BYO - no more printed magazines

[OakIslandBrewery]

Oh, and my membership just renewed last month. I paid them in November for another year. You can’t tell me this decision was made on the fly and they didn’t know last month when I renewed. They said nothing.

Yup, I got the same email from BYO. Been with them since day one. I feel blindsided too with my renewal.

I enjoyed reading each page when my copy came in the mail. Over recent years I noticed the pages per copy have cut in half. Not sure about advertising versus content.

Not sure what I will do, probably see how the year goes. Sad to see it go but in all honesty I get more from HBT.

 

[Exception13]

Don't get me started on Logitech discontinuing and killing support for the Squeezebox.

This! Damn I miss that.

 

[jdauria]

Not liking that they are going to digital only, but for those who like paper version, as I expect most of us older subscribers do, usually there is a way to print online magazines. I do it every now and then with Zymurgy. It allows you to save as a PDF and then print it off on your home printer. Looking at the last BYO issue online, it does the same. Open the digital version of the magazine and in the bottom toolbar, hover over the three dots, and it gives an option to print or save as PDF. I like to save as PDF and then go in and only print pages that are not all ads.

 

[shoengine]

 

[khannon]

View attachment 864130

And how much Fossil fuel was burned creating and serving this image

 

[stamandster]

@khannon Since you asked https://mccinnovations.com/insights/blog/the-cost-of-paper-vs-digital/ & https://www.repsly.com/blog/field-team-management/cost-analysis-paper-vs-digital-forms

 

[shoengine]

And how much Fossil fuel was burned creating and serving this image

I could've used the energy of a small village to generate it via AI. Sort of like I did when I asked it to make me a picture of racing kegerators.

 

[Yesfan]

LOL. If any of those beers are fusel, that Mustang doesn't stand a chance.

 

[BeerNsteadofH2O]

Just got my official notification, my wife us pissed, she just renewed it for 2 years, shes going to e mail them tomorrow, or call , shes miserable with sciatica and is ready to tear some one a new one.

 

[hout17]

This sucks. I'm really glad I have a decent stash of issues. I'm in the printed magazine camp.

I'm sure they are banking on better profitability.

 

[MaxStout]

A couple years ago I subscribed to BYO for a year. Took them 6 months to mail my first issue. Guess that was the writing on the wall. I canceled after a year.

BTW, if you want to stop your subscription be sure to contact them. Don't just let it run out thinking it's done, as it won't lapse. They auto-renew on your cc by default and you have to opt out.

 

[BeerNsteadofH2O]

A couple years ago I subscribed to BYO for a year. Took them 6 months to mail my first issue. Guess that was the writing on the wall. I canceled after a year.

BTW, if you want to stop your subscription be sure to contact them. Don't just let it run out thinking it's done, as it won't lapse. They auto-renew on your cc by default and you have to opt out.

We just renewed as I said earlier, but we are old school, and sent a check with the payment coupon( of coarse it's already been deposited), so no auto renewal, and that's the crying shame, they took my money, knowing full well what they were going to do, I feel they were very underhanded with the whole transfer,the honorable thing to do would to have given us" the reading public"the option, pretty sure I'll never see a reimbursement, we will see after the boss lady gives them an ear full.

 

[kevin58]

Not liking that they are going to digital only, but for those who like paper version, as I expect most of us older subscribers do, usually there is a way to print online magazines. I do it every now and then with Zymurgy. It allows you to save as a PDF and then print it off on your home printer. Looking at the last BYO issue online, it does the same. Open the digital version of the magazine and in the bottom toolbar, hover over the three dots, and it gives an option to print or save as PDF. I like to save as PDF and then go in and only print pages that are not all ads.

I have never looked at the online version so this is good news. As long as there is a way to save an article I want to keep I may hang in there a while longer.

 

[OakIslandBrewery]

Yesterday I logged on their site to see what the online magazine looked like. I was actually impressed with the flip page version. I'm not giving them a pass but reading the magazine that was ok.

Like I mentioned, I will give it some time. I get a half price subscription, club discount, so if they renew that again and I like the electronic version I might stay. To be honest though I think BYO is doomed to die eventually.

 

[BrewnWKopperKat]

For those prefer physical magazines or who don't like digital magazines, I'm not posting this to change your mind.

