# magazine articles, split to the last few pages of the mag? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [December 28, 2003, 6:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magazine-articles-split-to-the-last-few-pages-of-the-mag/221386 "2003-12-28T06:26:06Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![abby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/48db29/32.png) [@abby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/abby)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2003, 6:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magazine-articles-split-to-the-last-few-pages-of-the-mag/221386/1 "2003-12-28T06:26:06Z")
Hi This has frustrated me for a long time. How come magazines have thre first few pages of an article, then put the rest of the article in the last 10 pages of the mag? The only possible reason I can think of is that it might stop dumb people from getting bored too fast, but really, if they are that dumb, they should go read TV week. Surely it’s in the mag’s interests to include intereting articles that are easy to read? I cannot even thik how doing it this way helps advertisers, which presumably would be the driving force in any kinda mag publishing? It was Wired mag that caused me to post, but I have seen it in many mags. abby ---
**Author:** ![Apex\_Rogers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e480ec/32.png) [@Apex\_Rogers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Apex_Rogers)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2003, 6:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magazine-articles-split-to-the-last-few-pages-of-the-mag/221386/2 "2003-12-28T06:38:02Z")
The most likely reason would be that magazines want to cram as many different stories in the beginning pages, so that someone leafing through the magazine will find something of interest and want to continue reading. It’s pretty much the same reason the newspapers split up front page stories. They don’t want to waste the prime real estate by using two stories to take up the entire space when they can fit half of four stories. ---
**Author:** ![gluteus\_maximus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/f17d59/32.png) [@gluteus\_maximus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gluteus_maximus)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2003, 6:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magazine-articles-split-to-the-last-few-pages-of-the-mag/221386/3 "2003-12-28T06:38:45Z")
They do it so you’ll see all the ads in between. Honestly, if they put the entire 5-page article at the front of the mag, that’s all you’d look at, right? Sticking the last 2 pages (or 2 columns) way in the back gives Acme Widget Co. a reason to buy ad space in the middle. ---
**Author:** ![abby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/48db29/32.png) [@abby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/abby)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2003, 6:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magazine-articles-split-to-the-last-few-pages-of-the-mag/221386/4 "2003-12-28T06:47:33Z")
nah, I am not buying this. Most mags will place full page ads every few pages anyway. And the text at the back of the mags (goes for maybe five double-page spreads in Wired) is just solid text, with no ads. It’s dense, three columns per page text. Also, in Wired, and several other mags, they don’t even START the feature articles until TWO THIRDS the way into the mag. The first two thirds are full of ads, and regular spots, and maybe a continuous feature that is very graphic-based (graphs and so on). Then, the mostly-text articles start. There are less ads, but they are still there. abby ---
**Author:** ![gluteus\_maximus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/f17d59/32.png) [@gluteus\_maximus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gluteus_maximus)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2003, 7:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magazine-articles-split-to-the-last-few-pages-of-the-mag/221386/5 "2003-12-28T07:26:04Z")
OK. Then I guess they just do it to annoy you. ---
**Author:** ![AskNott](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asknott/32/5790_2.png) [@AskNott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AskNott)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2003, 3:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magazine-articles-split-to-the-last-few-pages-of-the-mag/221386/6 "2003-12-28T15:04:07Z")
**Gluteus maximus** had it right the first time. Advertising drives _everything_ in the magazine industry. Leaf through Rolling Stone, and you’ll see it. If there’s an actress on the cover, there will be big fat ads for her current show. Not just that, but check the photo credits on the contents page. All the makeup and clothes she’s wearing, if any, will be prominently sold inside. New CD’s are sold right next to reviews. Rock stars are dressed in the latest rags from CK or Versace, and the photo creds tell you where to buy them. The last two columns of the “day with Paris Hilton” are in the back, next to the cheaper ads. That’s so you’ll see those ads for a recording studio school next to the last few vapid quotes from America’s most annoying heiress. