I enjoy reading The Economist on the occasional flight, and once subscribed. I feel a completionist urge to read it cover-to-cover once I start, and combined with the insane volume it basically made me feel unaccomplished. Many delayed, guilty trips to dump a pile in my recycling bin.

I also went through a discount subscription parade which included Fast Company, Maxim, Entrepreneur, Sound & Vision, Vegetarian Times, Entertainment, Car & Driver. I've ultimately settled on the fact that the only magazine I regularly read and look forward to is Playboy, so I've let everything else lapse. Interviews, 20 Questions, Playboy Advisor, random flipthroughs to random articles. And celebriboobs. When I want to read something else, I'll buy a single copy. Probably at an airport.

lapham's quarterly is usually really good for anyone into that sorta thing.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lapham's_Quarterly

each issue focuses on a different subject ("the city", "sports and games") and then there's a bunch of essays and selections from fiction, poetry, etc. on the subject.

Very true. I'm a quite fast, though not amazing, reader and cover-to-covering the Economist probably takes me a little less than 4 hours, on the same scale as a lightweight ~300 page novel.

For sure - I phrased it wrong. What I'm saying is that it is a nice 'n quick overview of what's happening all around the world and not just in the US and EU.

I think a lot of people have it this way (with newspapers as well).

The Economist, New Scientist, Time magazine

Edit; its a shame theyre so expensive tho. £3.50 for a magazine, when i can get a decent newspaper that takes as long to read, and is almost as good means i never buy them anymore

This is done on purpose. The irrationally expensive print version makes the print and digital version seem relatively cheaper. Its been covered by either Freakonomics or Dan Arealys 'Predictably Irrational' I cant remember which. Studies showed inclusion of the irrational option weighted the sales to the more expensive print + digital version, rather than just the digital version

Economist
The New Statesman
Commentary

I don't subscribe to any but buy one or the other for a train journey, and I had a subscription to Commentary for a while.

I tend to read National Geographic in the doctors/dentist's waiting room, although I'd really rather read Nuts.

From The Onion:

'The Economist' To Halt Production For Month To Let Readers Catch Up

LONDON—World-renowned news and opinion magazine The Economist announced plans to suspend any new online and print content for the next month in an effort to finally allow subscribers a chance to catch up. "It's only fair to our readers," said Economist editor Winthrop Parker, adding that there was no reason for subscribers to feel ashamed for not necessarily knowing every last detail about the current economic and geopolitical climate. "Even just scanning over some of the feature stories can sometimes take two or three daily bus commutes to finish. After all, some of these issues have as many words in them as a short novel. No one should be expected to do that in one week." In related news, ESPN The Magazine announced Monday it would be suspending publication indefinitely until its readers learned to read.

Yeah I came in to mention this magazine. It's a good thing it's quarterly because it takes me a while to get through one. I definitely feel smarter after reading an issue and feel like doing so enriched my life.