Print Is Not Dead.

It’s ironic to be reading this on a screen. Let’s get that out of the way. I know it and you know it. But print isn’t dead.

As a reminder, most people used to read physical newspapers and magazines, bought at a newsstand, a magazine store, the dep, the pharmacy, or received through a mail subscription. Montreal used to publish three newspapers in French, two in English, and a handful of alt weeklies. The city had zines and magazines, and festivals celebrating both.

Long ago, on Saint-Laurent just north of Fairmount, we used to head to Lux, a 24-hour candyshop, restaurant, snack bar and magazine stand. Two massive racks of magazines climbed up the walls on either side. At Lux, you ate, you recovered, you read a magazine or two—it was magic. If Saint-Laurent above Laurier is vibrant at all today, it’s because of Lux. By the early 90s Lux was gone, which was also when the magazine industry started its long and ugly decline.

The problems print has faced are obvious: Craigslist and its ilk killed the classifieds in newspapers, including the big dailies and the indie weeklies. Facebook and Google killed everything else. The magazine industry, especially, depended on advertising. Subscriptions barely covered the cost of shipping. Readers were data points publishers could sell to advertisers, and the advertisers bought this until they chased those data points elsewhere.

It is hard to describe to most people today how influential magazines used to be. Newspapers were important, sure, but magazines were different because they influenced culture, creating talking points for the rest of the media world. Readers trusted the print media, and they followed its lead.

But you are reading this on a screen, and for good reason. We also need to take into account that print is expensive. It costs a lot to create and so there are serious barriers to entry—even zines are expensive to produce now. Print is also slower, because the immediacy of digital is its great selling point.

So, is print dead?

To me, that’s the wrong question. But if you have to ask, the answer is no.

Last January, I received a text from Hillary Brenhouse, editor of Elastic, a magazine about “psychedelic art and literature.” She and Haley Mlotke, an editor from AFM, a magazine about sexuality published by the dating app Feeld, were putting together an evening of magazine talk and asked if I would join. I said sure; I love talking about magazines. Hillary found a bar willing to host. We wondered how many people would show up, and the place was packed.

The interest is there, especially amongst the younger generations. The people buying magazines at a new wave of indie magazine shops are Gen Z and younger Millennials. Not only that, newsstands are coming back. “Magazines are cool” influencers are all over social media, as is “reading is the new sex” commentary, probably as a counterpoint and backlash to the infuriating “reading is dead” narrative.