In article , "Capt. Blackflag"
writes:


The first issue of 73 was published in October 1960 from what Green
--a former editor of CQ--once described as "a small, dingy
apartment" in Brooklyn, New York. Since the summer of 1962, 73 has
been based in Peterborough, New Hampshire--Green's home state. The
magazine was a pioneer promoter of SSB, FM, solid-state, easy
construction projects and the marriage of personal computing and
Amateur Radio. His interest in microcomputing led Green in 1975 to
found Byte, a magazine devoted to the then-nascent and largely do-it-
yourself computer hobby.

Sad News..
- Do recall driving down through New Hampshire & seeing a car with the Licence
" BYTE"
- Wildly improbably coincedence

Hopefully his accounts receivables will be paid in some fashion and he can
restart
publishing

Dan

Diverd4777 ) writes:
In article , "Capt. Blackflag"
writes:


The first issue of 73 was published in October 1960 from what Green
--a former editor of CQ--once described as "a small, dingy
apartment" in Brooklyn, New York. Since the summer of 1962, 73 has
been based in Peterborough, New Hampshire--Green's home state. The
magazine was a pioneer promoter of SSB, FM, solid-state, easy
construction projects and the marriage of personal computing and
Amateur Radio. His interest in microcomputing led Green in 1975 to
found Byte, a magazine devoted to the then-nascent and largely do-it-
yourself computer hobby.

Sad News..
- Do recall driving down through New Hampshire & seeing a car with the Licence
" BYTE"
- Wildly improbably coincedence

Hopefully his accounts receivables will be paid in some fashion and he can
restart
publishing

Dan

I always figured Wayne would die before the magazine (or the magazine
would die with his death).

I'm not sure money is the real issue here. While maybe he spent it
all, Wayne got significant amounts of money twice over the years, when
he sold off his magazines (including 73) to IDG in the early eighties,
and then when he sold off his CD magazine in the late eighties or
early nineties.

Wayne is old, and he is basically the magazine. When he was younger,
that was a good thing, but now that it's older, I think it's a bad thing.

The magazine was fading for a long time. It took a bit hit twenty years
ago when he sold everything to IDG, because they didn't know what to do
with an amateur radio magazine. It lost the momentum that the magazine gained
in the seventies and early eighties, when it was packed with articles.
Wayne wrote brief editorials in that period, and then none at all; I did
not realize for a long time that he had no other connection to the magazine
at the time. When IDG wanted to kill 73, Wayne grabbed it back, though I
can't remember the year.

At one point, there were rumours it was going to fold. I can't remember the
exact year, but I remember it wasn't in that great shape. The articles had
faded, in quality and quantity, and the small staff were not hams. I think
that was the time he had problems with his cold fusion magazine, and
73 was at risk. Around the same time, they were getting a lot of blaring
mistakes in the articles.

It got to the point where after nearly a quarter century, I did not
buy every issue. Then it got to a point where I couldn't get every issue
even if there was something I wanted, because it was getting sporadic
distribution here. Finally, it stopped completely. Word was that they'd
cut back on distribution, completely in Canada I gather and in some places
in the US. You could get a subscription, but A) you couldn't sample
the magazine before doing that and B) it had gotten to the point where
it wasn't worth it to me (and likely others).

While his editorials had been interesting, I remember when he wrote
about getting an early International Crystal microwave oven, by the
time the magazine disappeared from newsstands here, he was repeating himself
and rambling on about nonsense like "the moon landing is a hoax' and
"cures" for various diseases. The context of amateur radio was gone,
and it sure seemed like senility was setting in.

Now maybe he doesn't have the money to keep the magazine going. But
I think it's because he is tired, and the magazine had deteriorated
enough that it wasn't worth the time or money to keep it going. I
think it would be a very different case if the magazine was still vibrant,
and there were plenty of people begging him to continue.

Restarting a magazine is much more trouble than keeping an old one going.

I am sad about this. I read every issue from the time I discovered
the magazine in September of 1972 to sometime in the nineties when
it was in bad shape.

But unlike when Ham Radio died in the early nineties, still vibrant
and important, 73 in fact died some years back, and the loss is only
historical.

Michael