Bricks Magazine

Britcom · January 2017

Can anyone tell me if the Bricks Magazine is a monthly, or an as and when, publication?

I bought a three magazine subscription in September to try it out. Received two magazines within a month of each other and then nothing since October. Is this normal? I've tried going onto their website, but it currently seems to be down.

deephorse · January 2017

Their website works for me and the last update seems to have been on 3rd January this year.

deephorse · January 2017

Addit. I think they number their magazines rather than date them, but I haven't checked my copies. On 24 November I received an email from them saying that issue 18 would be delayed by three weeks or so. Since I don't know when #18 should have come out I also don't know whether or not we should have received it yet!

Britcom · January 2017

Ah, ok. Thanks for letting me know. The website seems to be working for me now too. The last one I got was #17 in October. Looking at the news feeds on here, they were coming out monthly until #17. Its probably just delayed then.

deephorse · January 2017

Just been to check my copies and #17 is the latest one I have.

deephorse · January 2017

I've now been given a free digital copy of #18 because the print version is still yet to appear. I don't care to read too much text on a screen and so will wait for the print copy to arrive before I examine the content. Whatever is holding up #18 had better be worth the wait.

msanders · February 2017

Have a missed something but is there any news of the next issue. It's been so long since issue 17 (Rogue one). Does anyone have any news?

Grimlock · February 2017

It's over priced and smug. It's not worth the money.

jumalichi · February 2017

^^ I was wondering the same question. That's a great magazine !

Ayliffe · February 2017

I subscribed to Blocks back at the very beginning, but after the fiasco with the team jumping ship over to Bricks and the surrounding chaos I just gave up on subscribing to any fan-created LEGO magazines.

I've considered subscribing again, but to be honest I'd rather spend money on actual lego rather than a magazine about lego, y'know?

deephorse · February 2017

I too subscribed to Blocks at the start. I found it a bit disconcerting when the crew jumped ship in case the magazine folded, but I certainly didn't regard it as a fiasco. I've continued to subscribe to Blocks and also subscribed to Bricks when it started. I find the content of both magazines to be perfect for my needs and about as far removed from 'smug' as it is possible to be. The downside is that there is a lot of overlap between the two magazines caused by the need to feature and review the latest LEGO releases.

monkey_roo · February 2017

So, to go back to the original question does anyone know if we will ever see issue 18 in print or more beyond?

For me it is getting time to cancel the subs and either go back to Blocks (which is OK) or just stick with the internet.

deephorse · February 2017

Unfortunately at this time there is no current news and the print edition is still a little more delayed than we'd like. Sorry for the delay.

1 · 2 February at 10:31

This is the latest comment from their Facebook page. Pretty poor customer service if you ask me.

obi_g · February 2017

according to the republic66 (and mark on twitter) the print edition subsctiptions for 12 months is all sold out as well. i went to renew mine recently and this is the status for both bricks. culture is also sold out.

monkey_roo · February 2017

Their email server is sending out an auto-message simply saying copies will be sent soon etc. etc. which means they aren't even fielding/responding to enquiries any more.

This may not be the case, but a magazine company that can't produce and ship a magazine is somewhat out of business, which i am beginning to think is the case here. Shame if that is the case, especially as most people (myself included) had a few months left to go on the subscriptions taken out...

I guess time will tell, but my money will be going to the Blocks people soon if it isn't sorted.

DeSaintEtienne · February 2017

Bad and sad news.
And the fact that they don't accept new subscriptions probably means that more bad news are on the way.
At least they could try to explain the situation now. Had a subscription running until issue #24...

theLEGOman · February 2017

Everything that's a physical item, eg new subscription, back issues and the display cases all seem to be out of stock at the moment.

mr_benn · February 2017

Great... I had my wife get me a year's subscription to Bricks Culture for Christmas (and haven't seen an issue yet as was going to be starting from issue 8) - I hope that whatever is going on behind the scenes can be sorted out!

deephorse · February 2017

I was starting to think that the reason why they could produce a digital copy but not a print copy was that they had run out of money. The comments above make me feel that this is the case.

