New Woodworking Magazine?

I just did a quick look in this group to see if anyone has discussed this magazine before and I couldn't find any posts. (that may be a statement of my newsgroup skills not a definitive "it isn't here" position)
Anyway, stumbling through a Barnes & Noble this week, I came across a "new" magazine. "Woodworking Magazine." The printed bar-code block carries the "Popular Woodworking" name, along with a $4.99 U.S. price.
It bills itself as the Spring 2004 issue, and states you can preorder the next issue, the Fall 2004 issue for $7.00. The Fall issue will be the second publication of 2004 and is promised out in July. Those are the only two issues planned for 2004. No subscriptions are being offered at this time.
Their web site is www.woodworking-magazine.com and forecasts "Coming Soon."
Steve Shanesy is the Editor & Publisher. Shanesy and the masthead staff have e-mail addresses at @fwpubs.com. Google has no listing for fwpubs.com. The magazine says they are F&W Publications Inc., in Cincinnati, Ohio. They state they are a sister publication to Popular Woodworking.
No advertisements! The only commercial tidbit is a small block of text recommending the book "Reverence for Wood" by Eric Sloane. This small blurb was signed by Christopher Schartz, Executive Editor of the magazine.
The magazine articles are basic stuff. Fundamental. Articles like "Cut Accurate and Clean Rabbets," Making Stub-tenon Doors," Shaker Hanging Cabinet," and similar. The articles seem well written and contain both photos and drawings in black and white, - no color. Only the covers, front and back, both sides use color. (The format/layout kind of reminds me of the "Cooks Illustrated" magazine a few years ago.)
Not a bad first attempt. Pretty good, I think. They have some work to do. They say they will have a free e-mail newsletter but that must be a future project since the web site is unavailable to sign-up.
Jack AMJ (Admitted Magazine Junkie)
-- "Whenever people agree with me I always feel I must be wrong."

John Flatley notes:
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small snip
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Steve is editor & publisher of PW, while Chris (Schwarz) is EE there, too. Not exactly neophytes. I forget how long they've been there, Steve a bit longer, IIRC.
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Good to know there's a new mag coming out. I'll see if I can locate a copy around here.
Another note: look for fwpublications.com, not fwpubs.
Charlie Self "All you need in this life is ignorance and confidence, and then success is sure." Mark Twain http://hometown.aol.com/charliediy/myhomepage/business.html

Charlie,
Thanks for the pointer to www.fwpublications.com. F+W lists "Popular Woodworking" as their only woodworking magazine. That may just mean the mother ship has not been updated. Maybe "Woodworking Magazine" is just a pilot project, that could explain why www.fwpubs.com is not active yet.
Actually pilot project can be used to explain many faults in the first issue. I haven't finished this issue yet and I'm already waiting for the July issue. Just a fish on the hook.
Good potential, good promise. The lack of ads really shines the light on the articles. No distractions. But that's okay, I subscribe to Fine Woodworking for the ads anyway. :-)
Jack
-- When I'm not in my right mind, my left mind gets pretty crowded.
Google has no listing
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You don't read it, you only look at the pictures, huh?

wrote:
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Only the color pictures. And only the ones that haven't been airbrushed. :-)
Jack
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I pick up a copy at Raleys grocery store today. I like it and the fact that it has no advertising.
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that
I'd imagine that would start changing after a few issues. That is where magazines make all their profits, unless they have a huge subscriber number.
-- Regards,
Dean Bielanowski Editor, Online Tool Reviews http://www.onlinetoolreviews.com ------------------------------------------------------------ Latest 5 Reviews: - Veritas Shelf Drilling Jig - Ryobi CID1802V 18v Cordless Drill - Workshop Essentials Under $30 - Festool PS 300 Jigsaws - Delta Universal Tenoning Jig ------------------------------------------------------------

