Save the Socialist Standard

[robbo203]

jondwhite wrote:

Indymedia UK has closed down. Add that to Freedom Newspaper and The People (SLP) who also tried online only

 And Common Voice/World in Common unfortunately which was a purely internet-based phenomenon (apart from a very brief spell when a physical leaflet was produced for distribution).  This is why I say dont go down that road of becoming totally reliant on the internet.  Your primary tap root has to be grounded in the physical reality of face to face contacts, not cyberspace. The internet must   of course be exploited in any way you can but it should be seen as supplementing not replacing physical organising and activity

[alanjjohnstone]

Quote:

Your primary tap root has to be grounded in the physical reality of face to face contacts, not cyberspace. The internet must  of course be exploited in any way you can but it should be seen as supplementing not replacing physical organising and activity

my emphasis In a couple of my response on this thread i drew attention to the neglect of discussing the proposal that the Party moves from a branch-based structure organisation to a national-organised Party and no-one seemed particularly concerned to pick up on this point which i think is much more related to your point, Robbo, of physical face-to-face contact. A print-only or e-zine Standard is simply a vehicle for the party's propaganda whereas the importance of local meetings is vital to just not the democracy of the Party, but the social side of membership and ultimately the survival of the Party. Too often, the only sympathetic relationship for socialists possess is with fellow members and much of the value of branches comes in the post-meeting pub meeting or whatever.  Related to this was the item on what are the expected obligations of a member. And i would suggest that an e-zine would involve many more members active in its production than being simply in the role of passive paper-sellers.  Of course, we could base the party on Socialist Standard Readers Groups as some left-wing organisations prefer to do as a substitute for a Party…(wasn't this how Militant developed)  Perhaps someone who attended conference could sum up the debate on this issue of branch or national structure for us less-fortunate. My own opinion is that with a falling membership, we will continue to lose branches such as recently with EARB and other branches will become "ghost" branches with "phantom" inactive members. The web-based NERB i think has encountered snags that make its model problematic.  We'll have to come up with answer to this and adapt somehow to the reality of being a "dying" political party and reversing the trend.  As for all the examples being offered, i think the closest comparison is the SLP…no amount of internet activity can replace actual members…or rejuvenate them into active members…  Once more i draw attention to the demographics of party members which i keep raising and am not at all apologetic about…Our obituaries are becoming too regular a feature of the Standard, print or otherwise.  And as a parting question, when will the situation of an overly-expensive and under-used HO going to be resolved. I suggest tackling the latter as a priority but eventually, we will need to deal with the former. 

[alanjjohnstone]

Apologies…paragraph breaking formattng failed again

[Anonymous]

Quote:

As i said in previous posts, i fully expected this suggestion to fail but unpopular ideas have to be discussed and as i also said, the question will return in the future simply because the issue of declining sales of the Standard, won't be going away, Vin. We have in the past discussed the usefulness of owning premises and the existence of the HO will return as well, and a look at the accounts still reveals that is a vast drain on the party finances and resources with debatable benefits for the Party.

Correct. It was quite in order that the item be discussed, I was personally opposed to the motion, but Lancaster branch had every right to advance the idea.

[jondwhite]

AFAIK the only suggestion that item was 'not in order' was a strawman argument put forward by the movers when asked for branch minutes.The item to 'rescinds Paragraph d of the 1990 Conference resolution separating layout from editorial control, as no longer being necessary.' however, should have been ruled out of order as inaccurate.As has demonstrated (by Jacobin in particular) there's no reason print publications can't reverse declining circulation, even growing circulation and turning a profit.

