SAGA Magazine lifetime subscription - compulsory shift to digital format

Alderbank

RefluentBeans said:

dobbles said:

The letter from Saga. And don't forget we paid for this membership.

So this is the same as what’s been previously said - no sign of printed magazines. Just 12 copies a year. Which can be online. Glad to see an original copy, finally. 

An excellent find by dobbles!

Although the magazine content would have been prepared digitally using QuarkXPress (as were >90% of magazines at that time) the cost of burning a digital copy onto CD-ROM would in those days have been much more than printed paper.
I wonder what the response would have been if dobbles had demanded twelve digital copies a year for life?

HillStreetBlues

Alderbank said:

RefluentBeans said:

So this is the same as what’s been previously said - no sign of printed magazines. Just 12 copies a year. Which can be online. Glad to see an original copy, finally. 

An excellent find by dobbles!

Although the magazine content would have been prepared digitally using QuarkXPress (as were >90% of magazines at that time) the cost of burning a digital copy onto CD-ROM would in those days have been much more than printed paper.
I wonder what the response would have been if dobbles had demanded twelve digital copies a year for life?

The same as SAGA's now, you get a copy, we decide in what format.

dobbles

This letter was sent in the same month as the previous one I posted. I regard a magazine as what it meant when that letter was sent in 1997. That is what I paid for!

GingerTim

dobbles said:

This letter was sent in the same month as the previous one I posted. I regard a magazine as what it meant when that letter was sent in 1997. That is what I paid for!

'Magazine' could mean more than one thing in the '90s - here is a CD-ROM magazine that ran for a good while.


(More info: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blender_(magazine))

sheramber

As already said, 12 issues per yer does not stipulate it will be a print version. 

You are still going to get  12 issues but digital copies.

RefluentBeans

dobbles said:

This letter was sent in the same month as the previous one I posted. I regard a magazine as what it meant when that letter was sent in 1997. That is what I paid for!

You might regard a magazine as a printed version. The world has changed since 1997. Newspapers are now online, with very little of their ‘circulation’ being in the paper format. But you would still consider the articles on The Guardians site newspaper articles. 

The bottom line is, if you want the articles then you have access to the articles online. If you want the printed copy of the articles then you can pay for the printed subscription, or print them yourself. You are entitled to 12 issues. You are getting 12 issues. It’s still an excellent deal to get unlimited articles for the rest of your life. 

eskbanker

dobbles said:

This letter was sent in the same month as the previous one I posted. I regard a magazine as what it meant when that letter was sent in 1997. That is what I paid for!

What you paid for was self-evidently to "receive 12 issues per year of the Saga magazine for Life", so what you choose to regard that as is up to you, but ultimately it would be up to a court to determine whether online copies are materially compliant with that wording or if substitution of soft for hard copies constitutes a breach of contract.  Opinions on this thread are clearly divided and there seems little room for common ground between the polarised viewpoints!

dobbles

sheramber said:

As already said, 12 issues per yer does not stipulate it will be a print version. 

You are still going to get  12 issues but digital copies.

The problem is, there are households where a digital subscription is not suitable. I have one friend who can only read print on paper using a magnifying glass, which is what he does. He cannot see print on screens.

Saga's response to these people is, to summarise, "hard luck.We're going digital for lifetime members even if you cannot make use of digital issues, and even though the magazine is still published on paper! Tough that you gave us £78 for membership for the rest of your life".

GingerTim

dobbles said:

sheramber said:

As already said, 12 issues per yer does not stipulate it will be a print version. 

You are still going to get  12 issues but digital copies.

The problem is, there are households where a digital subscription is not suitable. I have one friend who can only read print on paper using a magnifying glass, which is what he does. He cannot see print on screens.

Saga's response to these people is, to summarise, "hard luck.We're going digital for lifetime members even if you cannot make use of digital issues, and even though the magazine is still published on paper! Tough that you gave us £78 for membership for the rest of your life".

12 hard copy magazines for 26 years at £3/year, that is 312 issues at 25p each. That's been an incredible deal any way you look at it, and you've had a good run.

RefluentBeans

GingerTim said:

dobbles said:

sheramber said:

As already said, 12 issues per yer does not stipulate it will be a print version. 

You are still going to get  12 issues but digital copies.

The problem is, there are households where a digital subscription is not suitable. I have one friend who can only read print on paper using a magnifying glass, which is what he does. He cannot see print on screens.

Saga's response to these people is, to summarise, "hard luck.We're going digital for lifetime members even if you cannot make use of digital issues, and even though the magazine is still published on paper! Tough that you gave us £78 for membership for the rest of your life".

12 hard copy magazines for 26 years at £3/year. That's an incredible deal and you've had a good run.

And the content is still available to them online. Which they can print off themselves if they insist! Even better value!