It still would be odd if they had ZERO ads if they plan on soliciting them in the future. Shopsmith/Notes survive without ads, and Shopsmith just expanded their mag by 40%. :-) :-)
Joe Another woodrag junkie (where can I get help?)
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Well, I called to see if I could subscribe and they are not taking subscriptions yet. However, they will mail you a copy of the first issue for $8.00, all in.
Call 513.531.2690 and ask for Betty.
Joe
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May be getting into this thread late and most of what follows may have been covered but here goes
Thoughts after going through some more of the premiere issue of Woodworking Magazine
I pick up just about every woodworking magazine I find on the shelves during my twice a month visit to the local Barnes and Noble bookstore. There are almost a dozen different woodworking magazine titles on my shop library book shelves. In each issue of each magazine I usually find at least one gem that made the purchase worth it, though I note a great deal of duplication and I’d swear that the editors are either lurkers in, or participating members of, rec.woodworking.. A recent thread on lock miter router bits and their uses - the next issue of several woodworking magazines have multi-page articles on setting up and using lock miter bits. A question about distinguishing the various types of varnish - an article on the subject, with photos of how a small puddle of how they look when dry being used to identify which is which.
Most of the magazines take a shotgun approach to their articles selection - a three pager on plunge routers, an article on a finishing method, an article about joinery and maybe something using a bandsaw or lathe. And scattered throughout - ads, lots of ads. Many even have an index of advertisers - convenient for the advertiser to find his/her/their ad as well as for the reader trying to find a supplier for hardware or some tool.
Most of the magazines have lots of photos and a diagram or two, some quite good and some just adequate. Some magazines have great illustrators and some have pretty good photographers. Most have pretty good writers as well. But when I really go through an article I come away wishing the photos or the diagrams or the text filled in most, if not all the gaps each one had. And it would be nice to not have to wade through pages of ads to get to the next page of an article
Surprisingly, despite the word “wood” in their titles, most wood working magazines don’t devote much space to wood. If they do anything on the subject it’s usually technical - how it works, how much it moves, how it takes a finish. What it looks like and what I’ll call its personality are seldom if ever mentioned. But it’s wood we all use and the right wood for a project can make all the difference in the esthetics/look/feel of the finished piece, be it a pedestal, CD cabinet, table or chair. The right wood, used the right way can make a fair piece much better and a good piece a really nice piece.
So when I picked up what turns out to be the premiere issue of Woodworking Magazine the first thing I noticed was the photograph of a beautiful, simple wall hung cabinet with shaker boxes on a table top below it. To the left, on a white background, was clean legible text of what’s inside. No need to search the cover to get a feel for what’s inside.
But the magazine was “so thin” -just 32 pages plus the front and back covers - another ShopNotes?
Inside the cover - THE INDEX - Now that’s refreshing. No searching amongst the first 8 or 10 pages of ads to find it. No multiple indexes to try and find. Just one easy to find, easy to read and look at index with enough info to let you know what’s covered.
Page 1 - Listen to Your Lumber - the editor & publisher puts wood right up front on the very first page. And his wood talks to him too. I thought I was the only nut that had conversations with wood (here’s how some of those conversations went - all one line so watch the line wrap )
http://home.comcast.net/~charliebcz/MT/ConversationsWithWood.html