For those "on the fence", I offer a subscribers opinion on the Jan 2025-digital only issue.

The Jan 2025 issue is out, so this was the 1st issue that I read/scanned using the "flip page" viewer.

This was on my Windows 10 laptop (17" screen @ 1920x1080), so YMMV.

Overall it was a good experience:

• After the cover page was displayed, I
  • switched into full screen mode, and
  • zoomed in (using the wheel on the mouse)
  • to remove 'dead space' on the top / bottom of the screen.
• Paging through the magazine is easy. The "next page" button is on the far left. I put the mouse over the button and paged through the magazine.
• On the "table of contents" page(s), each "feature" article and "department" article is "clickable".
• Entries in the "recipe index" are also "clickable"
• To get back to the TOC page, there is is a "pages" icon on the tool bar. so two clicks to get back to the TOC (or any other page).
• URLs in the articles are also "clickable"

This may be the first online "flip page" reader that I've used that actually adds value. I'll still download issues for off-line reading.

---

For those who "suffered through" digital Zymurgy issues where the emphasis was on form (vs readability) on some pages, I have attached the "page view" from the BYO Jan 2025 issue. Every page is either white background with black text or gray/black background with white text.

BYO Jan 2025: White background & black text or dark background & white text. Every. Single. Page.

in fairness, I haven't seen Zymurgy issues since about Apr 2024. If this problem (difficult to read text) has been fixed in recent issues, please let me know.

edited for typing errors.

also eta: (12/12 4:30p): I'm migrating to a new MacBook Air (15" 2880x1864 display) - and the "flip page" viewer in Safari was a good experience. Everything seemed to work the same as on my Windows 10 laptop & the extra pixels made reading a little nicer.

 

[jcav]

Well this stinks, I got notified also that it's online only. I do not like navigating magazines online. I like to read a hard copy. Don't know what I will do either, been a subscriber for many many years.

John

 

[Indian_villager]

Considering the overall shrinking of the homebrew market how is anyone surprised? Print has been shrinking overall as well, not just for homebrew. Y'all are welcome to vote with your wallets either way you see fit. Are you prepared for BYO to flat out shut down and lose what they have been bringing to the table?

 

[BrewnWKopperKat]

Considering the overall shrinking of the homebrew market how is anyone surprised?

The transition of the subscription to digital-only was abrupt.

Abrupt transitions tend to surprise people.

Are you prepared for BYO to flat out shut down and lose what they have been bringing to the table?

tl;dr: I am.

• Content publishers come and go. But, and in IMO, BYO will be around for a while, maybe longer. Same with CB&B.
• Content creators, OTOH and IMO, are worth following wherever they choose to have their content published.
• The content creators that I follow provide content using books, magazine articles, personal web sites, podcasts, guest appearances on podcasts, conference presentations, guest appearances at home brew club meetings, etc.
• If magazine articles are no longer an option, there are other ways for them to publish content.

 

[mac_1103]

Abrupt transitions tend to surprise people.

Yeah. Shocking, isn't it?

 

[EscapeArtistBrewing]

When we were moving several years ago, we (mainly my wife, actually) just didn't have the space to save all my woodworking journals. I was really sick of heart to think of not having them as reference, but I discovered that most WW publishers were putting their entire archive on DVDs. I later came to realize that the search capabilities that PDFs afford was a really good thing, as well as storing the equivalent of 10 banker boxes of magazines in a desk drawer.

Having hard copy for plans was really important, but having the ability to print them out, mark them up, and not have to worry about scribbling or damaging the original was great. I suspect now that when I find a recipe I want to brew, I'll either print the BYO page and not worry about spilling wort on it, or, better, just transfer it to my brewing software on brew day. Besides, my multi-terabyte hard drive can handle any number of brews.

I'm just suggesting to have heart adjusting to the loss of a physical mag. Yes, some sitting-by-the-fire-reading experience is lost, but other, more handy and practical experiences can be forthcoming.

I would suggest to Brad that he consider some additional changes moving forward:

1. Offer a DVD (or a zip file for the on-line-only types) of all back and future issues.
2. Add content, such as .xml files of recipes to those published in the pdf-journal. Add some value.
3. Make sure there are good links in the PDFs, to make navigating to papers referenced in the article or contact links to authors (mailto, or vendor websites.
4. Make sure the magazine's PDF renders well on Kindles, Surface, iPad, and any other hand-held reader, for those of us old-timers who still like to read by the fireside.

