I Shoot and Fish Magazine July 2013

Antoennis

Hi All,
Here is the I Shoot and Fish Free Monthly Magazine. Hope you enjoy. All feed back welcomed and listened too!

http://www.joomag.com/magazine/i-shoot-and-fish-magazine-july-2013/0391098001373284583

Thanks
Anthony

Antoennis

Hi Lads,

Any feedback on this months issue? All welcomed.

Cass

Had a read through it, and in general it's a decent read.

Maybe it was just me but between fishing, Angling, and adverts there is not a huge amount on shooting. Now perhaps i have missed some articles as i did not read every but rather skimmed the topics and if it was about fishing i moved on or did not interest me i moved on.

I realise it's called "ishoot&fish", but it seems more like "ifish, and a bit of shooting". Not being a smart arse, just an attempt at some humour but the point is valid.

Perhaps some firearm reviews. If there are no shooting related features or stories then there is plenty to do on firearms, cartridges, and other topics that come up here on a daily/weekly basis. Lamping, gear, techniques, advice columns for newbies, introductory features spread out over numerous months. Some discipline focused articles for target shooting (perhaps only a page or two with an interview from some of our members that compete on that level).

It should not take the place of the fishing articles, but compliment them and the mag as a whole.

Antoennis

Thanks for your reply. Ya at this time of year there is a bit more fishing in it. But just went through it there and between video and articles there is almost 50 pages of hunting/shooting. Not bad for a 101 page free magazine.

Cass

Antoennis wrote: »

But just went through it there and between video and articles there is almost 50 pages of hunting/shooting. Not bad for a 101 page free magazine.

It's not a criticism lad so don't take it to heart. Remember what i said above;

Cass wrote: »

Now perhaps i have missed some articles as i did not read every one but rather skimmed the topics and if it was about fishing i moved on or did not interest me i moved on.

However there are;

• 8 page review of a Baikal shotgun (20 bore)
• 4 page review on Roe hunting in the UK (2 pages of pictures)
• 1 page on semi auto rimfire recommendation
• 1 page article from a lad called Mike
• 4 page article on clays (the target as opposed to the shooting)
• 1/2 page article about clays in the game fair
• 1/2 page on George Digweed
• 1 page on Cavan county shoot with 1 & 1/2 pages of pictures

Then;

• 4 pages on introduction
• 4 pages on Game fair
• 17 & 1/2 pages of advertisments
• 17 pages of videos links -Fieldsport tv, blogs, etc. (18 actually but pages 69 & 70 are copies of each other)
• 32 pages of fishing
• 7 pages of notices (CAI, Fieldsport china, etc).

While i appreciate the fact that fishing is possibly year round or at least busy when shooting is not, shooting/hunting is also year round but the game changes. So when Deer, Duck, Pheasants are not in does not mean that hunting stops.

Then the issue of the articles. I cannot imagine the 8 page one about the 20 bore Baikal appealing to an awful lot of people. The one about the semi auto rimfire is one page and did not contain a huge amount of info.

The rest of the shooting articles were about game fair shooting, blogs, youtube links, shooting abroad (not relevant to Ireland) and the like.


You asked for thoughts so i'm giving mine. If you don't like them then there is nothing i can about that or if they insult you then apologies, it's not my intent, but at the same time i'm not sugar coating it. One third of the mag is advertisements or links for youtube videos. One third is fishing. The remaining third is split between firearm/shooting related topics, introductions, notices form companies/organisations, etc.

Antoennis

Thanks for that. Wasn't insulted pretty thick skinned me:-). Most of the video I count into the hunting section as most of them are about hunting and it breaks the articles up as you can watch them on the pages of the mag. The ads are a bi product of keeping it a free mag with out them there would be little point in having the mag at all as it simply wouldn't pay even to cover costs. While we have a huge readership in Ireland our second biggest readership is England and then USA so that's why you see things that might not be so relevant to Ireland.

Your points are well made and thanks. If you'd ever like to submit an article let me know.

Anthony

Cass

Well as said above i would not suggest dropping the adverts. Revenue has to come from somewhere.

I'm also not picking faults. Perhaps others enjoy it more based on the articles being to their liking (fishing, etc).

I was also unaware that of your U, etc readership. So that explains that. However much like this forum i would like to see more firearm/shooting/hunting related articles. Reviews of more "in demand" firearms, caliber comparisons, etc.

Now i've no idea about how the mag is done in terms of personnel, budgets to go traveling to get the reviews/articles, etc (nor do i need to know). However in terms of shooting/hunting related articles there are always the same few questions asked here, and while i cannot say to take from here i would suggest looking at some of the more common or popular topics that come up regularly, and maybe address them on a monthly basis. So break it into parts, and do monthly reviews culminating in a summary.


Again i know nothing about reporting, press, media, publications, etc so perhaps i'm talking out my ass.