(This is a primer for a longer piece I will write at some point. Honest, I will. Whenever Dahlia returns to me (which will hopefully be this eve) and I can spend longer on it, not type furiously with the threat, and promise, of another meeting to attend. Oh, and yes, the photographs are a bit feeble, those shall be redone under proper lighting conditions too. And more of them. They are all linked to the large-large versions, you may note. Excuses over.)
Compare and contrast: Magazines from the year of our Lord 1974 and one from CE2007 (or whatever it is they call it these days.)
Start with the covers.
In thirty-three years, the advances seem to be glossy paper and a small footprint. Colour photographs, not drawings, and look how much better the designers are these days. As it happens, the production values do seem higher, although that isn’t to say the older is worse. Lessons have been learned.
Dumbing down scores: Focus: 3/10 L&L 3/10 Neither particularly dumb
Open up a magazine, and you should be hit with the contents. (Not a two-page glossy advert, Mr BBC.)
OK, so I have picked a science magazine, so the articles are science based. Where science is sometimes fine, and not touchy-feely. By which I mean sometimes has articles on physics.
A broader sweep of information and articles, including a comic.
Dumbing down scores: Focus: 3/10 L&L 3/10 Neither particularly dumb here either, at least not from first impressions.
Ah, the quiz. Get right down to it. Look at those questions. Excellent. Not prisoners taken, no surrender accepted. But, oh dear…
…what do we have here? Multiple choice? Referring to articles from the last magazine? Shall we just tell you the answers now?
Dumbing down scores: Focus: 8/10 L&L 1/10 Hand holding or graft. You decide..
Oh, here are the answers for the decent quiz:
And advertising? That has really come a long way since the seventies. But have the items being marketed changed much?
Full page. Quality. Attract girls with the power of etchings and metalcraft! And the modern version?
Shagging and green-mentalist psychos, probably both found if you reply to either.
Dumbing down scores: Focus: 6/10 L&L 1/10. But which would the youth prefer? Even then, it was probably the shagging and psychos.
Letters to the Editor? Dear sir…
And Judith enclosed a picture of Fort Charles, Port Royal too, the little posh scamp. But check her grammar. And look at the range of vocabulary in use.
These days you get an inarticulate grunt from some interwebs troll without a real name. tsk
Dumbing down scores: Focus: 7/10 L&L 1/10. Bai, k, thnx.
Total dumb score: Focus 27 Look and Learn 9
All this, and remember: Look and Learn was aimed at children, Focus is a general market rag. sigh Proof, if ever any were needed, that we have dumbed down by an order of magnitude. I guess when I investigate word lengths and so on that the margin will increase.
You read it here first, folks.
(with thanks to Tony for lend of the Look and Learns. We love them.)