In the middle of that editorial a quote “Each plank . . . can have only one ideal use. The woodworker must find this ideal use and create an object of utility to man, and, if nature smiles, an object of lasting beauty.” - George Nakashima
Now I’m one of those people who wants to know not only how to do something, but also why. Not just the mechanics and physics of why this method is better than that method in this application, but how does this fit with the other parts - to make a coherent, functional and beautiful piece of whatever “it” is. What’s going on not only in the hands using the tools, but in the mind guiding things.
It seems that article writers are given a rule book when they become professional writers for woodworking books or magazines. One of those rules is Never Use The Word “I” and NEVER let on that the writer has discovered anything for themselves that seems to fly in the face of “common knowledge’ or more likely, was a tried and true method a hundred years or more prior to the first power tool. There also seems to be a taboo about stating that what follows is the writer’s opinion.
The first article “Cut Accurate and Clean Rabbets” breaks most of the rules. “I consider this a technique that’s best for ...”
“The router table was my first choice for a couple of reasons ...” and he goes on to list his reasons.
Four pages with tip packed text and explanations of why this method works better than several alternative methods, clear black and white photos to illustrate key points in the article - with accompanying text right below each photo so you don't have to search for the photos text amongst evert=ything else on the page. Nice.
As I jumped around reading articles - the way I normally go through a woodworking magazine - I noticed the articles were directly related to the two projects in the magazine. - hanging cabinets - one being the Shaker cabinet on the cover and a similar sized small tool cabinet. What you learned in the “how to - and why” articles - you used in the projects. What a concept - a magazine with a coherent theme full of useful information that gets applied in not one but two projects that anyone with a basic woodshop could make over a weekend - excluding finishing time of course.
The last article “Bad Treehouse & Good Medicine” capped off the old adage - “Always leave them laughing” and was in the Walt Akers tradition of humor but without Helga. “The last thing I remember before the plank planted itself into my face was the smell of fresh wood.” This tale ends with a nice twist - one I’ll not divulge.
The inside of the back cover has Questions about Woodworking Magazine which the folks who did this magazine explain their goals and objectives, explaining why there are not ads and how to subscribe. Next to that is the “what’s coming next” info.
The icing on the cake was the back cover where the big full page ad is normally found.Instead there’s a nice “suitable for framing - or laminating” useful Screws Chart with clear images, dimensions, pilot hole sizes, driver sizes, clearance hole diameters etc.
Relative to the shelf price of most wood working magazines, the $4.99 cover price of this premiere issue of Woodworking Magazine is a real deal. When you remove all the ads from others “90 plus pages” on the market you end up with maybe 40 pages of actual articles scattered in all the ads. The fact that all the articles were directly related to the two projects in the issue is more valuable to me than 40 or 50 pages of stuff of which only 5 pages of interest to me. The fact that the editor and publisher obviously loves wood and woodworking gives me hope for the magazine’s future.
Next issue due in July will be $7 US - may be my first subscription to a wood working magazine. It looks like it will be another set of articles around the project them - a classic cherry side table. I think Fine Wood Working started out something like this. Though still a pretty good magazine, the changes in direction over the last few years haven’t IMHO been that good. Will have to see about this new and promising magazine.
charlie b

