Site Meter Reflections on Playboy: Why I buy <i>Playboy</i> at newsstands now

January 8, 2007

Why I buy Playboy at newsstands now

My subscription, which I chose not to renew, expired with the November 2006 issue. But either a clerical error or generosity on the part of someone in the organization has kept it coming to my mailbox anyway. Although I’m grateful for this happy accident or kindly gesture, I have my reasons for paying the extra money for the newsstand edition (and forgoing the free gifts that come with subscription renewal):

1.) Subscribers as well as newsstand buyers miss out on freebies. A recent newsstand copy came with a free bonus booklet of the women of Brazil. As a subscriber, I never would have known about it if I hadn’t noticed it on a newsstand.

2.) Postal workers tend to be rough on the magazine, not realizing how easy it is to mar the beautiful photographs with adhesion damage [not work-safe].

3.) According to the scuttlebutt among Playboy’s fans [not work-safe], advertisers are less impressed by subscription numbers (a strength for Playboy) than by newsstand sales (a weak area for Playboy). I don’t know enough about the ad business to confirm this, but I like making the switch just in case it helps the magazine financially.

4.) Even if reason 3 proves false, I’m putting more of my money into Playboy Enterprises. A fascinating series of lectures last year by professor Paul Cantor (written summary here; free audio and video here) explains that the ever-intimate relationship between art-slash-entertainment and commerce blurs the distinction between patronage of the arts and voting with one’s entertainment dollars. So why not pay more for what I like?

Posted by Brian Sorgatz at 6:11 PM

  • Blogger Tisha! left this comment at January 9, 2007 1:14 PM  
    Pay whatever you want for what you like just don't go overboard!

  • Blogger Salihah סליחה صالحه left this comment at January 10, 2007 7:33 PM  
    Love your blog concept! Awesome!

    Surfed in after seeing your banner while blog surfing. Had to look!

  • Anonymous R M Roxinger left this comment at June 17, 2007 12:56 PM  
    If subscribers get their mags via the mail, then how do the newsstand mags reach the newsstands--or at least do so in better condition than subscribers' mags?

    As for me, I subscribe to the digital edition. It's $1 a month, which is peanuts compared to membership fees for most Internet porn sites. I got to DL my 1st issue instantly, rather than wait more than a month like in the old days of printed mags. Best of all, I have more privacy because on a single hard drive, CD-ROM or whatever, I can store what would in print be stacks of mags. I could go on, but I'll stop here. To each their own.

  • Blogger Brian Sorgatz left this comment at June 17, 2007 2:06 PM  
    R M,
    For one thing, a magazine for sale on a newsstand hasn’t been stuffed into an apartment complex mailbox that happens to contain the bulky lock mechanism for that entire row of mailboxes. Naturally, I get a lot of mangled magazines.

    I refuse to participate in digital magazines. I’d miss the tangibility of paper and ink. Maybe it’s a Taurus thing.

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