BassMaster Magazine.

[WRB]

I recieved my Setp/Oct 2020 Bassmater magazine today......76 pages! 

My 1968 Sept/Oct issue was 2X that many pages. The hand writing is on the wall, print media is on it's last legs.

Tom

 

[Bluebasser86]

I use to love Bassmaster mag. When I first started to really get into bass fishing when I was around 9 or 10, I'd read it front to back. The "Day on the Lake" was one of my favorite parts but Harry and Charlie was great too. I learned so much from it, but I haven't been a subscriber for at least 5 years now. All the same stuff is on their website, no reason to waste my money.

[FryDog62]

Yes, its short and sweet now... but I still like reading it. When I'm done, I keep it on the foot stool... uh, I mean "ottoman" in our living room to offset my wife's usual fu-fu reading materials that are kept there. 

[Oregon Native]

Loved reading the fishing magazines...now give me fifteen  minutes or so and eyes disown me.  Many years ago we sold all our Bassmaster mags to Hank Parker's son...was kind of cool.

Computers have no warmth.

[Mobasser]

I subscribed to Bassmaster for many years. I still have a stack of older ones, up to 2005. I dropped my subscription then. Still a good magazine, but much less content now.

[Mike L]

I’ve gone from reading that and B.A.S.S. Times cover to cover, to just scanning the article headlines.
 

If something jumps out I’ll finish it, if 

not I toss it. 
 

 

 

 

Mike

[scaleface]

I still subscribe but dont read it like I use to .  I never was a huge fan of a "day on a lake" . Its all right to see how the pro goes about fishing different areas and lures trying to get something going . I just dont like the little obscure private lakes they fish . It would be a lot better if they put them on tough pressured reservoirs , like Mark Twain lake in september . 

[Team9nine]

Seems the way of most fishing mags. Have a bunch of old In-Fisherman mags and they were all well over 100 pages, and the content was heavy and cutting edge, and the ads were there but minimal. Subscribed to Bassmaster from about 1980-2007 or so, but dropped them because it was more and more promotional, and less and less new/novel content, and I stepped back from tourney fishing which often required membership. Gave my entire collection of B/M and Bass Times to Jacob Wheeler to learn from and dissect ?

[12poundbass]

23 minutes ago, Team9nine said:

Seems the way of most fishing mags. Have a bunch of old In-Fisherman mags and they were all well over 100 pages, and the content was heavy and cutting edge, and the ads were there but minimal. Subscribed to Bassmaster from about 1980-2007 or so, but dropped them because it was more and more promotional, and less and less new/novel content, and I stepped back from tourney fishing which often required membership. Gave my entire collection of B/M and Bass Times to Jacob Wheeler to learn from and dissect ?

Seems to have paid off. ?

[Jaderose]

Yep....same with Popular Mechanics.  It's a shell of it's former self

[geo g]

Magazines, along with big box stores, are all being put out of business by the internet.  Problem for me is I hate buying stuff if I can't feel it first!

[Smells like fish]

Back before the Internet I was a magazine junkie. Started as a kid and had around a dozen outdoor magazines on subscription at once. I had stacks and stacks that were a pain to get rid of and now I'd give a hundred dollar Bill to have them back and go through them again. My favorite was called FUR-FISH-GAME

[rtwvumtneer6]

I still get it.  It costs next to nothing.  Browse it for a few days then it gets donated to my local library.  Just hope the kids don't pay attention to the Winston smokes and Skoal adds... 

[PourMyOwn]

I got a lifetime membership/subscription back in 2000. They still go to my parents' house and my dad reads them and I get them a few at a time. They are getting pretty thin these days, wish I was.

[lo n slo]

28 minutes ago, Smells like fish said:

Back before the Internet I was a magazine junkie. Started as a kid and had around a dozen outdoor magazines on subscription at once. I had stacks and stacks that were a pain to get rid of and now I'd give a hundred dollar Bill to have them back and go through them again. My favorite was called FUR-FISH-GAME

i took North Carolina Game and Fish magazine for many years because it covered the lakes and other bodies of water close to home. i still have those old magazines (along with my Basmasters). i love to go back and research articles every now and then, mostly in late winter when pre spawn fever begins to take hold of me. 

[Sam]

21 hours ago, WRB said:

I recieved my Setp/Oct 2020 Bassmater magazine today......76 pages! 

My 1968 Sept/Oct issue was 2X that many pages. The hand writing is on the wall, print media is on it's last legs.

Tom

 

So my wife and I go out to a nice neighborhood restaurant last night and the menu is on two sides of an eight (8) and a half by 14 inch sheet of paper so it can be thrown away after we look at it and order.

 

Last night we went to a very nice Sicilian restaurant, my favorite, and had to take out our cell phones to look at the menu and order off what we saw on our cell phones. The waitress forgot to mention their specialties, which are usually out of this world.

