TORONTO — The editors of the once very popular Disco Weekly Magazine, who have been facing increasingly low sales since 1979, believe that they have discovered the root cause of all their problems.
“People just aren’t buying magazines anymore, it’s obvious,” said DWM editor-in-chief Craig Shubert. “What else could possibly account for the lack of interest in a weekly disco periodical?”
Shubert has said that he is well aware of the recent “death of print” phenomenon and has no doubt in his mind that it is what is driving his business into the ground.
“Everybody knows that print is a thing of the past and I’m not blind to it,” he explained. “Print publications aren’t going to be around forever, it’s just like Disco Halls … halls were always doomed to fail!”
Despite the best efforts of Disco Weekly Magazine’s staff to rally the entire magazine industry, their calls have fallen on deaf ears of major publications like Rolling Stone, Time, GQ and National Geographic who all claim to be doing “just fine.”
“We got Pet Rock Aficionado and Penny-farthing Quarterly on board but to be honest with you they have more problems than just a decline in print popularity,” affirmed DWM vice-president Allan King. “I mean there’s no way either of those magazines can honestly believe that they can compete with the likes of Pet Rock Illustrated or the High-Wheeler Observer!”
While King and Shubert, along with the rest of the DWM staff, know that changes need to be made if they want their publication to stay in business, they claim that they have no idea what to do.
“I’ve heard from some people that we ‘need to get online’ but I really don’t think this whole Internet thing is going to catch on,” Shubert told The Peak.
“Instead we’ve been trying to talk to the people from Tamagotchi about getting some of our content on their devices, but they haven’t returned our phone calls . . . must be because they’re too popular!”
With no concrete solutions on the horizon, and even their almost non-existent sales numbers falling everyday, Disco Weekly is on the brink of shutting down for good. But despite their grim prospects, Shubert has still managed to find some consolation.
“At least disco music will never die,” he said, laughing at such a ridiculous notion. He then excused himself and left to wallow in despair at the nearest oxygen bar, an almost 30 kilometre drive, which he assumed must be due to the recent decline in interest in “bars”.
