Hobby Dying?
My Rant ...
The short of it ... No, not dying, and no it is not "too expensive" ... Changing yes (dying no). .... and EVERYTHING is going up in price -- it is just a case the dollar changing. (A 1970 dollar is now ~6 or ~7 dollars. So something you bought in 1970 for $5 is now between $30 and $35 -- stop comparing 1970 to 2020)
Magazines are dying across the board (not just 'hobby mags'). But again, this is more of a "changing" not dying. They are going digital, or they are moving to "mail only" instead of on the 'news stands'. Much of the same content is now available in online forums, or videos, or social media groups, etc. and the need for a central clearing house of that information is not as needed as it once was.
Specialized storefronts are dying/changing across the board (when was the last time you went to a butcher shop? ) This one is frustrating if you live in an area that makes it hard to get to that special store, but again - its just changing to meet the needs of a given area. I live in a very urban area, and area that used to have a local butcher in each community. Now I just go to the grocery store. But my buddy in a rural area has a butcher he goes to regularly. He can even take the deer he just shot in and get it butchered. But he also doesn't have a 'hobby shop' within an 3 hour drive, and I have 3 different ones in that same radius.
Your path into the hobby is going to be different (but also VERY similar) to someone a generation or two younger than you... and this is true for ANYTHING (driving a car, building a shed, etc... things change!). It is funny to hear someone rant about how "Kids can't get into the hobby because it is too expensive" .. but kids are playing with $200+ game systems, and buying $50+ games every 2 months. Or they might say "Look around, there are no kids here/in the hobby" (speaking about teenagers not really 'kids').... teenagers aren't here because they are doing teenager stuff -- So many of us in the hobby have the story of "parent introduced me when I was pre-teen ... then I stopped in HS/College/Young Family... .then I picked it back up again when I was more settled in life" This is just how life goes!