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ICON RPG Convention |
 10-12 July 2009
JABULA REC HALL, JHB |
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Something Wicked is Going Digital |
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Something Wicked is Going Digital
Dear Loyal Readers
Okay, so I guess it’s time to come clean.
I’ve been stalling on this for as long as I could.
Forgive the length of this post, there are quite a few things I need to cover and I’ve decided to do them all in one go.
Where to start? With the end of course.
Publishing Something Wicked has always been a labour of love for me and managing editor, Vianne. Neither one of us has ever been paid for the three years of work we’ve put in to Something Wicked but this has never really been a problem as we both love the product and are immensely proud of it. As unpaid freelancers, however, what that means is that whenever there is paid work on offer, we really have no choice but to take it. This has meant having to stretch ourselves increasingly thin to be able to keep up with the magazine.
Which brings us to the crux of this post.
The current distribution and marketing model is not working anymore. My
ability to fund Something Wicked has come to an end. The fact is
Something Wicked has over its entire existence not made a penny of
profit. In fact, we posted losses of over R46,000 (+/- $4500) for the
2008 tax year. The financial constraints have also meant that we have
never been in a position to bring on extra staff to handle marketing,
distribution and sales. As a result, Something Wicked has remained a
full-time one-and-a-half-man job, except without the income.
Last
year we received partial funding from the National Arts Council (NAC),
which helped just enough to keep the mag going a little longer. This
has unfortunately not yet been renewed. In addition, the global
economic f@*k Storm (as Jon Stewart put it) has hit the print industry
hard. Printing costs have risen hugely in the past year and 2008 saw
over 500 publications close down in the USA alone. Many of our
international counterparts have halved the number of issues they’re
printing this year. Our print costs have gone up by 33% in the last
twelve months alone and more than doubled in the three years we’ve been
going. That means SW10 will cost 220% what SW01 cost in 2006.
What
am I trying to say? In its current form, Something Wicked is not a
financially sustainable project. It’s been a very hard decision and
I’ve put it off for as long as I could, but there is a very real
possibility that Something Wicked Issue #10 will be our last printed
copy.
What I have decided to do is to make Something Wicked an online-only magazine.
Now
I can hear some of you complaining already. I get it, I do. I love
paper and it kills me to have to make SW an online magazine, but the
fact of the matter is it is simply not possible to pay for printing
anymore.
What I am proposing is a do-it-yourself magazine sold
for a fraction of the price (we still need to pay our artists and
writers). The magazine will have exactly the same look as the current
print editions – the only difference will be that you will have to
print it yourself. You’ll be able to download the pdf and print out as
many copies as you want - just don’t sell them please.
Though
we’ll continue quarterly for now, the hope is to become bi-monthly (or
even monthly) at a later stage. If we are able to maintain our sales
through the online version we will also print an annual paperback
anthology of all the stories published in the magazine for that year,
plus a few extras.
It’s a win/win situation.
By selling
directly to our readers we can bypass printing and distribution costs
(easily the lion’s share of our current overheads) and therefore drop
the cover price significantly and hopefully raise our pay rate for
writers.
I realise that a great many of you are going to annoyed
by this, I know I am, but hopefully you will continue to support us in
this new phase of our evolution.
Hopefully we can, at some
point, afford to bring back the print versions but for now this is the
only way I can see Something Wicked continuing.
We still have great plans for the Something Wicked brand and we’d love you to stick around and enjoy the journey with us.
1. So what happens now?
Firstly,
SW10 will be printed, though there will be a delay in our printing
schedule. As mentioned earlier our printing costs have gone up 33% in
the last year, what that means in real numbers is that what cost us
R16,600 in April last year, now costs R23 000. Currently we have just
under R10k in the Something Wicked bank account. There is still some
money coming from outstanding invoices but until that money arrives we
are unable to go to print.
2. When will Issue 10 come out?
Honestly?
No idea. Hopefully within the next 6 to 8 weeks (June/July 2009), in
time for Icon Games Con. In the meantime, what we’re going to do is
publish some of the stories from Issue 10 online, as a printable,
downloadable pdf. This pdf will be a DIY booklet and will be available
free from the Something Wicked website.
3. AN IMPORTANT NOTE TO CURRENT SUBSCRIBERS:
Subscribers with outstanding issues on their subscriptions will
automatically receive the pdf issues directly to their email, free of
charge, for as long as Something Wicked remains an online publication
and until such time as we return to print, at which point their
subscriptions will continue from where they left off.
4. I’m not interested in an online version – I want my money back.
Fair
enough. Any subscribers who wish to request refunds for their unused
subscriptions are welcome to send us an email to
This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it
Please make sure you include your name
and the address where the magazines are sent so that we can quickly and
correctly refund your money.
- South African subscribers please include your bank details.
- Overseas subscribers please include the PayPal address you used to purchase the magazine.
5. AN IMPORTANT NOTE TO AUTHORS
What about all the stories that have been submitted (and selected) for publication in SW?
If your story has already been short-listed or accepted for Issue 10 it will make it to the print issue.
All
other stories submitted are still eligible for online publication and
we’re still reading/selecting/rejecting stories daily. So if you
submitted your story to us and haven’t received a reply yet, we won’t
let you down. Be aware though that beyond issue 10 your stories will be
eligible for online publication and possible inclusion in the print
anthology at a later stage. Your pay rate will NOT be affected. You
will still receive the same amount of pay even if your story is
selected for online-only publication. If you are unhappy at the
possibility of your story only being selected for online publication
and wish to withdraw your submission, then please write to us at
This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it
with the title of your submission
and the word WITHDRAWN in the subject line.
I know it sucks.
Unfortunately our current choices are go digital or shut down
altogether – and I desperately want to keep SW going.
It’s not all doom and gloom. We still have very exciting plans for 2009.
We’ll have the limited edition annual anthologies to look forward to.
The
Podcasts will start up again soon, starting with Kurt Bachard’s
Southern Bride Gothic (SW09) as well as some other surprises that we
can’t really talk about for now.
So you see, every cloud does have a silver lining.
We’re not dead yet, we’re just taking a hiatus from the print medium.
To
all of you who have stuck around and offered support, I can’t thank you
enough. From the very first days of Something Wicked the generosity,
help, advice and kind words I have received have been overwhelming. We
hope you’ll all continue to keep the faith and stand by us through this
new phase.
This is not the end.
- Joe Vaz
Editor
Something Wicked SF & Horror Magazine
28 May 2009
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 Supported by
The National Arts Council
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