Bad News

Posted by Darker Matter Thu, 02 Aug 2007 08:12:00 GMT

I'm afraid I've taken a tough decision: Issue 5 is to be the last issue of Darker Matter.

Since I set the site up, it's been loss making, and that loss comes entirely out of my own pocket. In theory I can afford to run it for a bit longer, but I'm starting to realise that that would just be indulging in a very expensive hobby. If I didn't have a family to support, that might be ok, but as it is, I'd find it hard to justify when I have more important things to spend my money on.

There are a couple of ways in which I could, in theory, continue running the site - one is to stop paying authors (or to pay minimal fees) and the other is to charge readers. Either of those feels, to me, like an unacceptable compromise, and here's why:

First, paying authors. I decided early on that I would pay professional rates for stories, and I think that was the right decision. It means I was able to attract a high quality of author, as well as attracting a large number of stories from which to choose. It also meant that I was able to reward authors, rather than just taking the results of their hard work and benefiting from it.

I should point out that a number of authors have either donated stories to me, or have given me stories in exchange for advertising or a share of advertising revenue. That was very generous of those authors, and I don't feel that I could make that the basis for the entire site.

Second, charging readers. I don't want to do that primarily because it was important to me that the site be free - there's so much content on the Internet that is either free and low quality or expensive that I felt there had to be a business model that would provide high quality material to readers for free.

I still think that's true, but it wasn't possible for me. It would have been possible either if I'd been personally wealthy (or at least wealthy enough that the cost of running the site would make no difference to my finances) or if I had some wealthy sponsor. The fact that I wasn't able to find a sponsor doesn't mean that no such sponsor exists, but rather than I didn't have the time available (or the connections, perhaps) to find them.

Time was another issue: I found that running the site used up a lot of my time - almost all my spare time at some points in the month. Another facet of that is that I wasn't able to put as much time into the site as it deserved - seeking sponsorship and other marketing opportunities, keeping the blog busy and interesting, soliciting stories and interviews from top authors and so on were all tasks I just didn't have time for.

So. The site will remain live, at least for a year or two; the forum will remain (but it's not a very active forum - another indicator to me that the site wasn't likely to succeed) and I may update the blog now and then, if I think of something relevant to say. But I won't publish any new issues of the magazine.

If there's someone out there who'd like to take on the task of funding and publishing the site, then they're welcome to do so, and it's possible that at some point in the future I'll change my mind and start it up again.

I should say, in conclusion, that running Darker Matter has been an enormous pleasure. I've had the chance to read some really fantastic science fiction stories (as well as some truly awful ones!) have met lots of really great people (writers, artists, people from book publishers, editors of other magazines and all kinds of other people that I'd never have had the chance to meet otherwise. It's also, perhaps, shown me a business model that doesn't work, which might help me pick a better business model next time, if I do decide to resurrect the magazine some day.

Thanks to everyone for the support you've given me over the months. I hope you've enjoyed reading DM as much as I've enjoyed creating it.

Ben

Comments

Leave a response

  1. null said about 1 hour later:
    I'm sad to see it go. I understand the reasons - but I just recommended it to my Clarion classmates as a friendly site for science fiction writers. Keyan
  2. Matt said about 2 hours later:
    Shame but good for you for sticking to your principles!
  3. JPD said about 6 hours later:
    Terrible news, though I understand the reasoning. FWIW, I think you could have gotten away with charging readers-- the site published very high quality fiction, I think it would have succeeded. Why must the good die young?
  4. Gerry Allen said about 10 hours later:
    While I am very sorry to your site go, it was a tower of light in on-line fiction. Excellent stories from professional authors differentiated your site from others. Fiction reinforces our view of ourselves and the world...and changes it utterly. Science fiction does this while unbinding the imaginations of both author and reader. Thank you for the hours of pleasure, gasps of delight and ahas of insight. gerry_allen@yahoo.com
  5. maria said 1 day later:
    Aw man. I'd like to say thanks and agree with the others. You had some good quality stuff here. You and the writers/artists all did a good job. Thanks for giving it a go! Maria
  6. null said 4 days later:
    The only thing I'd disagree with is the assumption you make that much of the free fiction on the net is low quality. That's not true. That kind of thinking is literary snobbism. I could point you to a number of non-paying sites where the quality of fiction is higher than anything you published here. Even if you weren't paying your writers you'd still get quality fiction submissions. The only difference is that you'd get fewer submissions.
  7. Kaolin said 21 days later:
    I'm sorry to see Darker Matter go, just on principle--I had it on my review list (twice, actually), but we never seemed to actually make it over. As to the previous (anonymous?) comment, I'm curious as to what you thought were better markets. Why not say straight out, with examples? That always sounds like bluff to me, like the author who tries to shove it in your face that "ThEy GauGh+ PUBl1sht sumwher #lse s0 scR00 j00R Rejecshun!" And hey, no harm in directing folks to somewhere else they might want to read, with DM closing down, right? Ben--good luck with Serendipity. What would you say you've learned from DM that will make things work better with Serendipity?
  8. Michael Anthony said 35 days later:
    Sorry to see the site go! You wrote me a very nice rejection letter to one of my stories :) Good luck in your future endeavers.
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