Monday, November 10, 2008

Chasen In Real Life

I'm officially a victim of the current state of the economy. Welcome to the real world, Chasen Marshall.

As most of you have probably already heard, Longboard Magazine is no more. Well, the publishers maintain that they have simply "suspended publishing" until they figure out how best to handle the downturn in the economy, but my guess is that we've probably seen the last of LBM. Oh well. A number of people have offered their "Oh, are you okays?" But the reality is that this was a long time coming, not a surprise to a single person in that office and to be honest, a bit of a relief. As most followers of the magazine had noticed, the overall quality of the publication had been slipping for some time now. We all knew it, but unfortunately, with practically no editorial budget to speak of there wasn't a whole lot we could do to stop it. The publishers tried to weather the storm, and I commend them for that, but the thing was a sinking ship.

For me, it was a great first stop on the career path, a resume builder. I was able to experience so many different elements of the magazine business that I would not have had the opportunity to experience had I been working elsewhere. For that, I'm grateful. It also allowed me to build my photography portfolio, something I had never initially intended to do. So yeah, my days at LBM were worthwhile. Best of luck to those guys getting things going again.

On that note, with my newfound unemployment and with it, abundance of free time, I've turned to freelance work. Really, I should have been doing this all along at Longboard, but while wearing so many different hats over there, I didn't feel I had the time to dedicate myself at a level I deemed worth my efforts. Published (or most likely unpublished) half-ass work is not a way to build a name. So, yeah, freelance it is. Luckily, I've built up a pretty decent network within the surf industry, so I'm hoping I'm not going to have to jump through as many hoops as your average just-starting-freelancing individual would normally encounter. Wish me luck. Better yet, put in a good word for me with someone you know in the publishing industry.

3 comments:

Sea Walk said...

That's really well-written Chasen. Interesteing and I hope something even better comes up for you.

-Christian

Jeffrey Case said...

Go back to school. It's working for me.

Justin said...

With your work ethic, passion and talent I'm sure you will have no problem moving on to bigger and much better things. I want to thank you for what you've done and wish you the best in the years to come.