Who wants a new mini magazine?

There is a possibilty of a new top quality bi monthly mini classic magazine devoted to projects and tech as well as top quality inspirational cars, would you buy it?

Is it because you don't llke the existing ones?

What do you like?

What don't you like?

This is your chance to design your ideal magazine so make the best of it!

Depends on price and whats included, it it had technical articals with guides to repairs and stuff then yeah id get it.

by the way i dont like any of the options there.

Is there one for "Yes, Depending on price and whats on offer"

Thanks for the opinions. It would be no more expensive than the existing magazines. What exactly would you like to see on offer then, more tech and how to articles it seems? Anything else? Now is the time to tell us! It is your magazine, you can have whatever you like!

Well did you ever see "Keeping Your Mini Alive" when they were around, i only got the last two but i liked what they had in that, technical discussions and how to articals. I like learning about technical stuff, the haynes manual is rubbish for stuff like that.

Yes, I used to love those KYMA's, but a lot of the detail was edited out, for example, the turbo conversion article glossed over some very important details that if you did not know, would have caused some expensive mistakes.

We don't all have vast amounts of money either so it's nice to see well engineered alternatives to the ££££ work.

We have all suffered with haynes manuals! This is great, keep them coming!

Query how many people out there are working on projects - who actually don't know what they're doing and would subscribe to a magazine to tell them how?

Maybe a better business model would be to offer all the "how to" solutions on a subscription only website.

That way the public can look up a specific repair point etc from a list of articles, rather than have to wait for random articles to come through in a magazine.

Maybe Marksmini and the gang can think about extending the TMF site to include this option; where it could be blended/linked into the "Doctors" sections for people to then discuss and query the finer points of a repair?

Yes, I used to love those KYMA's, but a lot of the detail was edited out, for example, the turbo conversion article glossed over some very important details that if you did not know, would have caused some expensive mistakes.

I find that with the current magazines too. They also tend to assume that all parts will come undone easily, and don't take into account any problems you could run into. They also tend to assume that all parts will 'bolt on' and most of them don't, they often require modification to fit. To someone with the right tools/experience, this isn't a problem, but to the young/inexperienced Mini owner it can be a nightmare.

I think a much more technical based magazine would be good, something along the lines of Land Rover Owner International (lots of good technical advice, although too many adverts!). I don't like the current trend of the Mini mags mostly featuring brightly coloured, technically unexciting cars. I understand that they need the circulation and the money from sales, and that a lot of Mini owners don't open their bonnets and spend most of the time polishing, so its natural they concentrate mostly on the 'bling' cars. So a magazine devoted purely to the technical and performance modified cars would be great!

*edit - and in response to andrewinlondon's post - how about a 'suggestion box' for future articles, and also an online website/forum (or even a link to this forum's technical pages) that runs in conjunction with the magazine, with the same features and articles?

I want it to come with free neon lights and LED dustcaps!


LOL!


Nah, Im happy with the current mags, I think they should go into more detail about technical things though. And I like the "How to" Guides too!


<|Ben|>

MiniWorld is great, I think they have the interests of Classic Mini owners at the heart of their magazine. I am not such a fan of Mni Magazine as it is part of a larger publishing house and seems less interested (in my opinion!). I do buy it every month tho.

I don't think there is a market for yet another Mini magazine. In real terms we are a very small community and to have three mags could be difficult to sustain.

Many years ago there were two windsurfings mags, then a new one came out which ultimately caused the demise of one of the others. People lost their jobs and money and a really great mag disappeared. I wouldn't want to see history repeating itself!

great idea...only if i can tell you what i want to know, then you print it in the next mag. am fed up of 100's of mags been saved just for the interesting tech bits that i "might" need in the future.

i agree with the above comments on current mini mags, too many chav mobiles, too much tat, too many spods asking the same questions, ie how do it fit sportspak arches, how do i fit 13" wheels. they tend to gloss over the big issues, such as rusty nuts (fnar fnar) and assume that we have 10's of thousands of pounds to fix our minis.

a lot of us don't have nice garages and repair our cars on the drive or even on the street. how about a guide for "the real people"

ideal example was the fitting of the smootharide suspension in a mini mag, theymade it sound like a piece of cake, and promised to tell us what the drive was like, which they never did. whats the point lol

Maybe a better business model would be to offer all the "how to" solutions on a subscription only website.

That way the public can look up a specific repair point etc from a list of articles, rather than have to wait for random articles to come through in a magazine.

Very good point. It has to be said that forums like this one have made a lot of this information available but how often it is checked and edited for accuracy and truth? We all know there are a minority of people on forums who don't really know anything but are quite happy to tell you how to do something, with obvious results. java script:emoticon('')

It is good to consider other business models, but have you ever tried to sell advertising space on a web site? Even good forums like this one, which I tend to read rather than post in, will tell you that it costs the site owner a lot of money to run them with little or no advertising revenue. You would have to charge more for a web magazine than for a print magazine to make it pay, the ads pay the wages of the staff.

I'm not interested in competing with all the brilliant mini forums and websites, I think people get fed up with looking at screens all day and night. I like to have a magazine.

I think you have a great idea for this site though, good luck!

I quite like the current mags but as alot of people have said they just dont go ito enough technical detail about the cars. They leave me thinking "how did they do that" and "whats that bit" and somethimes you never find out. I'd like a mag that really goes into detail of the cars, one for people who already know the basics and want more! I'd buy it even if it is more expensive.

MiniWorld is great, I think they have the interests of Classic Mini owners at the heart of their magazine. I am not such a fan of Mni Magazine as it is part of a larger publishing house and seems less interested (in my opinion!). I do buy it every month tho.

I don't think there is a market for yet another Mini magazine. In real terms we are a very small community and to have three mags could be difficult to sustain.

Many years ago there were two windsurfings mags, then a new one came out which ultimately caused the demise of one of the others. People lost their jobs and money and a really great mag disappeared. I wouldn't want to see history repeating itself!

I do agree with you there, and taste in magazines is a very personal thing. I would like to think that our magazine if it goes ahead would be very different from the others and not really directly compete as we will cover a different side of the mini scene.

I also buy the mini magazines and in no way would we like to see any of the others close. They have their place in the mini scene. Look at the VW scene, lot of magazines co-exist there.

great idea...only if i can tell you what i want to know, then you print it in the next mag. am fed up of 100's of mags been saved just for the interesting tech bits that i "might" need in the future.

i agree with the above comments on current mini mags, too many chav mobiles, too much tat, too many spods asking the same questions, ie how do it fit sportspak arches, how do i fit 13" wheels. they tend to gloss over the big issues, such as rusty nuts (fnar fnar) and assume that we have 10's of thousands of pounds to fix our minis.

a lot of us don't have nice garages and repair our cars on the drive or even on the street. how about a guide for "the real people"

ideal example was the fitting of the smootharide suspension in a mini mag, theymade it sound like a piece of cake, and promised to tell us what the drive was like, which they never did. whats the point lol

I know exactly where you are coming from! We would be a grassroots resto performance magazine, quite different from any other.

I think combining the 2 things, magazine and web would be a way forward.

Saving numerous magazines for articles is a pain, especially when you think, "I am sure i saw that some where" and have to go hunting to find articles

A magazine and a website hand in hand would be great.

I dont mean a full blown colour website that gives you a magazine online. I mean a simple site with a search engine built in, should you need something that you saw in a magazineyou could look up the web site and find the artice/Magazine issue number.

This would require simple headings and a very brief description of the article..
litterally a few words.

That way you would also develop a market for back issues for people who buy the magazine in future.