A well-written magazine can be engaging even if there's nothing to be report on. I know either myself or Gene always mention this whenever the topic turns to magazines, but Amiga Power in its last couple of years was brilliant, despite having absolutely nothing to write about. There were about five developers still making games for the Amiga, and three of them had stopped sending them copies because they'd pissed them off, so whole issues would go by with about ten pages worth of actual content - they filled the rest with features about the JFK assassination, stories they'd written and anything they thought was cool, and it was so good that I kept reading long after I'd put my Amiga in a box in the hope that girls would have sex with me.

I'm not saying Terrorizer should do that, or that they'd be allowed to get away with it (I think Amiga Power were given a ludicrous amount of freedom), but it shows that a magazine is not just a slave to the scene it reports, and that quality writing and imaginative solutions can make for something worth reading even if there's a shortage of things to report on.

Personally, I still think there's a lot to be said for trusting a particular writer's expert opinion too (Glasper, Chantler or James Hoare for example), but I appreciate this is probably not a view many people share any more, due to new ways to discover bands, and just being able to listen to the album yourself before deciding whether or not it's worth buying.

"if you show me god, i'll believe in it" (amon amarth)

I know I've been playing the RS card on here a little hard the last few days, but why the fuck would anyone want to read what someone from fucking Amon Amarth has to say about epistemology or the nature of the Universe? We've got philosophers to debate the value of empirical evidence in determining the objective nature of reality, cheers mate, go and record the same song about Thor fucking twelve more times.

You're right, the RS card has been well and truly worn out.