The term “roadmap” has become fashionable in video games, scam NFT projects, and other digital endeavors in the last few years.
While we wish we could cavalierly quote Back to the Future and say “where we’re going, we don’t need roads,” it’s important for us to state our goals for Typebar Magazine clearly. There is a vision. The audience deserves to know what it is, and so do the writers who help build that vision word-by-word.
What’s the plan, then?
We have it split into three categories: Essentials, Eventuallys, and Euphorias.
Essentials are the improvements we’re making as soon as we have the money to do so. They are, as the name suggests, the most essential parts of the vision.
Eventuallys are changes we’d like to enact, but are more expensive and/or less critical. We can realize the kernel of the vision without them, but they are still ultimately something we want sooner rather than later.
Euphorias fall under the realm of the impossible or near-impossible. It’s likely we’ll never see these goals come to pass, but we won’t stop trying.
Essentials
–Increase writer pay. This is the #1 most essential goal we have. Currently, we pay $50 an article. This was the going rate for a freelance article back when our editor-in-chief was working the freelance circuit 10 years ago. We are embarrassed to pay so little, and we intend to raise rates as soon as it’s sustainable. We want to be a publication that pays writers well for good work, ideally on a per-word basis rather than a flat rate.
–Become self-sustaining. For better or for worse (worse!), we live in a world of bills and recurring payments and currency. While Typebar Magazine is not an endeavor seeking profit and we intend to invest every cent from Patreon back into the publication, we still have to worry about keeping the figurative lights on. Becoming self-sustaining will allow us to make sure writers continue to get paid.
Honestly? If we complete just these two goals, we’ll consider Typebar Magazine a success.
Eventuallys
–PDF and e-Book versions of Typebar Magazine Issues. We’d love this, but it’s definitely something that’ll have to wait until the future. It’s more time consuming than just publishing on WordPress and requires expertise we currently don’t have.
–Unique artwork. We’re huge fans of Seize the Press magazine. Part of their allure is the stunning artwork they unveil for each issue’s cover. Visual art is under threat from AI sludge and we’d love to create an opportunity (even if it’s a small one) for a real artist to make money bringing their imagination to life. At first, to keep costs down, we’d just commission one piece as a “cover” for each Issue of Typebar Magazine.
–Periodic fiction articles. We want to publish fiction one day. It’ll be a while until it happens routinely. However, we do plan on commissioning the occasional fiction piece once we get the non-fiction operation running smoothly.
Euphorias
-Unique artwork for every article. A publication can dream, right? If we won the lottery, we’d hire artists to create a custom image for every article we publish. This, obviously, is more expensive than commissioning one image every few months.
-A fiction Issue (or Issues). One day we dream of publishing Issues of the magazine that are entirely fiction. We would publish these in addition to non-fiction, not instead of.
-A print Issue. Yes, this is wildly unrealistic. If we somehow become the most popular digital literary journal of all time and are rolling in cash, we’ll publish a single vanity issue in print.
Now, let’s talk about logistics…
Typebar Magazine launches on Monday, 3/25, with Issue 1.
Typebar Magazine publishes on a specific cadence: Issues of approximately 7-10 articles every 3 months (March, June, September, and December) with 1-2 articles a month in between Issues.
Issues will initially be accessible to our Patreon subscribers only. Articles will be unlocked one-by-one. By the time a new Issue launches, all of the articles from the prior Issue will have been unlocked.
Issue 1, however, will be accessible to everyone immediately.
Follow us on BlueSky and Instagram for any further updates.
We’re immensely excited for the launch. Many talented writers contributed to Issue 1 and we can’t wait for you to read their work. 