drlmiles1 · February 2017

I subscribed to Bricks for an initial 6 months, and have had a Block subscription since it started. I found there was too much overlap, and let my Bricks subscriptions lapse (it took them months to notice my subscription had run out). For me Blocks is an excellent magazine, and I'll be resubscribing. Sorry to hear that Bricks and Bricks Culture subscribers are getting a bit of a raw deal at present.
I think one of the main problems for Bricks is that it was a subscription only magazine, whereas Blocks appears in newsagents, and therefore is attracting new readers all the time. I have even seen foreign language versions of Bricks abroad (german, from memory)

deephorse · February 2017

Being subscription only eliminates any possibility of an impulse buy followed by, hopefully, regular readership and purchase. Perfect binding and the higher quality paper must increase the production costs too. Maybe they are in some financial difficulty? I think they should tell the subscribers something.

monkey_roo · February 2017

Statement from Bricks people on the homepage.
Sad to say but that is a lot of words to say absolutely nothing. Some of the comments also link to companies house showing Mark Guest as having left the shop (dispite his name being attributed to the statement).
time to move back to Blocks I think.

drlmiles1 · February 2017

No-one has commented on the Compulsory strike-off action mentioned in that link to Companies House. This action is taken if the registrar has reason to believe the company is no longer active. The action was quickly halted by a response from someone in the company, but I wonder what caused this action to be initiated.

snowhitie · February 2017

^ it's on the Brickset homepage, link is https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/company/09468828/filing-history

-Edit by the time I managed to post the link you've worked it out ;)

deephorse · February 2017

drlmiles1 said:

No-one has commented on the Compulsory strike-off action mentioned in that link to Companies House. This action is taken if the registrar has reason to believe the company is no longer active. The action was quickly halted by a response from someone in the company, but I wonder what caused this action to be initiated.

Looking at the timeline of the documents published my guess is that a failure to file an Annual Return on or around 01 Feb 2017 probably started the process. Someone at Republic66 must have replied to the advisory letter and so the strike-off was stopped.

caterham7 · March 2017

http://store.republic66media.com/

We'll be back soon.

We are busy updating our site for you and will be back shortly

deephorse · March 2017

Somehow I don't find that very encouraging.

Huw · March 2017

Update from Mark:

Repiblic66media update

Firstly apologies we haven’t issued a formal update sooner than this. You may be aware of the platform website outage which occurred Wednesday this week. This was due to an identified security threat that had the potential of external persons, with what appears to be the specific intent to hack us, having access to sensitive data.

We take any threat of this type very seriously and so as a precaution, although far from ideal, we felt we had to take action to safeguard the business and customer data. We accept we should have done a better job of keeping the community updated as to the situation and we are sorry that has not happened before now. When the issue was identified action was taken immediately and our technical team believe we prevented a very real threat to data security by expediting the ring fencing of the platform with all haste.

We are now putting in remedies to prevent a re-occurrence of this type of threat with implementation of real-time monitoring and alerts. This security improvement will take some time to complete and will result in the platform being offline until close of business on Monday 6th March. We sincerely apologise for this necessary outage but assure you of our best efforts to maintain the utmost security of your online business ongoing.

We would like to also stress that this has no association to speculation of the businesses future and that Bricks and Bricks Culture brands will be operating as normal very shortly. We appreciate that we have had a temporary pause in production due to as mentioned previously some external factors but these are now close to resolution and we look forward to bringing you some exciting new issues and developments very soon.

mr_benn · March 2017

Thank you Huw: very useful to hear a direct communication regarding the issue and very pleased to hear about the continuation of a rather good publication!

deephorse · March 2017

Thank you too Huw, but I'm not impressed. Three and a bit paragraphs about something I wasn't aware of, whilst something I was aware of, i.e. the lack of a product I have paid for, gets a rather vague mention. Bricks is going to have to do something really special to get me to risk my money with them ever again (assuming that they manage to produce the magazine again).

monkey_roo · March 2017

special? I would settle for just getting the product I paid for now, however, I suspect my chances of the Yeman national lottery, without actually buying a ticket are greater than seeing another magazine...

AndyPol · March 2017

I decided nearly a year ago not to renew my Bricks subscription but stayed with Blocks, mostly due to excessive P&P (in my opinion) with Bricks and Bricks Culture that I didn't have with Blocks. Reading this, it was obviously a good move in hindsight.

deephorse · March 2017

monkey_roo said:

special? I would settle for just getting the product I paid for now, however, I suspect my chances of the Yeman national lottery, without actually buying a ticket are greater than seeing another magazine...

What on earth is the "Yeman national lottery"?

