Research and Planning: institutions, history and genres

I decided to reasearch instituions that deal with the publishing of magazines so that if i was to publish my magazine I would have a company to comply with. I narrowed it down to two of the biggest magazine publishing companies that i would want to help publish my magazine with;

IPC Media

This is a leading UK magazine publisher and offers something for everyone. Their brands are very simple and their 80 magazines include; Now, Marie- Claire, Nuts and their digital properties include NME.com, the third largest commercial music website in the UK.
IPC is owned by Time inc of Time Warner inc. They have five distinct divisions; IPC connect, IPC inspire, IPC ignite, IPC Southbank and IPC TX. Marketforce works alongside theses the UK’s leading Magazine distribution business.
“IPC direct is responsible for driving revenues from our brands through direct marketing methods.”
The highly-profitable part of IPC media includes the companies subscriptions, marketing, marketing operations, database marketing, mail order and Telemedia operations.



Bauer Media

This publishing group owns more than 80 media brands including; heat, GRAZIA, FHM, Kiss 100, Kerrang! and Q radio. Bauer Media is a division of Beauer publishing group that they joined in 2008. It is Europe’s largest privately owned publishing group with over 230 magazines in 15 countries online, TV and radio, widely recognised and rewarded as industry innovators.
Their strategy is to connect audiences with excellent content through their broad multi-touch point brand platforms, wherever and whenever and however they want. Their heritage goes back to 1953 with angling times and in 1956 introduced motor cycle news. 1990 introduced kiss FM, Radio city and Magic FM and in 1994 they bought for him magazine which is now FHM. In 1996 they acquired the Box, 2002 Closer, the first weekly glossy and in 2005 GRAZIA.
Today Bauer Media spans over 80 influential brand names covering a range of interests. They own four commercial radio stations in London including; Kiss and Magic. They continue their investment with lanches of heat Radio and Q Radio in November 2007 and June 2008. More recent launches are GRAZIADAILY.co.uk and more! For 18-25 year old women.


I then looked at different genres of music and the history of magazines in order to get a better understanding of the magazine industry and what my competition will be and how i will have to make my magazine appeal to an audience so that it sells and becomes successful.


History of Magazines.

The term ‘Magazine’ came into usage in the 1730s, with the ‘Gentleman’s Magazine’ by Edward Cave, it was very popular in pubs, coffee houses and barber shops, a female version ‘ The Lady’s Magazine’ was then quickly published. The early magazines tended to be political or religious in content such as ‘The Pennsylvanian’, which ran articles calling for independence.
The government seemed to be so concerned about the power of media, stamp duty was introduced in 1765 and a tax levied on advertisements in such publications, the ‘taxes on knowledge’ were later removed over a period of years from 1853 to 1869.
The press expanded because of a better-educated reading public and magazines ended up being more affordable, British publishers produced fiction magazines such as ‘Romantic Confessions’. Press barons such as Northcliffe used profits from their magazines to support their wider interests, they successfully exported news values between their magazine and newspaper interests, the press barons were the ones who shaped the public for murder, mayhem and scandal.
Early 20th century saw new styles of magazine such as ‘Readers Digest’ which included edited versions of articles and stories. ‘Life’ which traded on the quality of its pictures in a period when photography was accepted as an art form, the slogan ‘Life’ used was: “To see life, to see the world; to witness great events; to watch the faces of the poor and the gestures of the proud; to see strange things”.
The end of the Second World War saw a further expansion of the market. New titles emerged to satisfy the needs of increasingly affluent customers, later spin-offs would include comics based on TV characters, and magazines dedicated to specific topics or programmes such as ‘BBC Wildlife’ and ‘Gardeners World’.
The main feature of the magazine market was the consolidation of ownership, because very large publishing companies such as IPC, have gathered more titles much like the earlier press barons. The difference is that these companies have other business interests, they are never fully dependant on one form of media. Magazines, periodicals, glossies or serials are publications, they are published on a regular schedule, with a variety of articles and they are generally financed by advertising, by a purchase price, by pre-paid magazine subscriptions or all three.
In 1999 advertising spending in the British media amounted to the £15.3 billion. The ‘Advertising Association’ the magazine sector accounted for 18.4%, there are laws and regulations that affect magazines that are just there for other media forms, such as ‘The 1955 Children’s and Young Person’s Publication Act’.

Music Genres

A music genre is a categorical and typological construct that identifies musical sounds as belonging to a particular category and type of music that can be distinguished from other types of music

These are the major genres and they branch off to other genres:
Metal
Punk – punk pop, new punk
Rap – gangster, spitting bars
Jazz
Hip Hop
Pop rock
Hard Rock
Alternative
Experimental
Latin
Country
Disco
Funk
Classical
Blues
Progressive
Techno – fused rock, eventually dance music
Ska
Reggae
Black - R n B,
Death metal
Screamo – hardcore
Power Pop
Rock
Pop

These will help me to find out what audiences want from music magazines and which types of music are the most popular. I will now be able to add this into our survey which will help decide what my magazines will be based on within the music industry.
From looking at the history of magazines I have decided that I would like my magazine to be of the modern, glossy, music magazine. I also looked into the types of music and will now produce surveys to get a feeling of what people want in a magazine and how much they would pay so that if my magazine was published it would not be overlooked by bigger better names.