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I'm a technical writer Charlie and the "I" thing, specifically not using it, was one of the first things drummed into me when I was taking courses. You're not supposed to insert any personal opinion into the text that you write and you're not supposed to allude to any personal involvement at all. It's the industry standard and maybe it needs changing, but that's not going to be easy. To tell the truth it's a pain in the butt, because I'm opinionated and outspoken when I can get away with it. Possibly, I've chosen the wrong profession, but it means that if I'm going to be successful as a technical writer, I'm doomed to roaming the newsgroups as a means of releasing pressure. :)

Upscale mentions:
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I do technical writing--tool manuals--as well as magazine articles and books: it's a whole different field. Hell, a lot of companies even have their own language structure (never use "the" for instance: i.e., Blade spring goes in...., instead of The blade bolt goes in...). Pictures may be cropped to a single size throughout the text, no matter the detail needed over a wide area.
I don't believe I've ever had an editor tell me not to use "I", nor have I found one who wanted me to not express my personal opinion. At least not in the last decade or so.
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Try writing articles. But they don't release any pressure that I've noticed.
And, regardless of whether or not one person likes a style and method of magazine layout, there is a method to that madness, which is to attract as wide a variety of customers as possible. Now, Charlie B likes the one project theme, a method Woodsmith has used successfully for a long time, also without advertising. I like it, too, but that becomes a PITA when at any particular time, I don't have ANY interest in building a cherry, or walnut or ipe, end table in a particular pattern. And as far as wood "talking" to the writer, sure. it does. Each board tends to have a particular spot in a project where it will look best. But in many cases the project is not ruined, but only set down a bit, if the board is used elsewhere. As far as having discussions of wood in every issue, well, I think some more information on wood in general in each issue of at least one major magazine is an excellent idea. But we won't see much conversation with wood in those articles. What I'd love to see, and take part in, is a series of articles using 2-3-4 woods to build a small project (or not so small). Describing not the project, but the wood and its reaction to being cut, chiseled, planed, glued up, scraped, sanded, filled (or not), finished and similar needs. Do that with maybe 2-3 woods per issue for a couple years and you'd have a great, great compendium of practical results that could be clipped out and punched and kept in the shop in a binder.
There would be a lot of similarities, but doing a hands on check of each wood also tells exactly what of the wood's reputation is deserved or not. Probably not possible, but it would be nice to take each article right from the rough boards out. How does it power plane? How does it hand plane? Can you cut dovetails in it with ease, or is it as compressible as pine, giving rough cuts without super-sharp chisels? Does ir rip cleanly? Does it burn at slow feed speeds in power cutting? Does it burn at fast feed speeds in power cutting? Does it fuzz on sanding? There are at least 3 dozen questions that could be answer empirically that we think we already know the answers to. We may. We may not. Check and see. It's probably impossible to test each and every filler/wood combination going for finishes, or the use of particular finishes, but...
Oh. A quick note on Charlie's feeling the editors of magazines watch and react to the rec. I'm sure they do, but seeing something on here and seeing an article on the subject two or three or four or five weeks alter in the magazine does not mean that's one of the reactions. Magazine lead time--between idea to finish--is more on the order of 3 months, not 3 weeks.
Charlie Self "A man who carries a cat by the tail learns something he can learn in no other way." Mark Twain http://hometown.aol.com/charliediy/myhomepage/business.html

On 06 Feb 2004 10:16:23 GMT, snipped-for-privacy@aol.comnotforme (Charlie Self) brought forth from the murky depths:
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True, and letters to the editors seldom, if ever, show up in less than 2 months. So what was the URL to that new mag?
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ROTFLSHIAPMP!
========================================================== Save the Endangered Boullions from being cubed! http://www.diversify.com/stees.html Hilarious T-shirts online ==========================================================

Larry Jaques asks:
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Just bought a copy, so: woodworking-magazine.com.
Charlie Self "A man who carries a cat by the tail learns something he can learn in no other way." Mark Twain http://hometown.aol.com/charliediy/myhomepage/business.html

On 06 Feb 2004 17:40:34 GMT, snipped-for-privacy@aol.comnotforme (Charlie Self) brought forth from the murky depths:
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"coming soon" is the entire content of that URL.
========================================================== Save the Endangered Boullions from being cubed! http://www.diversify.com/stees.html Hilarious T-shirts online ==========================================================

Larry Jaques responds:
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Ees not my yob!
Charlie Self "A man who carries a cat by the tail learns something he can learn in no other way." Mark Twain http://hometown.aol.com/charliediy/myhomepage/business.html

http://www.woodworking-magazine.com /
working as of Friday evening 7:11 pm pst

On 06 Feb 2004 22:54:33 GMT, snipped-for-privacy@aol.comnotforme (Charlie Self) brought forth from the murky depths:
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It was up by 4pm this afternoon, surprisingly enough. There's not much info on there but you can order a copy.
========================================================== Save the Endangered Boullions from being cubed! http://www.diversify.com/stees.html Hilarious T-shirts online ==========================================================

Larry Jaques responds:
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Got it now. No advertising is a policy to allow them to speak freely. Sounds good. I have to wonder a wee bit, though, if non-advertisers in Woodworking who get nailed aren't going to do a job on Pop. Woodworking by pulling their ads there. That one is going to be a tightrope.
Some caution with upcoming issues. One more this year, due out in July. I signedup for the newsletter to keep track of things.
Charlie Self "Don't go around saying the world owes you a living. The world owes you nothing. It was here first." Mark Twain
http://hometown.aol.com/charliediy/myhomepage/business.html

snipped-for-privacy@aol.comnotforme (Charlie Self) wrote
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I don't know, F+W Pubs. is pretty darn big; Woodworking probably has a 5-yr. budget already allocated. Besides most advertisers aren't going to cut off their nose to spite their face -- if the ads produce in Pop. Wood., they'll likely stay regardless. my $.015.
Cheers, Gary