Wow.
Interesting thread.
Have posted this in the past but happy to do again for da record.
Fighting Knives was discontinued - not sold - to raise revenue for LFP and so the publisher could divert additional investment monies to more lucrative titles. A number of other LFP titles were likewise discontinued or actually sold for this reason at roughly the same time.
BLADE magazine only purchased the subscription list. They did not buy the title. They implied otherwise and went so far as to offer they were going to cover combat/fighting knives in the manner FK had for the purpose of retaining FK readers. What they actually did was buy the sub list and then start sending Blade Magazine to FK's subscribers. Blade never could, and never did, cover tactical bladeware any differently than they had in the past...or have since.
Tactical Knives was never anything more than one magazine publisher seeing a market where he could make some $$ and choosing to clone a title to take advantage of that market. The thread is interesting because it calls into question TK's journalistic promotion(s) of knife makers and companies that offer up cheap replicas and imitations of original Work. In fact, TK is itself a cheap replica / imitation of Fighting Knives Magazine and always has been. Is there any wonder its editorial and advertising mix is one in the same?
Steve Dick is editor because the publisher needed a front man in the cutlery world and Steve fit their corporate profile as editor material. IMHO it's really pointless to beat Steve up. As its editor his job is to front the magazine, period. Compared to FK, Blade, Knives Illustrated, and Knife World (for example) Dick has no editorial throw weight as far as the content and voice of the magazine goes. None. Zero. Zip. Nada. He can recommend, suggest, enlist some close pals to write for the title, but in the end its the ad people who drive the voice of the magazine and ad money that counts.
LFP printed far fewer copies per issue of FK than TK/Blade/KI but our advertising revenue was more than impressive. Advertisers consistently told our ad gal, Mary Card, that they sold more product per ad or story in FK than the same ad or "story" in the other rags. Why? We offered straight talk on bladeware and presented cutlery in a manner that no one else in the cutlery publications industry had ever dared or considered. We found and went to makers the other publications didn't care about, didn't like, didn't know about, or were purposely keeping out of the public view for petty little industry and "good ole boy" agendas. Our contributors were for the most part goers and doers whereas the other titles' contributors were industry groupies of whom the industry thought very little of.
And we had fun
Steve Dick wrote for FK, as did many of his in-house stable of contributors to include Mike Janich, Jim Keating, Ralph Moroz, and a host of others. FK gave the unknown free lancer a forum to present his or her work in and more than a fair number of these have gone on to write great books, do great videos, become noted blade designers and instructors, and so on. Likewise many "unknown" and eager knife makers got their first break in FK. Ken Onion, Jerry Fisk, Alan Elishewitz, and Kit Carson are just a few who FK covered to enormous degree and from who the "other" magazines learned about these today industry giants.
TK is simply a money machine whose topic is cutlery. Steve Dick is simply its front man. I imagine he doesn't respond because there's nothing to say. If the ad people say "run it" he will and does. And those who write regularly for him, and whose own projects or employers have advertising interests in TK, will likewise do as Steve tells them if they want to maintain their positions on the masthead.
Dick will probably only leave TK if Harris tells him he has to move to New York. Until then he's content and will absorb the barbs and arrows as it's a good living, a good paycheck, and it's more fun than free-lancing articles was.
In the end magazine editors are a dime a dozen. Take it from one who knows
Bud Lang went bye-bye; and Bruce Voyles sold out (nothing new there, eh BV?). FK was on the stands for roughly seven years and we fought to stay there each and every day. We had fun, we put good knives into the hands of good people, we told it like it was, and we took the less than honorable in the industry to task whenever we found them and whoever they were. We never lacked for advertising and our advertisers never lacked for sales.
I don't read TK or any of the other knife rags. I sometimes pick one up and leaf through it but they are all the same. Big flashy catalogs. The writers are all the same, too. Pleasers. Yuk:barf:
Anyhow, that's my two bits. If I had any advice to offer it would be not to take the knife rags too seriously. They aren't about knives. They are about knife $$. Every once in awhile you will find someone or something neat, and that's kool. Every once in awhile you'll learn something you didn't know. And that's kool. If a title gives you a lift, or makes you smile, or just occupies you after a tough day at work, that's kool.
Otherwise it's just pulp and print and pictures meant to make $$ for its publisher.
GW
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