Mass customization appears ready to take another step with Time Inc.’s Maghound, a planned September 2008 rollout of a Netflix-type service for magazines. You pay a monthly fee and choose the magazines you want, for as long as you want them, switching as often as you like.
The report on Foliomag.com says: The pricing for a membership is tiered—three titles for $3.95 per month, five titles for $7.95, seven titles for $9.95, and $1 per title for eight titles or more. Titles that have a non-discounted traditional sub rate of around $19 or more per year are considered “premium” titles and will have an extra $2 fee per month (10-15 percent of titles fall in this category). First-time users will also be eligible for a free one month trial.
In a recent presentation, a Maghound executive said he hopes to have 300 magazines participating by launch. Some major challenges would seem to be:
* Rising paper and postal costs.
* The magazine industry’s traditionally slow execution starting new subscriptions.
* More and more magazine content being accessed on the Web.
Even so, it’s a bold move. I’m going to try it. How about you? The Maghound.com site isn’t yet active, but you can click on a customer service link and they promise to email you know when it’s live.
Lou Heldman on the News Media 