by RANDALL PARK
When Julie, my esteemed editor here at KoreAm, informed me that the print edition of our magazine was going from a monthly to a bimonthly, I was bummed. To me, this news marked a step toward the inevitable: our beloved magazine one day closing shop completely, followed by the demise of all forms of printed literature, followed by mass illiteracy on a global scale, and ending with all of us on a gigantic snow-piercing train in perpetual motion— elites in the front, the rest of us crammed into the cold confines of the caboose.
OK, maybe I’m overreacting here, but as a 40-year old, I may be part of the last generation to really appreciate flipping through actual pages of physical content. Some of my fondest memories as a young man involve sitting in my bedroom, completely lost inside a well-worn copy of Playboy, Penthouse or a book by Hemingway or one of those other guys. There is something absolutely cathartic about the act of turning over a new page. There’s beauty in the act of owning a collection of your favorites. But alas, the printed word is dying, everything is leaning toward digital, and there is no stopping this train.
And since we’re lamenting, let me take this time to inform you that this is my final column for KoreAm. I gather about 75 percent of you reading this are crying right now, your tears soaking into the pages of this issue. Can’t do that with digital. The other 25 percent of you have probably jumped out of a building. To those who have not killed themselves, I say don’t fret, for this is not the end of me.
I’m taking time to focus on my acting and other forms of writing that one day you all will get to enjoy. So instead of an end, consider this a new beginning. I guess the same goes for KoreAm. Julie tells me that, despite the fact that we’re paring down the print edition, our online readership has grown substantially and continues to grow. In fact, there’s a good chance that most of you reading this right now are doing it online. And thanks to you tech-savvy kids, trees get to live! So sometimes, when good things end, could it actually be a sign of progress? I certainly hope so. But I am glad that, for at least six months out of the year, we old heads get to have our physical copies to cry into.
With that, I wanted to take the time to thank Julie Ha, former online editor Y. Peter Kang, publisher James Ryu and everybody over at KoreAm for allowing me a space to express myself over the past few years. I’ve had a blast writing these columns, and I hope you enjoyed reading them. If you ever want to keep up with me, visit www.randallparkplace.com, follow me on Twitter @parkrandall, or just look me up on Google. I’m sure everything I’ve ever done will appear magically right before your eyes. I guess you can’t do that with a physical magazine.
This article was published in the October/November 2014 issue of KoreAm under the title “This is the End” Subscribe today! To purchase a single issue copy of the magazine issue, click the “Buy Now” button below. (U.S. customers only. Expect delivery in 5-7 business days).
