Code Like It's 198x

Future Publishing

The Somerset company behind Amstrad Action, Amiga Format and Edge

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Chris Anderson started Future Publishing in Somerton, Somerset, in 1985 with one magazine, Amstrad Action. Within six years, from offices in Bath, it claimed to sell more computer magazines than any other British publisher, with a title for almost every machine and a disk or tape on almost every cover.

Future Publishing began in 1985 as one man and one magazine in a small Somerset town. Chris Anderson published the first issue of Amstrad Action from Somerton in October that year. Six years later, from offices in Bath, his company told readers of Amiga Format that it was “a company founded just six years ago, but which now sells more computer magazines than any other publisher in Britain”. Its formula was one magazine for each machine, written by enthusiasts, usually with a disk or tape of programs fixed to the cover.

From ZZAP!64 to Somerton

Anderson had spent the first half of 1985 launching someone else’s magazine. CRASH introduced him in March 1985 as Newsfield put together the team for ZZAP!64: “Heading up the editorial team is Chris Anderson, who was editor of PCG until he heard about ZZAP! 64.” ZZAP!64 issue 1, dated May 1985, names him as editor. Five months later Amstrad Action issue 1 appeared, edited by Peter Connor, “another veteran of PCG”, with Future’s address at Somerton, Somerset.

For its first two years Future was a one-magazine company. Its second title, ACE, launched in October 1987 from 4 Queen Street, Bath, as a multi-format magazine “courtesy of the team who produced the legendary Personal Computer Games”. Subscriptions and mail order stayed behind at The Old Barn in Somerton for several more years.

A magazine for every machine

By December 1988 Future’s order form listed ACE, PC Plus, 8000 Plus, Amstrad Action, ST Amiga Format and New Computer Express. ST/Amiga Format, launched in July 1988 with Anderson as publisher, covered both of the new 16-bit computers in one magazine. A year later Future split it in two. The July 1989 issue announced that from the next month two magazines would take its place: Amiga Format would reach the shops on Thursday 13 July and ST Format a week later, each with its own 3.5-inch disk. The same news page noted that ACE was “no longer published by Future Publishing, having been taken over by the London-based EMAP”.

More single-machine magazines followed:

  • Commodore Format, for the Commodore 64, in October 1990.
  • Your Sinclair, bought from Dennis Publishing, from its April 1990 issue. The magazine told readers that Future’s chairman had only been trying to buy a second-hand Sinclair C5 and dialled a wrong number.
  • Amiga Shopper and Amiga Power, both in the spring of 1991. Amiga Format’s review of the year put their launch in April.
  • Edge, a multi-format games magazine, in October 1993.

By the summer of 1991 the house advertisement in Amiga Format listed twelve titles under the line “Home of Britain’s finest computer magazines”: Amiga Format, ST Format, Amiga Power, Amiga Shopper, PC Answers, PC Plus, 8000 Plus, Amstrad Action, Your Sinclair, Sega Power, New Computer Express and Commodore Format. The same page set out the company’s rules. Its editors worked “under two golden rules”: “Understand your readers’ needs” and “Satisfy them”. Its reviews came with “a cast-iron policy of editorial independence”, and buying one of its magazines was “like joining a nationwide user group”.

Disks and tapes on the cover

Most of Future’s magazines came with programs on the cover. Amiga Format carried a disk from its first issue in 1989. That disk held “880K of programs”, including a playable demo of The New Zealand Story. ACE promised the first five levels of Bubble Bobble on a cassette with its second issue, in 1987. Amstrad Action put a covertape on every issue from April 1991, and Commodore Format had a tape from its first issue. By mid-1996 Amiga Format also came in a CD-ROM edition.

The giveaways worried the software houses. In 1991 Amiga Format gave away complete games, among them Interphase. It later said that the industry’s reaction was “concern: if AF gave you games worth £30 for nothing, who’d buy theirs? An agreement was reached and we were prevented from doing it again”. Its timeline of that year summed it up as “No more free games from mags.”

Pearson and after

Edge reported in January 1995 that Anderson had sold Future to Pearson’s New Entertainment division for £52.5 million (later accounts give £52.7 million); he bought it back in 1998. Period magazines confirm the ownership: in March 1995 the Italian magazine Zeta described Pearson as the group “che controlla anche la Future Publishing” (“which also controls Future Publishing”). In 1999 the company was floated on the London Stock Exchange. The last issue of Amiga Format, in May 2000, described the parent company as The Future Network, “a public company quoted on the London Stock Exchange (symbol: FNET)”. It said the group published more than 115 magazines from offices in five countries and licensed 42 more in 30 countries.

Future also expanded abroad through purchases. In September 1999 the German monthly PC Player reported, in a note written “praktisch direkt vor dem Belichten unserer Seitenfilme” (just before its page films went for exposure), that it now belonged to Future Verlag GmbH instead of the WEKA publishing group. For readers who had not heard of the buyer, it explained that Future published “alles in allem 108 Magazine” (108 magazines in all), including market leaders in Britain, Italy, France and the United States, such as the American PC Gamer.

The company still trades, now as Future plc.

Sources

  • CRASH issue 14, March 1985: Chris Anderson, “editor of PCG until he heard about ZZAP! 64”.
  • ZZAP!64 issue 1, May 1985: Chris Anderson as editor.
  • Amstrad Action issue 1, October 1985: Future Publishing at Somerton, Somerset, and Peter Connor as editor. Issue 39, December 1988: Future’s order form listing six titles.
  • ACE issue 1, October 1987: the welcome page, 4 Queen Street, Bath, and the Bubble Bobble cassette announced for issue 2.
  • ST/Amiga Format issue 1, July 1988: masthead (Chris Anderson, publisher; subscriptions at The Old Barn, Somerton). Issue 13, July 1989: “Magazine splits” news item (the two new magazines, their on-sale dates, their disks, and ACE’s takeover by EMAP).
  • Amiga Format issue 1, August 1989: cover (880K of programs, The New Zealand Story demo). Issue 17, December 1990: masthead (subscriptions at The Old Barn, Somerton). Issue 25, August 1991: Future Publishing house advertisement (the “six years ago” claim, the twelve titles, the “golden rules”, 30 Monmouth Street, Bath). Issue 30, January 1992: “The Amiga Year” (the April 1991 launches, the free games and the agreement that stopped them). Issue 85, June 1996: the first Amiga Format CD. Issue 136, May 2000: masthead (The Future Network).
  • Your Sinclair issue 52, April 1990: “The Your Sinclair Sell-Off” and the first statement of publication by Future.
  • Commodore Format issue 1, October 1990. Amiga Power issue 1, May 1991. Edge issue 1, October 1993 (Future Publishing, Bath).
  • Amstrad Action issue 67, April 1991: the first regular covertape.
  • Zeta issue 2, March 1995: Pearson “controlla anche la Future Publishing”.
  • PC Player (Germany), September 1999: the editorial note on the sale to Future Verlag GmbH. October 1999: the publisher’s address, Future Verlag GmbH, Poing.
  • Edge issue 16, January 1995: the sale to Pearson New Entertainment for £52.5 million.
  • Wikipedia, “Future plc” (web, secondary): founded by Chris Anderson in Somerton with Amstrad Action; sold to Pearson for £52.7m in 1994 and bought back in 1998; floated on the London Stock Exchange in 1999. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Future_plc

See also

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