Maybe it had something to do with my being paid to read, as a self-employed copyeditor, I thought. You know—after reading all day long at work, who feels like spare-time reading? Or maybe it had something to do with my having school-age children at home. They take up a lot of my time.
But then today, on one of the editorial e-mail lists that I subscribe to, we began discussing what materials we pay subscriptions for and what materials we read for free, and why. Here's my list.
Paid subscriptions:
- ADDitude—magazine about attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD); print subscription; because I live in the House of ADHD
- Attitude!—magazine about ADHD, produced by CHADD; print subscription; because I live in the House of ADHD
- Copy Editor—newsletter; print subscription; because I'm an editor
- Lancet—medical journal; online subscription only; because I'm a medical editor
- Mothering—magazine; print subscription; because I'm a parent; dropped this only within last year or so
- New York Times—newspaper; online subscription only; for the news and features
- Newsweek—weekly news magazine; print subscription since I was in college in the late '70s; for news analysis
- Science Editor—professional journal, produced by the Council of Science Editors; print subscription; because I'm a medical editor and a member of the CSE
Free subscriptions/reading addictions:
- 69 blogs—I'm a fast skimmer; because they're funny, personal, newsy, political, or focus on issues I'm interested in
- MSNBC—news organization; online only; for the news
- PublishersLunch—daily e-mail newsletter; because I'm an editor
- PW Daily (Publishers Weekly's daily e-mail newsletter; because I'm an editor
No wonder I never read novels anymore! I don't have time to because I read too much!
What do you read?
magazines newspapers newsletters subscriptions reading medical copyeditor copyediting editor editing publishing EditorMom
6 comments:
This is fun!. Let's see.
Print magazines: Time (we almost dropped this one, seeing as it's so mainstream, but it became clear that Impera reads it cover to cover; so we've kept it), The Nation (for real news), I'll skim Consumer Reports, and Mother Jones
Online: NYT, 72 feeds (wow! I hadn't checked until you mentioned your 69), and I'm a lurker on a few porfessional mailing lists (you know the ones)
I do make time for reading (mostly SF/F), otherwise I'd go crazy. I should read more weighty stuff, but that always falls through the cracks.
I'm aiming to add fiction back to my reading material when I have more free time in the evenings. Right now, that time is taken up with corraling the boys into getting things ready for the next day of school, getting showered, and getting into and remaining in bed.
Print: Great Falls Tribune (daily newspaper; I work there, so really Vicky's the only one who reads the one that gets dropped at the doorstep, except on the days following my nights off); a couple of parenting magazines (one's called Parenting and I think the other's called Parents; because I'm a parent and because I'm considering sending in some articles from dad's perspective, since they seem heavily geared to moms); Reader's Digest. Would like to subscribe to more print magazines but they cost money that we don't have. Would love to subscribe to the N.Y. Times (I did when I was in L.A.) but they don't offer home delivery in this neck of the woods yet, and there's no point reading a newspaper three days later when it finally gets here in the mail. Considering a Wall Street Journal subscription; they do deliver here but it's a bit expensive.
Online: Nowhere near 69 blogs (wow!) -- perhaps a half-dozen that I follow day-to-day and another dozen or so that I check on periodically. (Since I started school even the half-dozen sometimes go unread for a couple days now ...) A smattering of newspaper sites, primarily the L.A. Times (because I used to live there and I like the paper), the N.Y. Times (never lived there, but love the paper), the Philadelphia Inquirer (used to work there, and perhaps the only newspaper job I'd leave Montana for), and The Desert Sun (Palm Springs, Calif.; used to work there). I also check up on the other Montana dailies (the Billings Gazette, Missoulian, Helena Independent-Record, Bozeman Daily Chronicle, Montana Standard [Butte] and the Daily Inter Lake [Kalispell]), but I read those sites almost exclusively at work, so I don't know if that counts. Ditto for the large collection of Montana weeklies that we get mailed to us in the newsroom, which I cull for "Across the Big Sky" briefs.
Dad articles! Go, Willie! You write 'em, I'll read 'em and tell all my friends.
I read the NY Times every morning along with the (Chicago) Trib; the WaPo on-line; PollingReport.com; Google News, customized for stories I blog about; EDITOR MOM (!!!); Raw Story; a number of others.
But mostly I read BOOKS, BOOKS, BOOKS!!!
Right now, I'm (re-)reading Richard Leakey's "People of the Lake," Al Gore's "Assault on Reason," and a manuscript on Leopold von Ranke for Edwin Mellen Press.
I want to read Gore's latest too. The reviews make it sound great.
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