Paperback dreams
As print was beginning its decline, we were passionate, young creatives who wanted to resuscitate publishing—even if it meant making our own magazines
It was decided I didn t want to be successful when I became an adult.
I wanted success the same time most teenagers wanted success right at that very moment. I had decided, setting my sights as high as I could, that 20 was going to be the year I revive print. A tall order for any established publication, let alone a 7 year old, but I didn t let that stop me. While people of far off generations tried to gure out what to call us Gen s? Millennials? A bunch of entitled kids? , we busied ourselves trying to achieve “success or rather, success as we perceived it reviving a “dying industry.
The realization dawned on me when I visited a decade old magazine stand in a popular Makati mall, one that I went to every month during high school. There I bought new issues of print mags I swore by, and I was amazed with every ip of a page. I called it my regular weekend routine the thought of holding a new copy always sent me to the moon and back. The middle aged woman who sold them was thoughtful enough to remember my favorites.
The old “ding of Facebook Messenger marked what I thought was the start of my success story. “Something Spectacular, I named the PowerPoint presentation I sent to our high school barkada group chat. o hints, no warnings. Just the thrill of having them open it made me want to ump out of my rusty computer chair. Seen by three people. Let the clickbait work.
It was 20 . The presentation I sent came with a formal message that looked weird for a group of friends who always banter and tease each other “I have a proposal. Why don t we make an online magazine?
In less than a week I managed to drag three of my friends to a now defunct milk tea shop, solidifying their commitment to “Something Spectacular. ach of us sat in our sweat soaked uniforms, having spent two hours commuting from different universities in Metro Manila. This was the rst time we had seen each other since college started. Funny how it was a business meeting of sorts. I was on the edge of my seat, presenting the full structure of our publication our editorial board chart, a list of categories, and a blank slide to build our vision mission on.
With my passion fueled by different online websites I contributed to and was grateful to have learned from , I nally decided to be the founder of another. You could say this was e tremely spontaneous, but for me, it felt like an eruption of long built frustrations.
Around 20 , as the weight of technology hoisted itself everywhere, I witnessed my favorite magazines slow decline.
The decade old magazine stand even lost the titles I honestly didn t notice before. o hints, no warnings ust a head helplessly shedding hair.
I should have known, right then and there, that print was slowly dying. ebates about this gradual demise sparked in the early years of the 20 0s. It was talked about by ma or publications like
The Guardian and The Washington Post. It was alarming, but the symptoms were there. Would I stop seeing magazines completely?
Those uestions led me to create Charlie n Charlotte, our online magazine. I don t remember where we got its title, but
Charlie means “man and Charlotte means “free man. We wanted to be an escape portal for the passionate youth particularly those
who thought their ideas were “caged in a blank room. Or at least, that s what our site said.
Settling on a name, goal, and overall aesthetic at our rst meeting convinced me that this pro ect was for the long run. Making my own magazine sounded both e citing and cathartic. This would be my “success.
This was a time when everyone praised kids who achieved so much at an early age. The wunderkinds. The prodigies. Their names were in the headlines, and we were obsessed with them child stars, young entrepreneurs, the 0 under 0. And if Tavi Gevinson who started Rookie magazine at age became successful, why couldn t I? I wanted those shiny badges for myself.
ventually, online magazines became the publishing world s salvation. Stache, which dedicated its content to the creative youth, became my favorite publication to download from Issuu. very issue was lled with fantastic photo essays and sharp visuals. Manic Pi ie Bakunawa, an art and literary website, never fell short in serving Philippine literature so engaging you d nd yourself waiting for the ne t update. There were The Thing and Rumination, which in their own uni ue voices served a hefty amount of pop culture stories and thought provoking insights. These were all made by kids like us.
Little by little, they resuscitated publishing s last lung through collaborative effort and a genuine drive to create. Seeing your printed name on a page suddenly felt like a very real possibility, as you were assured that your essay, poem, short story, photo or video would be seen by ust clicking “send. Independent publishing became an open option it encouraged more freedom in content and form. The sense of gatekeeping suddenly vanished.
Charlie n Charlotte also found a spotlight of its own. I invited more people to oin college friends, friends of friends, and friends of friends of friends. We celebrated when we were visible enough to be invited to events we all got stressed thinking of a story lineup for each week. What theme should follow after “ iscovery? Who would be free to do another photoshoot?
We would change our pro le pictures in sync ust to promote our upcoming theme. We would commute for two hours again ust to meet each other at a caf and secretly record snippets for our social media platforms. I don t know how we pulled it off, but we d also meet at 9 a.m. in a Mc onald s ust to settle on website ad ustments. Youthful ambition was the steam that kept us going.
But even the brightest of spotlights fade through time. As 20 7 creeped in, I witnessed online magazines eventual decline I m not sure for what reason. For our makeshift editorial vision, personal struggles started cropping up. It was a mi of schedules that suddenly weren t meeting and growing commitments in other aspects of our lives. It was after the commitment started waning that I learned even creativity is a group effort, too.
My “success was supposed to start with “Something Spectacular, marked by the old “ding of Facebook Messenger. My heart was secretly broken for a couple of months, thinking I was a failure. espite all the forms of grati cation Charlie n Charlotte had provided, I was so absorbed in making it that I never took the time to notice all that surround it. What is a tiny a rmation here and there compared to single handedly reviving print?
But as I moved forward, little achievements started to get my attention. Seeing my high school and college friends who rst met through Charlie n Charlotte keeping in touch online. Receiving a re uest for collaboration from a girl I didn t know ust because she saw our “nice work in the mag. Finding out a teammate included Charlie n Charlotte on her LinkedIn pro le years later. And oh, we used the term Something Spectacular for a couple of years in our
barkada when we wanted to open up about ideas we believed in. Articles in HuffPost, The Guardian and Gateway Journalism have said “the death of print doesn t have to mean the death of publishing. It s funny how in retrospect, we all took part in saving publishing in our little ways. It s come full circle, and it s delightful to see that times have changed now.
Wunderkinds, prodigies, and successful young people aren t meant to be living guidebooks. There are circumstances we can t control like the privilege we re born with that play a huge part in how and when we get our goals. I was in such a hurry to become a big name out there, and I know other people were, too. o one told us to pace ourselves. Unlike now.
Maybe it s still true ow that I m an adult, I have realized that there s more to life than “success. Maybe I ust wanted to create things that matter, make things move, keep things alive. And maybe I together with the youth that tried to save publishing have already started it with the work of our words. The same way we protect our heritage, history and identity.
ew Radicals was right. ids, we have the dreamer s disease. And it s pretty contagious.