 

And Tom, I remember going to a chain restaurant a few years ago where you ordered from a small computer on your table. I think it was Applebee's but I am not 100% sure.

 

So yes, print and paper may be on the way out within the next 10 years. Newspapers are having a hard time with paper subscriptions and you can subscribe over the Internet. Our Richmond Times Dispatch wants over $260 a year for the week and Sunday editions. We noticed the paper was getting smaller and smaller as the years rolled by during our 39 years of subscribing.

[CountryboyinDC]

Bass Pro Shops sends me mine for free.  I read it when I'm waiting for something, if I'm not reading or posting something on a forum.  I do like to look at the clunkers page, just like on this forum.  No one looks anything but happy when they catch a big bass! 

[the reel ess]

I only ever read Bassmaster in my dentist's waiting room. A handful of pros used to hold secrets and not let them out. The Interwebs is the best thing to ever happen to fishing, and many other areas. For instance, you can easily find the best value in almost any goods or services using the web.

12 hours ago, Smells like fish said:

Back before the Internet I was a magazine junkie. Started as a kid and had around a dozen outdoor magazines on subscription at once. I had stacks and stacks that were a pain to get rid of and now I'd give a hundred dollar Bill to have them back and go through them again. My favorite was called FUR-FISH-GAME

Same here. I used to have 5 years or so of F&S and SC Fish and Game mags stored in paper grocery bags. My buddy called it my "fish porn" collection. I began to notice the Game & Fish articles were recycled for several years and passed around between the states of the same region. I was also into old cars so I got Car Craft and Hot Rod mags. I probably spent enough on those mags to buy a cheap car or at least some good fishing equipment. When I got married the first time (I was flat broke throughout my first marriage), I would save the money and walk to the local library and sit and read them all.

[scaleface]

They usually give away a lure set worth more than the cost of the magazine . I'm waiting for that offer or a BASS hat . I dont like the little books they give away . They are just articles in the magazines that I have already seen . Or a daily planner . I want  new lure or a hat.

[Steveo-1969]

I saw this thread yesterday and was reminded I've been putting my Bassmaster Magazines in a pile when I receive them in the mail and I haven't read one in a while. I counted last night and I haven't read the last 9 issues! They are just collecting dust.

[volzfan59]

I guess I'm just kind of "old school", at least in some respects. I much prefer real magazines and books over online or Kindle offerings. I still subscribe to Bassmaster, B.A.S.S. Times, In-Fisherman and Bass Angler and read them cover to cover. I'm an avid reader and have ended up with quite the fishing library.

When comes to magazine articles, if one jumps out at me I cut it out and add it to notebooks. If I don't clip anything, I my old magazines to my wife. She's a nurse in a MD office. Most offices don't have fishing magazines for patients to read. Now hers does!

 

 

[J Francho]

I still like a printed magazine as well. They’re getting harder to read without cheaters tho, lol. This thread reminded me that I’m no longer getting the magazine. I have been getting it for over a decade, despite never subscribing. I haven’t seen one in the mail in a year maybe. 

[Bassun]

I used to subscribe to a few different magazines over the years.  As I got more serious about fishing, I started cataloging articles in a note book so I could easily find a specific topic and find that article.  Worked great for learning how to lake fish vs wading the streams and rivers I was used to.  Being able to find a dozen articles about whatever and reread them was fantastic.  I learned a ton!  

Now if I want to look into something, I just google it and usually end up at youtube.  I guess it kind of works, I don't spend a lot of time reading anymore - so by the power of the internet I can gobble up some info pretty quickly.  That said, I don't think I learn as much as I did reading the articles.  I think when I was reading, I would be thinking more about how that technique would apply for me locally.  When I watch a video I'm usually thinking - man, I wish we had that kind of fish population here, or that kind of structure lol.

 

It's kind of sad, but print media is certainly a dying form.  I subscribe to 0 magazines now, and only mildly miss reading In-Fisherman out of them all.  I always felt like they had the most in-depth articles that got into more details vs say Bassmaster.  I think when we moved I tossed all of the old magazines.  If not, they are boxed up somewhere and haven't been sought out for years.

[Koz]

I used to work in print media with a company that had been around for decades. Like many, I saw the future shift of magazines once smart phones came around. I told the publisher my vision of where the industry was going. He balked.

 

This was before prepackaged publishing software and building block apps so I went out and wrote the code to supplement our print version with digital publishing. The publisher still balked at the idea. After a few pay cuts my job was eliminated completely as their debt climbed and circulation dwindled.

 

A few years later he had to sell the company because of crushing debt. The new owner went digital.

[king fisher]

I prefer magazines, newspapers, and paper catalogs.  All of which will be gone soon.  I am not saying it is a bad thing, just that I will miss flipping through pages.