The Underground’s Short Casts for 2009-07-20

by Tom Chandler on July 20, 2009 · 4 comments

Outdoor writing's Golden Age falls in the 60s-70s? TrueNorthTrout thinks so: http://tinyurl.com/m7bofa #

Technorati Tags: fishing, Fly Fishing

{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }

1 Devin July 20, 2009 at 7:26 am: Well of course one would NOT include TU in this critique but overall this is true. I remember when Outside 1st came out and it was a great read every issue, now it’s all advertising.
Grays sporting journal is really the last refuge for good writing, although there are some good publications with regard to Fly Fishing, Northwest Flyfishing ( and it’s sister publications ), This is fly has some great writing etc… But it’s slim picking…

This has more to do with the hyper commercialization of outdoor sports as a whole, most magazines reflect the demographic they sell to….More about image than substance….. Devin(Quote)

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2 Tom Chandler July 20, 2009 at 9:19 am: Devin: Well of course one would NOT include TU in this critique but overall this is true. I remember when Outside 1st came out and it was a great read every issue, now it’s all advertising.

I tend to view a lot of “it’s not like the good old days” stuff with some suspicion, though I do think increasing specialization of magazines – and the unhappy truth that most magazines pay about the same as they did back in the 70s – means there were few writers willing to write professionally (it meant taking a vow of celibacy).

The growth of what I characterize as “Ten Top/Gear Ho” articles – and their undeniable success in almost every niche – has really driven the trend towards anonymous outdoor writing. Tom Chandler(Quote)

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3 Jordan Lindberg July 20, 2009 at 6:00 pm: That’s a good point, Tom. When you look to pin-down the causes of much of the worst in the outdoor writing that is out there — and of course there is still lots of GREAT stuff out there — it does come back to the dual fact that the publishers are stuck between getting the maximum revenue that they can out of advertisers at the same time that they need to keep their costs down by, among other things, not paying their writers very well.

This explains why, to me, much of the best stuff I’m finding these days is online — where the costs to publish are minimal, and writers can afford to be experimental. Jordan Lindberg(Quote)

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4 Tom Chandler July 21, 2009 at 2:09 pm: Jordan Lindberg: This explains why, to me, much of the best stuff I’m finding these days is online — where the costs to publish are minimal, and writers can afford to be experimental.

You’re probably right about the experimental part, but other issues abound – and the online stuff remains largely unpaid, and we’ll see how sustainable that really is over the long run. Tom Chandler(Quote)

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