The Printed Blog returns with new subscription model

This article was migrated from an old version of our website in 2025. As a result, it might have some low-quality images or non-functioning links - if there's any issues you'd like to see fixed, get in touch with us at info@journalism.co.uk.

A start-up that turned blog content into printed newspapers has been brought back to life by its founder as a new magazine . The Printed Blog ceased publication in July last year citing a lack of investment. But founder Joshua Karp has resurrected the venture with a new subscription-based model. The start-up initially launched as a series of twice-daily, local newspapers compiled from handpicked blog posts. With editions in Chicago and San Francisco, the freesheets offered local advertising and a mix of local and global content sourced from bloggers, who were selected for the quality of their posts.

Sixteen issues were printed, 80,000 print copies distributed and around 100,000 copies downloaded, but The Printed Blog tried to expand too quickly, spreading itself "too thin, too fast", Karp said in July 2009.

But continued interest in the concept encouraged the entrepreneur to restart the business, he told Journalism.co.uk via email this week.

"Since the day I shuttered The Printed Blog last year, I have received some number of inquiries a week into restarting it, or purchasing the domain name, or advising some new start-up that was trying to do something similar. The intensity of interest never seemed to stop," said Karp.

"Also, no major media in the US picked up on this opportunity, and there still is no national publication that takes the best of the web and delivers it in a beautiful print magazine. Finally, even as more and more content is pushed online, onto your mobile device, or onto your iPad, I think that print is going to become more important. Sometimes, it's just nice to sit down and read something in print. Not everything is automatically better online. I think that a lot of people agree with this."

The new version of The Printed Blog will be a weekly magazine available to paying subscribers. There has been no fresh investment in the venture and the magazine won't go into print until a target of 3,000 subscribers has been reached, said Karp. Bloggers contributing articles will be paid per post with this amount increasing as more subscribers sign up, says an advertisement for writers for the magazine .

"If we can generate that much interest, we'll have enough revenue to build from there. We've already signed up a lot of people," he said.

Karp said launching the first version in major US cities and news markets was a mistake: "I learned that you need to be careful about how you position yourself when trying to raise money in a market [newspapers] where the biggest and the best are all going into bankruptcy."