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1993-09-01
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Editorial - The First Year in the Life of RAH
by Dave Bealer
RAH was officially launched on September 1, 1992. There wasn't much
ceremony attached to the debut, the first issue simply trickled out
the modem to the other four official distribution sites. Trickle is
the word, too; The Puffin's Nest (TPN) only sported a 2400bps/MNP5
modem at the time.
Much has changed in the last twelve months. TPN now boasts a U.S.
Robotics HST/Dual Standard modem capable of up to 16800 bps. RAH now
flies out the modem to over fifty official distribution sites and two
major file echoes. For the last few months RAH has been available on
the Internet. The sketchy demographics provided by the 17 responses
received from the 1993 RAH Reader Survey indicate that well over 1000
BBSs carry RAH every month. Furthermore, the download statistics
I've seen indicate the monthly RAH readership falls in the 5,000 -
10,000 person range. This is quite an accomplishment for just one
year.
A review of the first twelve issues reveals both good and bad news
about this experiment known as RAH:
Good News:
1) The writing is getting better. While none of the RAH
contributors is a professional writer, the quality of
writing improved in later issues.
2) The readers are enjoying the experience. Considering
the trouble many of them are going to in an effort to
obtain their monthly RAH "fix," it seems obvious they
are enjoying the magazine.
Bad News:
1) There are not enough writers interested in contributing
to RAH. Only five people authored all the original
humor published in the first 12 issues of RAH. About
the same number of people sent in non-original material.
Only three original works were rejected in the past
year! The author of one of those may still bring the
work up to an acceptable level.
RAH can't go on indefinitely this way. I'm still having a good time
writing and publishing RAH, but that can't last forever. We need new
blood to help RAH continue to grow. There have to be *some* talented
humorists out there willing to have their work published in a free,
non-paying magazine like RAH which offers international exposure. In
any event, I will continue on with RAH until I tire of it, which may
take years.
- - -
On a happy note, Muffy Mandel returns this month to resume her duties
as ace investigative reporter for RAH. Muffy spent two months in an
"Honesty in Journalism" program at the Swords to Ploughshares School
for Radical Thought in Big Sur, California. This program involved,
among other things, quite a bit of surfing. Unfortunately her new
found honesty made Muffy totally useless as an investigative
reporter. She has just returned from several months of deprogramming
at the Woodward-Bernstein School of Journalistic Realism in Waco,
Texas.
- - -
As mentioned last month, the "Best of RAH" hypertext book has been
delayed. The reason is simple. When RAH began last year, my intent
was to publish 12 issues per volume, one a month. The volumes would
be numbered from zero and the issues in each volume would be numbered
from 0 through B using the hexadecimal numbering system. This would
result in a "Best of RAH" book each year, making it an annual affair.
Difficulties this Summer have proved that getting out 12 issues of
RAH each year is just not practical. Final details have not been set
as yet, but RAH will be published only 9 or 10 times each year from
now on. This wrecks the "annual" idea since the diminished number of
issues would not provide enough material for a reasonably large book.
One of my colleagues mentioned the idea of using all of the numbers
in the hexadecimal system for issue numbers, resulting in sixteen
issue volumes. This makes a weird kind of sense from a RAH point of
view, so I decided to adopt this plan. Therefore, Volume 0 of RAH
will include the issues from September 1992 (Vol. 0, No. 0) through
December 1993 (Vol. 0, No. F). Volume 1 will start with the January
1994 issue (Vol. 1, No. 0), and continue until sixteen more issues
have been published. See the Announcements section for further info
about the first "Best of RAH" book.
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Starting this Fall - Saturday mornings on the Lox Network:
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