BoSacks Speaks Out: The Velocity Trap and the Print Magazine Dilemma

It may sound like the setup to a cosmic joke, but here we are, living in a time of unprecedented innovation and political mayhem, and somehow still expected to keep our subscriptions current.

Lucky us! If history is a loop, we’ve hit the part where everything starts spinning faster, and no one remembers who left the iron on.

As a guy who’s been around long enough to have waxed boards, wrangled Letraset, and faxed press releases (yes, faxed, look it up, kids), I can tell you that every generation thinks their tech shift is the big one.

Gutenberg had his day. So did Edison.

But what are we facing now? This isn’t a leap, it’s a catapult, and no one remembered to pack a parachute.

We’re not walking through the future anymore. We’re being yanked into it by the collar.

Technology is evolving so fast, even the algorithms are getting whiplash. By the time you finish reading this sentence, five new AI tools will have launched, one of them will claim it’s the future of media, and another will have already filed for bankruptcy. The pace is absurd. And unlike in the past, where new tech gave us time to kick the tires, today we’re lucky if we get to read the instruction manual before the entire operating system changes mid-download.

And this is where it gets personal, especially for those of us who still believe in the power of ink on paper.

Let’s be blunt: print magazines are feeling the squeeze like never before. The newsstand is now a nostalgia exhibit. The ad dollars are hiding out in TikTok’s basement. And AI? It’s busy learning how to write 500-word listicles on “10 Ways to Organize Your Socks” in half a second, using our own content as its cheat sheet. It’s like letting someone copy your homework, only to have them land a book deal.

But speed isn’t the only problem. No, the real villain in this story is old-fashioned, unapologetic, unfiltered greed. Silicon Valley’s motto might as well be “Move fast and monetize everything.” Ethics? Context? Long-term societal value? Those are bugs, not features. The goal isn’t betterment, it’s domination. They’re not just disrupting industries—they’re strip-mining culture with a grin.

So what’s a humble print publisher to do in an era where everything’s digital, disposable, and downloadable?

Here’s the truth: we don’t need to beat the machines. We just need to out-human them.

Because while algorithms can churn out infinite content, they can’t build trust. They don’t understand nuance. They don’t sip coffee while debating cover lines or agonize over which shade of red screams "urgent but classy." That’s our turf.

Print still matters—when it’s meaningful. It can’t be filler. It has to be felt. Literally and emotionally. The magazines that survive will be the ones that offer depth in a world of scrolls, curation in a sea of chaos, and a sense of humor when all else fails.

So no, we won’t win by playing their game. But we can still win. By being slower, smarter, and stubbornly human. By valuing the long read over the hot take. And maybe, just maybe, by making readers laugh, think, and pause long enough to remember why they picked up a magazine in the first place.

Because if the world’s going off the rails, we might as well publish a damn good issue while it happens.