(It's instant gratification.)
I had a revelation today.
Intrigued by a cover blurb on a randomly tossed past issue of Fast Company lying at the office, I opened not the magazine to decrypt the teaser (“The Most Hated Brand in America”) – for I had dread expectations not just of FC’s preposterous portrayals of businesspeople as hipster-heroes, but also of a diabolically hidden page number on the TOC and a story placement deep in the bowels of the issue – but instead opened my browser, which in seconds gave me what I wanted: my answer (“Ticketmaster,” with an amen, brother).
This caused me to ask: If print is going to ably compete with the web’s information-at-your-fingertips, would it not better itself by dispensing with the old, tarted-up come-ons of the previous print era and start getting readers right to the point?
Or is the ‘tease’ a huge part of print’s appeal?
Intrigued by a cover blurb on a randomly tossed past issue of Fast Company lying at the office, I opened not the magazine to decrypt the teaser (“The Most Hated Brand in America”) – for I had dread expectations not just of FC’s preposterous portrayals of businesspeople as hipster-heroes, but also of a diabolically hidden page number on the TOC and a story placement deep in the bowels of the issue – but instead opened my browser, which in seconds gave me what I wanted: my answer (“Ticketmaster,” with an amen, brother).
This caused me to ask: If print is going to ably compete with the web’s information-at-your-fingertips, would it not better itself by dispensing with the old, tarted-up come-ons of the previous print era and start getting readers right to the point?
Or is the ‘tease’ a huge part of print’s appeal?
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