I was informed today by the publisher that Python Magazine has been deemed “viable” using all of the important business metrics that they use to evaluate the magazine. This is fantastic news, and speaks volumes about the viability of the magazine in *non* business terms, as well as the model we’ve been employing at MTA since 2002.
We’ve never (yet) done anything to market the magazine. We didn’t really do a whole bunch of market analysis and research. We don’t pitch old guys in suits to convince them to fund our work. Not with php|architect, and not with Python Magazine. In each case, there was someone with a passion for the language, who was plugged into the community, who could see that a magazine would be valued as a tool by the community. In each case, we could see that there were people with great knowledge, and people with relatively little knowledge, and that those people didn’t often get around to finding each other to share that knowledge.
What we found with php|architect was that the magazine served as a bridge between those who have knowledge, and those who want it. We’re finding the same exact thing happening with Python Magazine.
There are millions of things we’ve discovered about how people consume documentation and think about languages and lots of other things along the way. It’s an immensely interesting business to be involved in. We’ve learned a whole lot about how publishing, distribution, translation, and even weird things like banking work in other countries all over the world. We’ve learned about how communities organize themselves into subcommunities in the digital realm and how different communication mechanisms affect how information is perceived and consumed and used. It’s fascinating stuff.
In the end, though, I think the success of the magazines is owed to the fact that the people producing them have a passion for the content. We’re still plugged into the respective communities – and not for the sake of the magazines. We’re plugged into the communities to help us perform at our day jobs, and we produce the magazine to help ourselves and our friends in the community get at the information they need.