[alanjjohnstone]

JDW, As materialists, we are not determinists and therefore no-one is excluding the possibility of a growth in the print-run  circulation, although i myself view it as an unlikely possibility. Nor has anyone said there should not be a printed version of the Standard but that a print version of the e-zine is produced regularly, the frequency being unagreed but i would go for quarterly. At the moment we have an online duplicate of the print-run. What is being really suggested is that the focus no longer remains concentrated on a printed Socialist Standard but our aim is primarily shifted to the internet version that becomes updated and amended daily and weekly. Jacobin – average a print-run of 36,000 copies. But online it has over 1,200,000 visitors. Staff involved in its production about 40.(It has scores of readers groups just to relate to my previous post point)Having started in end of 2010 and i think Jacobin managed to tap into the general revival of radical thought in the USA and in many ways reflects that audience.  If we are to grow – i think we need to take more cognisance of any potential readers out there to reach…and can anybody say that we have a policy of attracting those.  Jacobin has a model that appears to work for them = Hence they have begun to produce yet another print journal called Catalyst, a more theoretical/academic magazine. But let us be clear, we would not be having this debate if the print Standard was a growing success. It isn't and i'd be happy to engage in debate and discussion on the ways and means of reversing the declining trend. The onus is upon those who support the continuance of the print run to come up with the measures and future plans to reverse the fall in circulation and lack of readers and i eagerly await the proposals 

[alanjjohnstone]

Just a postscript – yes i have to acknowledge we have a new advertising campaign – and i hope it does result in new readers – but something a lot more is required than simply inserts in existing magazines – and with respect to those who will try hard to implement such a campaign, it does smack of the little boy with his finger in the leaking dyke. I believe thousands of pounds has to be put aside to a sustained ad campaign but more importantly we have to return to the question of how the Standard can be re-themed to capture an increased audience. I recall once that we have a party debate column where members exchange opinions and it has been suggested we make use of guest writers. Isn't this what we should be discussing, now that Lancaster's proposal has fallen. Time to move on to raise more ideas on how to raise the Standard's public profile.  BTW, Who is doing the vital task of lay-out and front-cover design?

[jondwhite]

The movers said "print is in terminal decline" and talked of inevitability in their supporting statement which sounds determinist (and wrong) to me. I think there are a few things off the top of my head;Content – at last ADM concerns were raised but basically there should be less Russell Brand and David Bowie sycophancy.Layout – the order of articles hasn't changed for around 10 years, it should be seriously considered.Price – the cover price has been half that of Socialist Review (same frequency and length) and incredibly even a pound less than Big Issue. Without a margin – big distributors won't take us on.Why hundreds of monthly subscribers should have the frequency reduced, I have to admit baffles me. To save money? What business reduces supply to below demand? Why is Morning Star able to print daily? Socialist Worker is weekly. Even the tiny AWL and Weekly Worker print weekly.

[alanjjohnstone]

So let us discuss the content.The SS editors, if i am correct, are presently under a mandate to ensure that the articles are aimed at the general ordinary reader and it excludes articles of deeper theory, hence the lack of discussion on the tendency of the declining rate of profit, etc. What guidance should there be instead? Who do we aim at? Preach to the congregation or seek out the politically floating?The regular layout team has resigned therefore there is plenty of opportunities to address this issue. However, do we have the skilled members to undertake the task. Alternatively, are we prepared to pay for its outsourcing either by the printers or sub-contactors?Raising the price. Since on of the reasons offered for the Standards continued print-run was its accessibility does a higher price help the street sales at protests and demonstrations and street stalls? Perhaps you can provide the sales figures through commercial outlets for the higher priced Socialist Review. I don't think i have walked into a newsagent and seen it on the shelves. But if you look back at past conferences, Lancaster Br suggested just that solution.  As for the Big Issue, perhaps we could enlist several hundred street-sellers and give them the price margin profit you say we could offer the magazine chains. But would they find a Marxist journal a big seller? We could try our best to eliminate the price entirely and turn it into a free-sheet magazine…Like the Metro…and as i think someone suggested…leave it around buses and trains. But as i often said…theme special issues to coincide with large political events (a reminder to some on the thread that i have never undervalued the worth of print material, i simply argue horses for courses) Once more, these "hundreds of monthly subscribers", just who are they? Members or the public or institutions? When was the last readership survey done? Surely a SAE can be enclosed in a future issue with a consumer survey questionnaire and, as some do, a raffle prize for returning (free book or pamphlet?). Why not ask the readers what they wish to see in the Standard. Or do you think the membership would continue to put their views and wishes to the forefront, regardless of what non-members desire?Apples and oranges. i am afraidMorning Star is heavily supported and subsidised by trade unions, are they not? They employ professional NUJ journalists to ensure newspaper content. Without the online version of the Weekly Worker, it would be insignificant and very much under the radar of many.You have me on the AWL's Solidarity, i know very little of it to comment.  But JDW, we are now getting closer to a better debate…how to improve and change the Standard to make it more receptive. 

