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CANPARA Magazine has radically changed their editorial policy.
CANPARA Magazine and CSPA were fiercely anti-BASE since the mid-1980s, but the latest issue (June-August 2014) includes 2 articles about BASE jumping and homages to 2 Canadians who recently died while BASE-jumping.
Why the radical change in editorial policy?

Why not?! Things change, BASE has changed, the face of BASE has changed. Hell, I say it is about freaking time! Sooner or later the old guard that has issues with new things BASE, or otherwise fade away.....

" Why the radical change in editorial policy " ?
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probably choice in change to what ever 'sells' more copy and nothing to do with like or disliking BASE .
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The skydiving community has to accept and be aware of the fact that the BASE presence in the media is really what's bringing most new students into skydiving these days. I think of the surge in jump student numbers when a good Skydiving themed movie hits the mainstream. As an AFF instructor I can tell you that BASE has been the best thing to happen to skydiving in the last 5 or so years and ask any Tandem instructor how many of his passengers these days pop the question " Do you BASE jump? " or "Do you fly one of them squirrel suits ?" These are images that are in a lot of whuffos minds, blame the internet, but it's definitely been good for skydiving.
Regards, B.

At the same time, that new generation blazing through AFF, a double dozen solo tracking jumps and a base FJC to be epic on their facebook might not always be as positive as we hope it would be

I don't know where these people are. I keep hearing about them, but I have yet to meet one.

You'd think they'd be all over the BFL...right?

Are your eyes painted on?

No, I'm being serious.

Maybe it's because I don't live in Moab or LB. But between the DZ and my local scene the worst offenders I've seen are 150-200 sky jumps and a little overzealous to get all 4 objects. Maybe Jarno was using hyperbole to drive home a point, but in my 2 years jumping I've never personally come across one of these self-educated, non-skydiving, gainer-only "jumpers."

There are the known cases like the jumper a year or so ago in LB who was hucking accidental aerials and posting them to YouTube, but the fact that I know about that incident all the way over in LB makes me think that these people would be more widely known.

Intuition also tells me that they'd show up on the incident reports every once in a while.

There have been a few recent cases in Brento recently, but without going back and checking each thread I don't recall any of them being self-taught and low sky experience (which is more relevant than BASE experience for that sight I think, considering that it's frequently used for FJCs). Again, correct me if I'm wrong as I didn't go back and check each thread.

Maybe this is it's own topic, but I think that these 25 jump YouTube wonders are more straw men than you'd think after reading these boards. The experienced jumpers always point to them and say, "this is the problem," but the BFL is overflowing with experience.

Is the experience level at entry into BASE, on average, lower than it has been in the past (as measured by sky experience)? I'm absolutely sure that it is. But is that inappropriate given the improvements in gear, knowledge, FJCs, etc.?

I don't know. I guess that's up for debate.

Well! I'm definitely not saying it's good for BASE.
If you've ever noticed over the years USPA is always trying to promote the sport of skydiving and almost every month in it's newsletter has advice for DZ's regarding how to increase business, I suspect the Canadian Sport Parachuting Association is similar, so I think they have to accept that the interest in BASE has been very good financially for both organizations since in my experience it has brought significant numbers to try a Tandem or enroll in First Jump courses.
Regards,B.

who cares, i mean.. its CANPARA

I dont think accidents, but more-so the attitude (consumer style behaviour) that I was making fun of. It was a 'fun' comment, but for sure its something that varies per location I guess.

Gotcha. That's what I figured, hyperbole.

I only see the one article on BASE jumping, however, I agree with Dave. I don't care why CANPARA has finally changed it's long standing denial of the sport, I'm just glad there's been a changing of the guard so to speak. It's been long overdue. Canada has some highly skilled BASE jumpers like Jay Mo that deserve to be acknowledged for their accomplishments by their home magazine

I'm not sure where "self-educated" came from. I read "person rushes through skydiving to take BASE FJC". You may just be secluded and surrounded by awesome jumpers but that is not the norm. The 200 skydive pre-requisite is a fucking joke. Go to Kjerag and see people smashed up against boulders, go to LB and see people fly into fences, you can go to Bridge Day and watch dozens upon dozens of people slam into the dirt one after another because they have no idea of when to flare a parachute. And that is just flying the fucking thing.
As for the BFL I bet if you categorized it by some random numbers like less than 500 skydives less than 100 BASE jumps the results would be staggering.

I guess I took "low experience" and "self-educated" to mean the same thing. in retrospect they are not, though there may be a correlation.