The new March issue of "Shivers"...a querie

Print magazines have embargos as well, but they're not usually the same as online, because they know we have longer lead-times.

But eight months in advance seems extreme. It could just be that studios still see print as "legitimate", and so don't realise the double standard. The general feeling seems to be that once you let something online, you lose control over it.

Actually, interesting tid-bit about this Shivers issue (which I can no longer get since my local Borders discontinued their order for Shivers)...

The stills in the mag are the very same ones we saw as a so-called "exclusive" on another horror site (when all they did was scan the pics and put them on their site). There's a lot of spoilers in these pics.

Well, MGM was informed of these pics surfacing on the web and had the site PULL THEM. Shivers on the other hand...well, I don't know if they got a slap on the wrist or not from the studio, but Alan Jones (the one who penned the article) is mighty anxious to show the world that he is behind this film 100%.

Inspector - mind snagging me an issue? I'll pay ya when I get out there. I wanted to grab this issue 'cause I was around while Jones was doing all the coverage.

Well, we're also talking about the same mag that ran an unauthorized piece on Bob Burns' Halloween Show.

Not being massively familiar with the US mag scene, it's hard to say. There is a definite vibe of "if we can get it, we'll print it" that goes on with the UK press in general.

I suspect it's due to the smaller market size, coupled with the concentration on newsstand sales rather than subscriptions. In the US, the magazine market is subscription driven - they want you to sign up and get it through the mail. Because of this, newsstand sale in the US are a secondary concern - it just costs too much to send out thousands of mags and hope enough people pick them up. Publishing is a high-waste industry anyway.

In the UK, everything is decided on the shop floor. The person who walks into the newsagent and browses the shelves is the key customer - getting their attention, and getting them to buy you again next month, is the key factor. I guess this is why the UK press tends to be more lurid and showy - every single issue needs to make an impact and beat the competition month after month. This leads to some pretty nasty cutthroat competition between mags, and if fudging a feature or printing photos early gives them an advantage that month, then that's what they do.

The worst that they get is a slap on the wrists from the studios, but the sales figures are all that count. If that issue outsells the other guys, then a few snarky phone calls from some PR is water off a ducks back. Shivers probably do it because their sales are nothing like the big film mags like Empire or Total Film, or even Hotdog (which only sells about 20,000 copies), and if they have to break the rules to beat the big boys to the horror scoops, then that's what they do.

It sucks, but that's just the way it is over here.