Re: GS+ Magazine Ceases Publication!!!

[Shinya Nagashima <shinyan@delphi.com>]

Boy, this is the worst news I've heard in the 8 years I've been a GS user.
Believe it or not, it was so devastating for me that it actually made me
physically sick... I've recently been putting some of my excess GS sw/hw up
for sale to generate cash and some space in my room. Upon hearing of this, a
well-know A2 celeb asked me if I was next in line for leaving the GS world.
While this question was amusing to me when I first heard it, after the news
of GS+'s demise, it's suddenly not so funny no more...
 
The death of GS+ is perhaps the biggest loss for the GS community since the
official plug was pulled on the GS. No longer will we be able to read all
those informative and interesting letters, news, feature articles, and
product reviews. My favorite part of the mag were the reviews. Unlike the
other remaining publications, GS+ put their precious funds into products to
review. Each issue had a review of the latest GS goodies which directly
influenced my purchasing decisions. The most recent issue I got was a prime
example. Right when I was curious about the cool Zip drive and the Second
Sight (I was actually curious of this one for a good 6 months :), GS+ had a
review of them. Not only that, the reviews were always well written with the
end-user in mind. It actually felt like I had a Zip drive hooked up to my GS
or I was cranking up the SS to view high-quality graphics (I have yet to do
any of these in real life, unfortunately). So many times I've bought a GS
product (e.g. Kangaroo, Pointless, Spectrum, Prism, etc. etc.) because a GS+
review recommended it or it was advertised there.
 
The loss of GS+ will also be devastating for the remaining GS
developers/vendors. Almost all of the developers/vendors worth dealing with
(Seven Hills, Westcode, Sequential, etc. And no, I don't mean QC) have had
ads in the mag in recent years. Where are they gonna advertise now?
Advertising online and doing direct mailings can only go so far... I
seriously feel that the loss of this crucial advertising outlet will
discourage the remaining developers/venders to keep supporting the GS.
 
There are many more reasons why I enjoyed reading GS+ but I think I've said
enough for now. My only cosolation at the moment is that for the first time
I may get a hold of some of their out of print issues which I missed.
Besides that, I'm very curious as to how SSII and SD G-S will react to this
bad news...
 
Shinya
GS+ subscriber '92-'95