There’s a new sci-fi mag: Lightspeed Magazine, which encourages its submitters to “take chances with their fiction and push the envelope.”

So, there’s that.

Their model is interesting: a new story each week, alongside essays on the themes in said story. Also available in ebook format each month. And podcasts. To me, this seems wise: give away a story or two via the podcast, package your constantly-updated content in larger, less frequent clumps, and reach audiences in multiple ways.

They seem strong-willed; from the editorial: “The number of fantasy and horror stories far surpass the number of science fiction stories. We’ve set out to rectify that.”

Noble effort to do things the right way? Doomed effort because of genre concentration?

Bigger question: does a genre short story automatically have more merit than a genre novel? The idea being that you’re not going to make cash with short stories, so you must not be selling out. Or is this just an excuse to write parables with aliens more quickly?