Quote:
Originally Posted by Sonist
Uhm, I have to respectfully disagree. You are missing the point of color and large screens. And of course, design.
I am looking at the latest DWELL which just landed on my desk. The design and content are one. If it reflowed, it would be different, and most of its subscribers would not care for it.
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That's funny, because DWELL seems to have a pretty extensive online site, with content and art, which is pretty effective at communicating to the reader.
I'm not saying DWELL isn't a beautiful magazine. Just that there is more than one way to present content, and an e-book format shouldn't be expected to mimic a magazine format. (In fact, it should be closer to a minimalist web site format.)
Zinio essentially takes pictures of magazine pages. That's fine, if you must have the art and text exactly as it is presented in the magazine. But with few exceptions, it is really not necessary to the task of communicating to your audience, which is the task of most magazines. In short, only an "art magazine" really needs the Zinio treatment... and I daresay some of them could probably do without, as well.
You know what else is funny? I actually didn't set out to "attack" Zinio in this thread, just to indicate that their service didn't work that well for
my needs... and incidentally, that their unilaterally handing my subscription over to another company (which produced an inferior online reading experience) was even less acceptable to me.
My laptop is a bit heavy and bulky to use as en e-book reader, and the screen isn't well-optimized for reading the content... but if I had a lighter and larger tablet PC, Zinio might make a better choice for me. For now, portability is key, and presenting magazine content in e-book formats like ePub, LIT or PRC would be more practical for me.