Speaking of magazines, I just found out yesterday that yet another publication that I used to write for — Cargo — is shutting down. It now joins the list alongside the original Red Herring, Sync, FEED, and George (I wrote a profile of Larry Augustin for them that never got published because they went out of business about two weeks after I submitted it). Not sure what happened specifically this time around, but apparently the higher-ups at Condé Nast decided that the ad market just wasn’t there and they opted to cut their losses rather than continue to pump money into the mag.
Two years ago a magazine about gadgets (and all the other stuff men buy) may have seemed like a sure thing, but the simple fact of the matter is that it’s hard for a magazine to cover the world of gadgets better than a website can (note that Cargo launched about the same time as Engadget — early 2004 — after two years has less than 10% of our readership). Cargo‘s tech coverage (as well as Sync‘s and Vitals‘s) was basically just Engadget in print three months later with better photography, and that’s not going to cut it for someone interested in keeping up with the latest gadgets. Product cycles are so short now that the three month lead time of a magazine is practically an eternity; anyone serious about gadgets is reading this stuff online, and anyone only casually interested is probably satisfied with what they’re getting in Maxim or Stuff or FHM. Cargo had to go after a rare breed of reader: someone interested enough in gadgets to subscribe to a magazine about them, but not quite interested enough to be reading Engadget, Gizmodo, or any of the hundreds of other gadget sites out there. Yeah, Cargo wasn’t just about gadgets — fashion and grooming were a big part of the magazine as well — but it only makes their job harder. They essentially were targeting a reader, who in addition to wanting to read about $400 jeans, also wanted coverage of the world of gadgets that was more comprehensive than the page or two found in most men’s magazines but less timely and thorough than what you could find online. Is it all that surprising that they never found a substantial audience?

InformationWeek has a brief interview with me in their current issue. (The piece includes a photo of me on the roof of my building — guess it won’t be too hard for someone to figure out where I live now). I don’t say anything particularly insightful (big surprise!), but I do like having it on record that I still love print. Obviously I live online, but I got my start as a writer in the magazine world (the original Red Herring, baby!), and while I don’t think I’ll regularly write for another print publication ever again (four years of blogging have left me incapable of dealing with lead times), I still devour magazines and subscribe to way too many of them.

Has it really been two years already?

Apparently I only speak at SXSW during even-numbered years: I’ll be on a panel with Marc Canter and Jon Lebkowsky talking about “How to develop for (convergent) personal devices.” I’m not a developer, so I guess I’m there to offer the consumer’s perspective, or something like that. The action kicks off Saturday, March 11th, at 5pm in Room 15 at the Convention Center. Try and contain your excitement.Anyway, if you’re going to SXSW Interactive or are just kicking around Austin that weekend and know of anything interesting going on (or just want to meet up to chat), drop me a line.

Without a doubt it’s an honor to debut at the top of The Blog 50, a new chart ranking bloggers by, well, some sort of metric that isn’t exactly clear, but as we all know, there’s only place to go from there and that’s down, baby!