Davenports sell Abracadabra

[Matthew Field]

It is reported in this week's Abra that the Davenport family have sold Abra to Stephen Martin, a "magical enthusiast and entrepreneur.". They have published the weekly magazine for more than 60 years.

Matt Field

[Dale Shrimpton]

lets hope it continues to serve the magical community in the same fantastic manner it has over the last 60 years...

[Q. Kumber]

Actually Goodliffe published Abra until his death in the early 1980's. His family continued to publish it for a while before selling to Davenports.

[Matthew Field]

I met with Betty Davenport yesterday and she informed me that the deal with the prospective buyer had fallen through.

Barring a miracle, this Saturday's Abra will be the last.

Matt Field

[Dale Shrimpton]

good lord!!! that would be a crying shame.
Just as we say farewell to one national treasure this weekend, another may also disappear.

[Richard Kaufman]

This says it all:
http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/03/19/newspa ... index.html

[Dale Shrimpton]

you know, why davenports dont just create an on line magazine that the reader can print if they want, is beyond me.
they have the team of reporters, and the readers, they should just switch format.

silly me.... what am i saying..... Its davys.

[naquada]

its not a small task 'just to put something online' my view is that run right, something like abra would work very well as an online format, but you have to consider the audience, do they WANT a purely online version? and do they want to print it? and how do you manage WHO gets it (given the fact there are magicians only bits in there), and its a business.. how does it make money ??

if the whole subscriber base doesnt want an online only, your pushing out even more of your readers..

Abra would be a killer source of information if it was on-line, but then would it be abra ? or something else ?

is 'abra' the printed version? and hence if the readership isn't there or whatever the issue is.. would that make a difference moving it to an online version?

keep in mind many magic based news sources and discussion sources are available free on line...

magicweek - weekly.. free
itricks.com - daily.. free
magicconventionguide - daily / as needed.. free
all the forums (including this one).. free

[Richard Kaufman]

No one wants to pay for online content (and free online content, along with a significant drop in both readership and advertising) is what's killing printed periodicals and newspapers.

Who is going to pay for the work involved in keeping Abra alive online since online readers won't pay for the content. It's not advertisers.

[Dale Shrimpton]

Agreed, few will want to pay for on line content.

but that doesnt mean that it has to disapper all together.

one excelent on line resource that Andrews forgotten to mention, is the news letter that gets sent out every week by Alan Watson.
the content is as up to date as anything that Abra published, ( moreso as he sends out hot news from time to time) It also has some wonderfull articals , and is free.
I could see an on line version of Abra being the same.

you could, for example, have the news section free, but ask for a small charge for a suppliment containing a few tricks and routines.

your core membership, would naturally only go for the news option.. but if the content on teh suppliment was good and stong, that would build up a following.

and, lets not forget that this could be a shared venture, rather than one small team trying to pull it all together on their own. that would be a thankless task!

[Richard Kaufman]

I would say that Alan Watson's e-zine is one of the reasons that Abra is going out of business.