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2003, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magazine-articles-split-to-the-last-few-pages-of-the-mag/221386/7 "2003-12-28T18:44:57Z")
While there are certainly some magazines that have that level of tie-in, there are many more who do not. The articles are continued in the back primarily so that they can be found in the front part of the magazine, where people are more likely to stumble upon them when browsing. If you pick up a magazine, you’re likely to start reading it in the front and put it down if there’s nothing that interests you. So they want the first few pages where people are more likely to see them. Remember, too, that magazines don’t give a good goddamn whether you’re reading their ads or not. They set ad rates by circulation, and it doesn’t matter if anyone actually reads the ad. A magazine could charge exactly the same rates if people who bought the magazines immediately put it into the trash. Advertisers don’t know. ---
**Author:** ![BobT](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8e8cbc/32.png) [@BobT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobT)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2003, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magazine-articles-split-to-the-last-few-pages-of-the-mag/221386/8 "2003-12-28T19:05:29Z")
In magazines without significant advertising, such as academic journals, the articles just run straight through. But in those situations, you are more likely to look at the table of contents to see if there is one particular article of interest. I assume the OP is referring to magazines with both a lot of advertising and a long articles, such as The New Yorker or The Atlantic Monthly. ---
**Author:** ![Mister\_Rik](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mister_rik/32/491_2.png) [@Mister\_Rik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mister_Rik)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2003, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magazine-articles-split-to-the-last-few-pages-of-the-mag/221386/9 "2003-12-28T21:26:16Z")
The thing I hate about this practice is that there is always a whole string of pages with no page numbers, making the task of finding the rest of the article exceedingly difficult. ---
**Author:** ![pesch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pesch/32/4925_2.png) [@pesch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pesch)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2003, 10:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magazine-articles-split-to-the-last-few-pages-of-the-mag/221386/10 "2003-12-28T22:40:45Z")
The first magazine editor who came up with this was Edward William Bok, who ran the Ladies’ Home Journal. Here’s the story as explained in this section from [“The Americanization of Edward Bok”](http://www.bartleby.com/197/20.html) > [@](#): > > One day Bok was handling a story by Rudyard Kipling which had overrun the space allowed for it in the front. The story had come late, and the rest of the front portion of the magazine had gone to press. The editor was in a quandary what to do with the two remaining columns of the Kipling tale. There were only two pages open, and these were at the back. He remade those pages, and continued the story from pages 6 and 7 to pages 38 and 39. > > At once Bok saw that this was an instance where “necessity was the mother of invention.” He realized that if he could run some of his front material over to the back he would relieve the pressure at the front, present a more varied contents there, and make his advertisements more valuable by putting them next to the most expensive material in the magazine. > > In the next issue he combined some of his smaller departments in the back; and thus, in 1896, he inaugurated the method of “running over into the back” which has now become a recognized principle in the make-up of magazines of larger size. At first, Bok’s readers objected, but he explained why he did it; that they were the benefiters by the plan; and, so far as readers can be satisfied with what is, at best, an awkward method of presentation, they were content. Today the practice is undoubtedly followed to excess, some magazines carrying as much as eighty and ninety columns over from the front to the back; from such abuse it will, of course, free itself either by a return to the original method of make-up or by the adoption of some other less-irritating plan. Scroll down to lines 59-60 (seen on the right side of the page) for this section. Up top on this page are a couple of interesting stories about Bok trying to get reclusive British writers like Charles Dodgson (who denied that he was Lewis Carroll) and Kate Greenaway to write for the LHJ. Of course, back then, the Journal was a more literary magazine. Nowadays, they’d try to get them to write about hot sexual positions writers favor. ---
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2003, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magazine-articles-split-to-the-last-few-pages-of-the-mag/221386/11 "2003-12-28T23:16:56Z")
It’s because _we run out of room._ There is no deep, dark conspiracy. The art dept. tries to fit as many articles as they can in the “well” (the main body of the magazine). But we don’t want to have to cut three or four columns from an article if we don’t have to: so we have the “run-over” pages in the back, to continue the rest of the articles we couldn’t squeeze onto one or two spreads. We don’t like having to do it, as it results in oddly shapes columns that have to be squeezed and edited and cut, but it is unavoidable.