Open letter to SCUBA Diving magazine

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crispix

Contributor
Scuba Instructor
Divemaster
Messages
161
Reaction score
12
Location
San Diego, California, United States
# of dives
200 - 499
Dear SCUBA Diving Magazine,


Oh, how I used to look forward to seeing your magazine in my mailbox. Your photographs were mesmerizing, the articles about dive destinations, wrecks, and sea life compelling, and the regular columns (always a fan of "lessons for life") a must-read. Remember your article about the Oriskany? It made me want to book a flight right then.


Sure, your equipment reviews have always been a bit too Pollyanna -- I don't think you've ever said a negative word about any piece of equipment -- but I understand the need to placate your advertisers.


Things started to slip a couple years ago. All your cover photos went black-and-white and looked the same. Your articles got shorter and often skipped key details like the maximum and average depth of the wreck you were reviewing. You introduced this weird star-graph in your product reviews that was meaningless, where every product had the exact same features and a blob-like asterisk that tried to relay quantitative information to the reader without pissing off your advertisers. You got rid of the cute model that tried on all your wetsuits. I miss her.


While you've gotten rid of the asterisk-graphs and started publishing color photographs again, your Jan/Feb 2013 has reached an all-time low.


There isn't any content! When I say that, I mean it: there is almost NOTHING worth looking at in this issue. It's your "reader's choice awards" issue, which seems that you took this as an excuse to give your writers a couple months off so you could recycle stock photos and list the same bunch of places and one-paragraph (or shorter) descriptions we've all seen many times before in your magazine.


You skipped the columns: no "Lessons for Life" (the one thing you KNOW we enjoy reading), and Letters to the Editor (you don't even have to write that yourself) was so small and short I almost missed it.


The product reviews were adequate, I'll give you that. The new Aeris full-foot travel fins look pretty interesting.


But I'm giving up on SCUBA Magazine. I just can't bring myself to renew a magazine that doesn't even seem to be trying. While I want to support an industry that needs every subscriber dollar it can get, I draw the line at paying for a magazine full of ads and recycled content and little else.


Sincerely yours,


Crispix, former SCUBA magazine subscriber



P.S.
Have you ever read an issue of DAN's "Alert Diver"? It's a fantastic magazine. The articles are long, varied, always from an expert in his/her field, always a unique topic, and full of details and photographs. I recommend!
 
I don't feel that I can comment directly about Scuba Diving Magazine, since I view them as a competitor. It's one of those "If you don't have something good to say, then don't say it" issues. :D

However, I have to fully agree that DAN's Alert Diver magazine is incredibly awesome. Stephen Frink, the Publisher, has really turned that around from being a ho hum stuffy periodical to being a state of the art must read. I am proud to count him as a friend and an inspiration.
 
Agree 110%!

I've already voted with my wallet but my subscription hasn't ended (oddly enough because I don't think I've paid in maybe 2 years, but maybe their billing office is also a little off).

The newest issue was indeed a new low, as slim as the advertisements from our local supermarket and equally as much to read. The magzine has for maybe 3 years been completely unrecognizable as the excellent content-rich Scuba Diving Magazine I subscribed to back in 2008.

Buy dvds of the old issues (2006, 2007) if you can find them. THAT was a good magazine. The new magazine is just a travel office advertisement, and a ridiculously thin one at that.
I like both Diver (UK) and Sport Diver (UK).
 
Scuba Diver became a rag not worth using as outhouse paper when they sold out. Their reviews always were useless from the time I started reading it but they used to have decent articles. Now it's like some open water courses. Thin on content, no substance whatsoever, and only designed to separate people from their money. Preying on the ignorance of those who don't know to research their purchase. Hopefully it will fail and not take advantage of the uninformed much longer. It's right in there in it's blatant transparency to support it's advertisers over divers as Sport Diver is. Both suck.

Sent from my DROID X2 using Tapatalk 2
 
When I first got in to diving I subscribed. I was fascinated by it. Then I started seeing it differently and realized its content was getting slim. I did not renew. Ten years later I tried reading a couple of issues that I picked up since it was the only mag available where I was. What a waste of money.
 
When I first got in to diving I subscribed. I was fascinated by it. Then I started seeing it differently and realized its content was getting slim. I did not renew. Ten years later I tried reading a couple of issues that I picked up since it was the only mag available where I was. What a waste of money.

Ditto which is why I switched to Diver Magazine. Great articles from all angles of the dive industry (sport, military, commercial, police) such that I keep issues around the house for a few years. The medical and photography columnists are excellent.

Diver Magazine | The longest-established scuba diving magazine in North America
 
When I thumbed it end to end non stop I thought I had lost interest. I am happy to read that I know nothing when I see it.
 
Even I, the vacation diver type, found this most recent issue disappointing.
 
Agree. Alert Diver is the best right now. Dive Training is good, but mostly Alex Brylske at the moment. None of the others seem worthwhile.
 

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