My question is this: do the members of the Perl community see value in having a dedicated, print magazine on the topic of Perl? Aren't there a fair number of web sites that are devoted to Perl, Perl news, fun with Perl (Poetry/ObFu), Perl tips, and general Perl Perl Perl?

Making magazines is actually pretty easy-- provided you are able to negotiate with writers and such. It's selling subscriptions and advertisements that are the hard part-- that is, financing the magazine. It seems to me that there is some demand for a Perl magazine, but that the one that's been going for a while is not doing so well.

There are some serious questions I'd like to ask in this regard. Would the community willingly pay more for an ad-free magazine? Are there qualified writers who would be willing to trade articles for ad-space (at least for early issues), thus lessening the capital required to get going? How often is often enough? And most importantly what features should a Perl magazine have (either stuff that is somehow lacking in existing publications, or stuff that is not in one single magazine)?

Then there are other questions... like what kind of format is most useful, should it be standard magazine size? Would newsprint be acceptable? Would newsprint be more acceptable if the magazine were more frequent? These sorts of things massively affect cost, but also affect perception. How would they affect your perceptions?