Slap Magazine Goes Digital: An Interview With Editor Mark Whiteley

adamsullivan

• August 11 2008
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High Speed Productions’ SLAP Magazine recently announced it will be ceasing the monthly print publication, and refocusing its efforts on its Web site, slapmagazine.com. Transworld Business caught up with longtime SLAP editor Mark Whiteley, and got the scoop.

TWB: Why change up the format? Was there a catalyst, or was this a long time coming?

MW: It’s a changing time out there, in the media, in the economy, in skateboarding. Rather than try to struggle indefinitely against the tide of all these changes, the decision was made to instead go with our strongest asset for the future, and that’s our website. Everybody knows the popularity of the forum- we get literally millions of people a month coming to the site- and we’re aiming at corralling all of those people who we already have coming to see part of the total thing SLAP is and having them see more of what are and do, as well as bringing along all our long-time readers, friends and supporters.

What exactly is the new format? Will there be any print components at all, or all online?

We’re still building the thing so I can’t say completely, but the general idea is a fully fleshed-out website, as opposed to a monthly digital magazine. We’re planning on having big features that the mag would have run
coming on a regular basis, as well as smaller articles, interviews, etc. (that we couldn’t have done in print due to space limitations) dropping more regularly, and of course news and links and videos and all that coming up all the time. We want it to be something that people can check all the time and have new content, whether it’s a big feature or a little snack for the day.

As far as print goes, we’re hoping to have some kind of print component, such as a semi-annual mag or book, or special projects, or… It’s kind of up in the air at this point, but the site is definitely going to be the
focus.

Are you revamping your site, if so, how?

Majorly. Still in process, so I can’t really say, but it’ll be a vastly more “content-rich” site, as it’ll be getting all our editorial output. I love web terminology. Watch for me to populate and monetize at a webinar near you.

What are the advantages and disadvantages of going all digital?

The disadvantages- simply losing that thing in hand, that time-honored way to pass along information and images. That’s kind of the only disadvantage, although it’s a big psychological thing, especially for those of us who have been making a print mag for a long time. The advantages are many- no limitation on space, so we can have way more articles, more thorough articles, start to use video and audio files, music, you lose the whole cost of printing, shipping and distributing a physical mag, which is huge, and it’s better for the environment because of cutting the print component. We’ll be able to get out massive forum community
involved directly, and give them a place for some content as well. The part that’s gonna take the most doing is getting people to see being on the site as being as legit as being in the mag, but that’s what we’re gonna
do.

When is the switch taking place?

We’re printing our October, November and December issues, and then the new site will go up in early December.

Will there be a refocus of content?

The goal is to be producing the same kind of content that goes into the mag but just showing it to millions of people, instead of thousands. As I said earlier, there’ll be a lot of space for smaller articles and interviews as well, and being able to incorporate other mediums, mainly video, will be pretty huge eventually.

Had the Web eclipsed the mag in terms of popularity?

It’s hard to say, but there are definitely a ton of people coming to the site. You can tell exactly how many people come to the site in a given month, and with a mag you know how many you print but you don’t know how many people really see it all in all. But in general terms, yeah, it seems like the web is the bigger attention-getter. It sure seems like this is something the majority of print magazines are going to have to go through in the next few years. Being the first in the skate world is equal parts scary and exciting, but we’re diving in head long.

Will you keep all your mag’s departments/columns/events, like OIAM?

In terms of events like OIAM, yeah, we fully plan on continuing that. It’s already web-based, so it shouldn’t be a changed deal on that front. In terms of things in the mag, a lot of the departments and regular articles will continue, although some won’t, and some will change. For instance we do the “behind the lens” page where a photographer tells the story behind a certain photo- with  the web format there’s the potential to have the story behind every photo if we want to. With the web, the layers are kind of limitless. We want to keep some feeling of the mag experience there, some by way or organization, some by way of viewing on the site, some by way of making photos available to print out or something to hang up, but at the same time
we’re looking forwards to seeing how we can expand with the new format and technology.