Categories: IT Industry Activity

Storage Magazine in a Virtual World

Despite some internet chatter the other day that the TechTarget Storage magazine (not to be confused with a different Dutch magazine that I happen to have recently appeared in) had ceased to exist, the reality is that the print version like so many other publications is giving way to an on-line, digital only version as has been the trend recently.

Printed magazines, whether weekly, monthly or quarterly for general interest or industry specific have all been under going a transformation over the past decade with examples including the Sears catalog giving way to new mediums and venues on the internet.

For the most part, those printed magazines that still exist keep getting smaller and thinner with less and less content to correspond to the decrease in advertising dollars that keeps the publications in existence in many cases. Personally I like and have adjusted to having virtual magazines in the form of on-line HTML or PDF or some other form as part of an on-line, downloadable virtual desktop. However, I still enjoyed being able to take a pile of magazines onto an airplane to read especially when you have to turn off your electronics and before nap time.

Magazines are not the only publications going to on-line, in addition to catalogs that have given way to the likes of Amazon.com among others, more books are also being published on-line either in PDF or secure download as well as emerging kindle versions. My book Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier) is currently available at Amazon.com in both print as well as Kindle versions and while initially my new book The Green and Virtual Data Center (Auerbach) which can be ordered now at Amazon (and other venues) will be in print, rest assured, there will also be a digital version very soon.

Books have been an interesting scenario talking with other authors who have seen an increase in digital versions being sold, there is still a preference for readers to get a physical version that they can carry with them and make notes or use as a desktop paper weight or what suits your preference.

Back to TechTarget Storage magazine, what’s interesting is that TechTarget had only a hand full of printed publications with the bulk of their content being on-line at sites like SearchStorage and other sibling sites as well as their conferences, seminars and other custom events.

While I have not been involved Storage magazine as long as early contributors like Steve Foskett who has a nice posting on his blog, I have been involved with Storage magazine among many other TechTarget as well as most of the other industry related publications (print and on-line).

My involvement with Storage magazine for many years has included writing some articles (Scaling SANs, Bridging the Gap, and Automate Data Recovery), doing tips, ask the experts (ATE) as well as appearing in other authors articles providing commentary and industry trends and perspectives quotes not to mention always looking forward to getting my monthly hard copy version to take with and read on airplanes or trains when traveling. Storage magazine and many of the people involved with producing the publication from what I understand will continue to produce a publication inconjunction with SearchStorage and sibling sites such as SearchSMBstorage among others where you can find various articles, tips, podcasts and other material from myself and others in the industry.

December 2008 Storage Magzine

The final printed version is the December 2008 version and while I do not have any articles in this edition, I am honored to appear via interviews and providing quotes in a couple of articles including How you SAN will evolve by Alan Radding as well as Next Year’s hot technologies by Ellen O’Brien.

So here’s to one more printed version of a publication going to the archives, and look forward to the future of the on-line version as well as all of the other on-line venues that are doing what they need to do to remain viable in a changing world.

Cheers gs

Greg Schulz – Author Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press, 2011), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press, 2009), and Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier, 2004)

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