Gun 'Riters

[George Hill]

Let's see here... being a Gun'Riter now... let me look at these catagories of complaints.

Churching it Up:
Actually, I write like a talk. If you talk to me face to face, I might use the word "Plethora". Is that too long for you or do you need the word "Lots" instead?

Cliche City:
I try to avoid cliches, but I do like to use metaphores or analogies. Oh dear... I just used more church words.

Butt-Kissing:
I only praise what is worthy of praise... if something isn't right, I do make sure to point it out.

Broken Articles:
The gun writer has no choice in how the article is published. You need to talk to the layout artists about that. Bugs me too... I like to read cover to cover. Turning to the back of the rag for the last 4 paragraphs is annoying.

Annoying Ads:
Unfortunately this is what pays for the magazine. Magazines need this money or your subscription rate would be much much higher. Magazines have to pay for the printing and for the individual articles that are written... You gotta have them... even the annoying ones. The ads are the product of the company doing the ads, not the magazine. If you don't like the ad, contact that company selling the product. Tell them you find their ad to be annoying and tell them why.
Personal least favorite ad - Photoblocker Spray. The ads are retarded and the product is a scam.

Bad Pictures:
Ichiro Nagata and Oleg Volk are gifted photographers... something that takes years and years to become. They know how to use the camera and get the most. Me? I don't know jack and I'm using a 140 dollar cheapo Fuji... I'm still learning the functions on the thing. The pictures, I know they are an important part of the finished article, but they are the least favorite thing to do... to me, doing the pics is like work or something.

 

[mec]

One thing that amazes me is that highschool graduates and other non-college people seem to have no trouble with the big words I use sometimes but college types can't seem to read from context and whine about them. Sometimes the big words come in handy. I mean non-therapeutic explosive hemi-orcidectomy goes over better than saying it plain.

I can't remember ever finding a magazine of any sort that didn't have "continued on page____." and I quit getting pissed about it a long time ago.

You are dang right advertisement is important. Irritating too. An editor just told me that he had whacked one of my articles ( and one of his own too) because he had fallen into a full-page advertisement. The article will run later if he doesn't sell another %$# ad first.

 

[PlayboyPenguin]

I agree with some of the others that it seems whoever buys the most ad space gets the best reviews but I mainly buy them just to see what is out there. I do get shocked at the price of some of them though. I bought a 2006 buyers guide the other night and it was $10 for a regular sized magazine. I thought comics were expensive...

 

[Skipper]

I've got a couple thousand gun magazines on hand at present although since discovering internet forums I don't get or buy as many as I once did. I'm distressed over some of the same issues that many of you are,but I'm able to keep up with what's out there that's new by reading a few of them every month. I like SWAT, SMALL ARMS REVIEW,RIFLE,HANDLOADER, AMERICAN HANDGUNNER, and GUNS (I like John Taffin).
Understand that they're just entertainment and you'll enjoy them much more.
Regards,
SKIP

 

[Old Dog]

Exactly, Skip. Gun magazines are what they are. What's funny to me is that on this forum, a lot of people say they don't read the gun rags, but they sure seem to know a lot about 'em ...

 

[Nightcrawler]

Churching it Up:
Actually, I write like a talk. If you talk to me face to face, I might use the word "Plethora". Is that too long for you or do you need the word "Lots" instead?

My specific gripe in this area is hard to define. It's not that I mind reading an eloquent writer; just the opposite, in fact.

But in a lot of the "gun rag" articles, sometimes the attempts at eloquence seem directly contradictory to the author's normal writing style. It often seems as if he's attempting to inject "prettyness" into his article after it's already written.

You know who was probably most guilty of this? Elmer Keith. I've read Sixguns many times. You can tell when it was him actually writing and when it was him and his editor adding the niceties to make him sound like a college boy.

Writing the way you talk is generally the way to go! If you try to write any other way, at least, for something like a magazine article, you're going to sound hollow and unnatural. With Keith, sometimes you could amost imagine him and his editor looking through a thesaurus to find "educated" sounding words and phrases to insert into his text. While bad grammar and profanity should be left out of articles regardless of your speaking habits, a writer shouldn't attempt to write in Oxford English if he's a plain-speaking, matter of fact speaker.

Sometimes, in some publications, it seems like the article writers are attempting to imitate Tolkien, though, and this doesn't usually work too well.

Example? Use of the Royal We. Jeff Cooper can get away with it, most of the time. For most other gun-writers, it sounds artificial. This is puncuated especially when they slip up and leave an "I" or two in there.

Dare I ask...what the hell is photoblocker spray?

I don't mind the articles being broken up. I do get annoyed when they do it with every single article, though. Especially vexing is when they continue the article on an earlier page than it's started on. I think that's just getting into the realm of the ridiculous.

Butt-Kissing:
I only praise what is worthy of praise... if something isn't right, I do make sure to point it out.

I've spent many nights reading many gun magazines down there in Mississippi. I can't tell you enough what a rare trait that is! Of course, the same is probably true of ATV magazines, boat magazines, computer magazines, car magazines, you name it.

Cliche City:
I try to avoid cliches, but I do like to use metaphores or analogies.

That's fine. What cliches do I mean? Well, "disassembly is straightforward" appears in every other article, even if the disassembly of the given weapon is anything but. "Druthers" is a header for a section of the article that's been done to death now. Phrases like "good for mililtary, law enforcement, or qualified citizens". You see that one a lot in the LE-centered magazines. Often, the piece of equipement in question would be entirely impractical for military use, but I have to wonder what they mean by "qualified citizen". Over 18 years of age with no felony conviction? A set of qualifications that broad aren't worth mentioning.

Hell, Ogre, I read your website every day. I know how you write.