MaffyD · March 2017

^ I think @monkey_roo is joking about how remote the chances are for getting the magazine - Yemen is a country. I'm not sure if it has a national lottery, but if it doesn't that makes the joke even more apt: the chances of winning the lottery of a distant country where they don't have a lottery and even if they did he didn't buy a ticket, are still more likely than getting another edition of the magazine. Good luck though!

deephorse · April 2017

Thanks MaffyD, I'm aware of all that. Yemen is a country but I'm still not sure what YemAn is!

sid3windr · April 2017

Yea man, what is Yeman!?

MaffyD · April 2017

^ An imaginary country - I think the chances of winning the lottery there are even more remote :-)

SeanTheCollector · April 2017

^ Well i'm still waiting for 2 issues on my subscription and I haven't heard a word! :(

snowhitie · April 2017

Site is still online (seems like got can still buy a digital subscription), and they've filed their (limited) accounts, but still no word?

Thisis not a way to treat people who helped you start up me thinks.

sid3windr · April 2017

Ya, mean!

drlmiles1 · June 2017

It's now 8 months since the last issue (17) of Bricks magazine was released. At the beginning of this year subscribers were told that there was a "temporary" delay - but there is no news on their site of any return to publishing it (or Bricks Culture). Has the magazine folded?

Britcom · June 2017

Its about time the publishers said something, if only to say they cant afford to produce a magazine anymore. But such a submission would mean they would have to issue refunds to their subscribers, which I doubt they want to do either.

So in my opinion they are probably keeping quiet, hoping their customers will forget about them.

deephorse · June 2017

I'm no accountant, but it seems to me that as of March 2016 they were broke, just £161 in the bank. Since, as far as I know, their only source of income was the magazine subscriptions - I don't recall them carrying any advertising - it would appear that they couldn't afford to post out any magazines even if they produced them.

A sorry tale, and not one I will forget.

MAGNINOMINISUMBRA · June 2017

Reminds me of the lyrics to a Steve Miller Band song...

MAGNINOMINISUMBRA · June 2017

Oops...
Wrong thread (and the Steve Miller Band NEVER had a song called Repeat Offender).

gratefulnat · June 2017

MAGNINOMINISUMBRA said:

Reminds me of the lyrics to a Steve Miller Band song...

Well, how about 'Abra abra cadabra, let me reach out and grab [your money]'

MAGNINOMINISUMBRA · June 2017

I was thinking more along the lines of the first track on the flip side of 'Fly like an Eagle"...

mr_benn · June 2017

Well the website's down, and they happily took an annual subscription for Bricks Culture last November for which I've never received a thing. So what's the recourse for me and all the other subscribers here?

Lovely to see from the editor's twitter feed though that he's had a nice time in Billund...

Casper · June 2017

Just seen his twitter feed too. That is rubbing it in for those who took a subscription and have lost out. It's one thing for a business venture to fail but another to simply hide away and not keep customers updated. I see that its says he is there on a fan/media day - surely he can't be there under the pretense of media if he isn't producing the magazine anymore. This leaves a bad taste in the mouth

sid3windr · June 2017

Start of recourse would probably be a complaint at your credit card issuer?

snowhitie · June 2017

It is very sad. Off course a magazine can go bust, but don't the owners have got to prove they used the money sensibly and not taking it out to put into own accounts for example? I'm not saying that they are but it does seem strange they are ont communicating at all and apparantly are still using their connection to Lego to get into events, which doesn't make you feel reasured. If it just failed because suppliers jacked up their prices or something than that's too bad, but then why are they not telling anything. Very sad to do this to fellow enthusiasts.

Are there any UK lawyers around who know about this?

I remember when I was a kid one of my favourite magazines (TinTin) folded as well, they didn't give us our money back but we got a comic book of choice from the company that did the printing for every month we had paid and the magazine wouldn't exist anymore. I'm guessing if there is no money or no parent company they can't really send everyone Lego sets but at least an email with an explanation is something to be done.

I remember Mark Guest was going to speak in April at rockthatblock @stlux, did he turn up there?

On the 'introduction' thread someone posted this:

Silvo36 said:

Hi, I'm Tim from Melbourne Australia. Have had a bit of a problem with the mags "Bricks" and "Bricks Culture". Their website "Republic66.com" has been taken down. I recently had to get my bank to reverse a Visa Charge paid to them for 2017 mags. Has anyone got any more info on this issue. It would be a great pity if they have gone bust as the mags were beautifully produced. Maybe too beautiful.

So the credit card thing that @sid3windr suggested might be a good idea. I've not subscirbed (didn't fit into my budget) so I can't join in with you @mr_benn.

Feel bad for the people who lost out and gave someone a chance to pursue a dream.

Bricks Magazine

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