Another stalwart of the Australian music street press is withdrawing from the world of print media.

After supplying the streets of Adelaide with 25 years worth of free music news, reviews, and features across 1,000 issues, Rip It Up magazine has announced that it will discontinue its print edition and become a ‘digital-only’ publication as of this month.

A post on the street press’ official website announces: “Rip It Up will celebrate its 25th year of supplying Adelaide with the latest entertainment news, interviews and information by becoming a digital-only platform from April 18.”

The final print issue of Rip It Up, issue #1286, will land on Adelaide streets on Thursday 17th April before its ultimate online shift.

“Our website ripitup.com.au has, over recent years, become the primary source of Adelaide’s local, national and international music, lifestyle and entertainment news,” write the magazine’s publishers. “Digital is the future. Rip It Up’s shift to a digital-only format allows us endless possibilities to expand on what we have always done best – mirror the creative energy of this wonderful city… Here’s to another 25 years.” “Rip It Up will celebrate its 25th year… by becoming a digital-only platform.”

Rip It Up’s print demise is the latest in a small pool of Aussie street press that have ceased operations in recent years. The first casualty was Brisbane’s Rave, shuttering the presses after 21 years of publication in 2012, then Central Coast regional music press Reverb shut up shop under mounting debts a few months after. 

This time last year, The Music Network announced ‘print is dead’, while ceasing its long running-music print publication making the shift to online. Then in May, Triple J Magazine staff were made redundant as its publisher, News Custom Publishing – part of the News Limited group, decided to ‘re-centralise’ to its Sydney headquarters, leaving the national youth broadcaster to put together the magazine itself as it moved towards annual editions of its print magazine.

The writing for print media’s downturn has also been on the wall for a number of prominent international music publications. Long-running British magazines haven’t fared so well in recent years, seeing declines in circulation across the board, including Bauer Media’s long-running publications Q, Mojo, and Kerrang! experiencing drops in readership along with rival publishers, IPC, who deliver Uncut and NME, which might explain the latter’s experimentation with paywalls for certain website content.

Closer to home, last November saw the local Editor In Chief of Rolling Stones Australian edition, Matthew Coyte, becoming the long-running magazine’s publisher with the formation of Paper Riot Pty Ltd, breaking away from long-running publishers Bauer Media Group. In the same month, famous Chicago music website Pitchfork took the reverse route, entering into the print media business with the launch of quarterly magazine the Pitchfork Review.

Most recently, Britain’s The Fly – once the UK’s widest read title – closed down after 15 years “as a result of current market conditions surrounding publishing.”  Which is another way of saying that the majority of music consumers these days prefer to scroll through their smartphones and social media feeds for their music fix rather than leaf through the pages of magazines.

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