Researching magazines

To help me design my college magazine I have found 3 examples of past magazines with one being a professional college magazine. This is good as it gives me an insight as to what professionals use and how they lay the cover out.
The magazine below is important as it is a professional college magazine targeted at American college students. This is appropriate as it is giving me an insight to what subjects they would have on the front page. It is also the first magazine to ever have an African-American person on the front cover (1968).

 The magazine below is good as it is simple and doesn't give much away. This could be a selling point as people will pick it up and read whats inside. This could also be a negative as people aren't as likely to just pick up and read in this day and age. If the subject aren't on the front, people might just ignore it.

 This magazine is good as it is very bright and appealing. The apple logo with the Barbed wire shows how that technology is still quite new and the barbed wire symbolises the unknown territory we have not gone to yet. The placement of the subjects is quite good as it doesn't bring attention away from the rest of the magazine cover. I may take tis idea into account later on.