Information ain't free. I'm not ready to stop getting my brew-knowledge fix.

 

[Oldskewl]

Before covid I picked up this really neat magazine dealing with fermentation. Had all sorts of info on stuff, mainly foods. I liked it so much I ordered a subscription. It took a couple of months before I for my next issue, but I must've missed a mailer because I got a completely different magazine. Turns out it got discontinued after just one issue.

Print periodicals are all but dead. The magazine stand at my local drug store was probably 15 feet long. Now it just has old copies of Runners World and Elle.

I subbed to that magazine as well. I think it was called "Fermentaion". Sadly I didn't even realize I stopped receiving it until I read your post. I think it came out every 2 or 3 months. I only got 1 or 2 issues. Easily forgotten about.

I am also a fan of printed material(54 years old). I have always struggled reading a magazine online and hated that fact that when I stopped my subscription I could no longer access it. But being able to download PDFs of articles/issues I find valuable will alleviate that problem. I will give the online subscription another chance as I got billed right before the change over as well. But they should have given their print subscribers a heads up and not automatically renewed them. That was in poor taste.

 

[BrewnWKopperKat]

A couple of thoughts on building a browsable / searchable magazine library (assuming each magazine issue is a searchable PDF).

Note taking apps (I occasionally use Obsidian) will often include searchable PDFs as 'first class citizens'.

With Obsidian, I put the PDFs in a folder (or folders by magazine then by year) and it's easy to navigate to a specific magazine:

Obsidian supports links to pages within the PDF. So one could create notes page with links to the "recipes index" page within each issue. Then over time, create links to recipes that were interesting.

Could those recipe links be automagically generated? I'm still a 'noob' with python, but there seems to be a number of packages that would be helpful. Over in the .Net environment, there is a nuget package to generate HOCR from source PDF pages (so no need to OCR the page image to get the text - if the PDF is searchable). If you are interested in the next layer of details, PM me (but be aware that this 'rabbit hole' goes very deep).

 

[BrewDrinkRepeat]

I find it very difficult to read the digital versions, having to enlarge in order to read the words and then move the page around to see all the content.

That is exactly what I hate about reading magazines digitally. Unlike text-focused books (like novels) which are read linearly L-R / T-B, magazine are designed entirely differently and more often than not are formatted in a way that doesn't translate well to a screen.

I have yet to directly experience either BYO or Zymurgy in digital form, but I think I'd rather they were morphed into a paywalled website, formatted accordingly and adaptive to different screen sizes, rather than a PDF of how the magazine would have been laid out.

My BYO sub has at least a few more "issues" to go, so I guess I'll have to go log on and see how they're doing it.

But, if I'm being honest, the magazine hasn't been of huge interest for some time. It's comfortable, like an old friend, but I can't say I learn much from it these days. I'm reading it because I'm used to reading it.

 

[bwible]

That is exactly what I hate about reading magazines digitally. Unlike text-focused books (like novels) which are read linearly L-R / T-B, magazine are designed entirely differently and more often than not are formatted in a way that doesn't translate well to a screen.

I have yet to directly experience either BYO or Zymurgy in digital form, but I think I'd rather they were morphed into a paywalled website, formatted accordingly and adaptive to different screen sizes, rather than a PDF of how the magazine would have been laid out.

My BYO sub has at least a few more "issues" to go, so I guess I'll have to go log on and see how they're doing it.

But, if I'm being honest, the magazine hasn't been of huge interest for some time. It's comfortable, like an old friend, but I can't say I learn much from it these days. I'm reading it because I'm used to reading it.

BYO has had much of their content behind a paywall for a few years. They started selling seperate print magazine and online subscriptions awhile back. Many is the time I tried searching for something and clicking on a BYO article in the search results to hit a sign up page even though I was a magazine subscriber.

 

[kevin58]

My subscription ended today and I did not renew. I'm done. There are plenty other available sources of content and information that I don't need to spend my retirement income on BYO.

 

[BrewZer]

Whoa! At 150-ish°F I gotta believe anyone dry humping a mash tun will only try that once

Reflectix underwear solves that problem.