[Young Master Smeet]

I think the bottom line is that we need to  look more at some sort of print on demand approach: I'll try and persuade my branch to bring that to conference next year…

[alanjjohnstone]

Quote:

I'll try and persuade my branch to bring that to conference next year.

As i have said previously, this question is not going away and one thing we should do is collate the necessary information to and contrary to the opinion of some, all the data has not been made available.Another type of organisation would set up a working group to study the issue and come up with an array of options to be discussed and debated. Unlike YMS "optimism" or next conference, i think this will be something we will spend a number of years on before it is resolved to everybody's satisfaction, my fear is that we will miss the bus. But as they say, another bus will be along…probably in time to coordinate with the dissolution of branches into a national structured organisation where we are in effect all Central Br. members…and that, of course, raises a whole lot of questions on how we make decisions and debate among ourselves.But the downside in all this internal discussion is that we spend time in an incestuous relationship with fellow members rather than devoting our energy in advocating socialism and implementing policies to recruit new members to reverse our decline. Finding solutions become our problem, in other words.

[Anonymous]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

As materialists, we are not determinists 

 Speak for yourself   The Dof P is determinist. I should distiguish that from 'fatalism' and 'inevitability' but I as a socialist am definitely determist. 

[Anonymous]

jondwhite wrote:

The movers said "print is in terminal decline" and talked of inevitability in their supporting statement which sounds determinist (and wrong) to me.

That is  'fatalism' or 'inevitablity'. you allude to. We would have no science without determinism, so let's not get it a bad name.

[Anonymous]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

The SS editors, if i am correct, are presently under a mandate to ensure that the articles are aimed at the general ordinary reader and it excludes articles of deeper theory, hence the lack of discussion on the tendency of the declining rate of profit, etc. What guidance should there be instead? Who do we aim at? Preach to the congregation or seek out the politically floating?

 IMHO our case has not changed our message remains the same. So we don't need to change what we sayhttp://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/socialist-standard/1970s/1971/no-807-november-1971

[alanjjohnstone]

I guess Vin, your attitude is, if it isn't broke why fix it but i'm not sure our propaganda model remains fit for purpose BrianG from Glasgow Br posted this several years back

Quote:

Rather than pay lip service to our open-ness and internal democracy we should advertise it by having a significant discussion section or element, in our main journal, the SocialistStandard. Far from being offputting, this would be attractive to new readers and sympathisers – evidence of a organisation that is alive, and of ideas that are constantly being reviewed and renewed. Why is the Weekly Worker nowadays the most influential paper on the Left? Because it hosts opendebate and discussion. Its not just a party line. But also the role of the Party isn't just to make socialists – it also needs to try and keep them also. And that means keeping members interested, which such adevelopment would help to do.

As it is now agreed to have the print-run continue, let us ask what message it is we wish to convey in the Standard…and that is not as easy as Vin, implies.Any media has a target audience it wishes to reach. I don't think we are any different. When was the last time Standard sellers attended an EDL rally, for instance? Are we intending to poach members from the left-wing? Do we reach out for a "virgin" audience, is it the environmentalists, the internationalists, trade unionists… who exactly do we aim for?We can campaign blindly, after all that is what we do with a lit stall…we contact the public indiscriminately as simply random passer-bys. Is the street stall approach versatile enough to adapt?As i said, now that we decide to go for the print run for the foreseeable future…how do we make it people-friendly? 

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