On Not Renewing Magazine Subscriptions

I love books. All kinds of books. Bookity book book books. Piles of books. But have only so many hours, minutes actually, in a day to read. Result: lots of unread books. Books stacked up behind me as I surf the web. Burning into the back of neck. Whispering, “Read me”. Oh, the guilt.

But I’m scaling the unread book mountain. How? I’ve given up magazines. Not all mags, I still get Word (sorry Q I just couldn’t bare to read another story about a poor rock star’s drug habit) and the IET (formerly IEE) stuff which is unavoidable if you’re a member. But I did not renew Q, The Spectator, The Economist, Make, The IEEE and The ACM. All fine mags but, given the results of the world financial cowboys shenanigans championships not essential by any means.

And you know what? I don’t miss one. No more thinking, “Hey, I better hurry up and read this before the next one arrives”. No more piles of magazines getting re-cycled. Less costs. Yes, I might miss a good article but chances are it will be mentioned on a filter (Reddit, Hacker News, Slashdot) and I can probably read it for free. So, I’m not missing anything and I’m less cluttered.

I guess I’m not suited to mags. I like to take my time reading, to concentrate, to take it all in. In short, to read books like they should be read. I’m getting there. Let a subscription expire today.