages
10,714
My first posting on here although a few of you may recognise my id from the EOTL forum.

I think one thing to remember is that the new Railway Herald will be pretty different from the current version - at the moment it appears on an ad-hoc basis and sees to vary in size from about 5 to 10 pages normally. It has been promised that the new e-magazine will be at least 25 pages if my memory serves me right. Also, at the moment, Richard Tuplin does it in his free time in addition to his job - this won't be the case in future, and both him and Colin Marsden will have a lot more time to devote to the title.

Obviously its success will depend on getting enough subscribers. They won't need as many as the printed mags as there are no printing costs, distribution costs and cut taken by WH Smiths (which I gather is around 40% of the cover price of a lot of mags!). At 39p an issue, it appears good value, but I think a lot of people will want to see it before they stump up the cash, so I imagine there'll be a free issue to start with to tempt people in.

Will I be subscribing? I think I will "wait and see"!
 

Techniquest

Veteran Member
Joined
19 Jun 2005
Messages
21,674
Location
Nowhere Heath
Never seen or heard of it til now. I usually get my news from both this forum, Railwayscene and conversations with members of both via MSN. That'll do me TBH.
 

47205

Member
Joined
1 Jul 2005
Messages
285
Considering the content to people like me (Preservationist) is not really useful, I won't be paying £20 P/A for something I'm never likely to read more than once.
 
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