Evaluation Question 3

Based on the genre of my music magazine ‘p.i’ and its contents, I think that it would be best if it is distributed through its own business.

p.i is designed to be unique in its genre as there are no known magazines that focus around electronic and experimental music. The fonts and colour scheme also provide the feel of a magazine that has never been distributed or read by the public before.

Companies such as Bauer and IPC generally distribute magazines of common genres such as pop, rock, alternative and R&B. With prior consideration, I have decided that the magazine should be distributed independently, through its own business, rather than with an aggregator because of the genre of the magazine and its unique approach to its target audience.

This choice may or may not be the right one in the long term, but for now it is the best option because other companies and aggregators will not be entirely, if at all, aware of what purpose p.i is trying to serve, let alone know and understand the electronic music genre and the artists who produce such music. If needs be, a publishing company can be chosen at a later date, based on how well p.i turns out in its own right first.

Also for now, p.i will pilot as a paper magazine and digital copy, which will provide access for the majority of people who are interested or would take interest. It may have a radio station in the future depending on how successful it is as a publication, but this is not expected or needed; podcasts can be released on the website and through services such as iTunes, Google Play and Spotify, and free or paid tracks can be presented on SoundCloud and sold in dedicated compilations on Bandcamp.

Distributing the magazine in shops and supermarkets is very much possible, but p.i needs to have a stable financial status from the successful publications in smaller shops and digital distributions on the Internet before taking to more significant places.

I am aware that there are magazines that appear to take off upon their release but fail in their first three years and cease publication and activity. In regards to the fate of p.i, I cannot make any guarantee that it will succeed or fail in its first three years, and being the type of magazine it is yet having the ethos of conveying its messages to the general public, it could go either way.