Radiohead’s rainbow turns into a publishing model

After Paste magazine decided to follow Radiohead’s lead and offer their magazine for a pay-what-you-want price, Premiere Guitar magazine is now doing the same. What’s fascinating about this is that: 1) the publishing world is picking up on a music industry model, 2) there’s only speculative results back about how well Radiohead did though it’s believed that they raked in mucho bucks, no matter how many people downloaded for free. Granted that like the music industry, the publishing industry is also in desperate straights right now, also flailing around to find a sustainable model. Granted, these kind of moves are good for publicity and to shoot up subscription bases (which can be turned into increased ad dollars) but as you see here, it is a gimmick that gets you noticed. The question now is, will this be a winning model for the magazine biz?