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iPad as replacement for paper magazines?

H

hockeynut

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jun 29, 2009
9
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I am one of those folk who subscribe to a bunch of magazines and the iPad seems like it may be right up my alley.

I have a nook (wife has a Kindle) and we love 'em for eBooks. I am hesitant to move to a screen like the iPad for eBooks as the eInk screens are so easy on the eyes. But for magazine articles it seems to be a marriage made in Cupertino :D

Anyone use their iPad as a magazine reader (Zinio or other)?
 
I do. It works quite well. Zinio has a featue that allows you to see the text of an article in a seperate window rather than pinching to zoom in/out.

Head down to a Best Buy or Apple store and download and check out the app. There are "featured articles" that allow you to get the idea from about 20 different magazines.:apple:
 
hockeynut said:
I am one of those folk who subscribe to a bunch of magazines and the iPad seems like it may be right up my alley.

I have a nook (wife has a Kindle) and we love 'em for eBooks. I am hesitant to move to a screen like the iPad for eBooks as the eInk screens are so easy on the eyes. But for magazine articles it seems to be a marriage made in Cupertino :D

Anyone use their iPad as a magazine reader (Zinio or other)?
Click to expand...

On Zinio:

MacWorld
Business Week
PC Magazine

On separate applications:

Time
Newsweek

Being Newsweek much cheaper than Time, that wants to charge full price for the electronic copy.

Zinio has proven to be the cheapest provider of magazines although they don't have the largest selection.
 
I haven't touched my Kindle in a couple of months. I now read exclusively on the iPad (I'm still keeping the Kindle for beach reading - for readability and because I'm leery of bringing the iPad to a sandy shore). It's a very comfortable experience for books or magazines, all the more so due to the backlight (reading a Kindle on a plane with just the overhead spot lights requires a lot of awkward positioning - and causes eye strain). Magazines are, for the most part, fine. I haven't tried any of the interactive ones, but the pdfs and the newspapers/news sites (USA Today, BBC) which tend to be more magazine-like are very usable.
 
It's replaced a few of mine, notably The Spectator and Watch Time. I think this is one of the best uses of the iPad. Great potential there.
 
I was blown away by National Geographic Magazine through Zinio, so I subscribed.

As I sit here and wait for the July issue (which has been out on Newsstands for almost 2 weeks) I think that I may have made a mistake.

Zinio customer service did reply quickly to my inquiry, however, saying they were trying to provide the best product that they could in a timely manner.

I'll give it another month, but I have a feeling that I'll be reverting to paper for now.
 
I am looking forward to The New Yorker app for iPad, honestly.

Don't understand why it's taking so long.
 
Great to know all this information, thank you all for sharing. I think the digital media will take its time to replace shopped trees. But I'll love to see this happening very soon. I have an iPod Touch and I am constantly investigating on the iPad development to see if I get one. I think I will get it on its second iteration but my mayor motivation is precisely the iPad as eReader and all the graphic and text interactive media I could access with it.
 
hockeynut said:
I am one of those folk who subscribe to a bunch of magazines and the iPad seems like it may be right up my alley.

I have a nook (wife has a Kindle) and we love 'em for eBooks. I am hesitant to move to a screen like the iPad for eBooks as the eInk screens are so easy on the eyes. But for magazine articles it seems to be a marriage made in Cupertino :D

Anyone use their iPad as a magazine reader (Zinio or other)?
Click to expand...

I will use ipad as magazine once they stop charging for premium prices.
 
hcho3 said:
I will use ipad as magazine once they stop charging for premium prices.
Click to expand...

I was pretty shocked to see things like $5 per issue for Pop Science.

You would think that the magazines themselves would be written in a tool such that generating online content would be a simple point+click operation.
 
I use Zinio for my audio video magazines. JPG Magazine is offered in PDF downloads, so I view them in iBooks.

I really enjoy my iPad for magazines and eBooks. The amount of space in my house for books and magazines is so less, it makes my wife and I very happy! :D
 
I have movie magazines going back thirty years in ComicZeal. It's one of the iPad's killer apps, IMO.
 
Does anyone know if MacLife has a magazine or plans to have one soon? BTW, what's the monthly price for MacWorld?
 
I was really disappointed with newspaper apps - certainly in the UK they are not as good in any fashion as a physical newspaper. iBooks and Zino seem to be horrifically expensive with a limited range - although to be fair I have not checked on iBooks again for sometime. Especially sad as this was a main reason for me to buy an iPad; I just cannot justify the mark up over paper products.
 
You could just do the sensible thing- DL the Kindle app, access Amazon's book store.

It might be different in a year or two but right now Amazon beats iBooks by a loooong way.
 
many of the magazine subscription prices on the iPad seem too high, and I wish there was more selection. but I guess it's early and publishers are still testing the water. A lot of the examples I've seen look great. I'm hopeful the iPad can be a good substitute for paper magazines.

just don't throw away all your paper magazines - the iPad will make a lousy flyswatter :)
 
I use Zinio. I have three subscriptions (Car&Driver, Home Theater, Sound&Vision) each of which cost about $12 for a full year (10-12 issues), far cheaper than the dedicated-app-based magazines like Wired.

Works great for me, I get the new issues about 3-4 weeks before the issue month (i.e. August 2010 comes in early July), which is consistent with newsstand timing.
 
I would cross over to electronic versions of magazines in a heartbeat --- if only the publishers would charge a fair and competitive price. Really now, how do they expect to build a decent electronic magazine business by charging the same price for a single issue of the electronic version of a magazine as they do for a year's subscription to the paper version? Until the publishers get real, I will continue to read and recycle the pile of paper that they print, assemble and mail to me each month...whenever I'm not reading an ebook, that is.
 
cocky jeremy said:
Does anyone know if MacLife has a magazine or plans to have one soon? BTW, what's the monthly price for MacWorld?
Click to expand...

MacLife stated in their latest issue that they are working on making it available for an iPad. Not sure though if they will make it available through Zinio. Also, as far as the MacWorld goes, you can go to zinio.com and check out how much the individual issues are. I have their annual subscription, which costs the same as their paper subscription.

But as per OP's question, I subscribe to a bunch of magazines through Zinio. I really enjoy reading my magazines on iPad. Plus, I'm helping to save some trees in the process.
 
Really need to find a common, more efficient delivery method for the iPad before this will work. There are only so many 500Mb issues of Wired that you can fit even on the largest iPad (not to mention just how long it makes the backup!)

Wired it is the stand-out best magazine replacement so far, but I have been surprised (shocked?) at the effort Metro has gone to with its free paper... the app is rather good (shame about the tabloid content).

We're almost there, and this is definitely the device to take us there!
 
The New Yorker for Kindle costs $2.99 per month, so that's $36 a year. Not bad. A smoothie would set you back more than that.:)

Don't know if The New Yorker would work on the Kindle app for iPad?

I don't have a Kindle, only an iPad. Am debating between subscribing to The New Yorker for the Kindle app for iPad--if that works--and waiting for the special app for iPad by The New Yorker.
 
It is going to take a while for the market to stabilize but I think that it will. It is a new medium for publishers to work with and they need to test the waters and see what they can do / what people are willing to pay.

There are so many variables that it is going to take some time but it will get there.
 
I have the iPad 64/3G and Kindle2

I don't read on my Kindle much anymore but don't plan on selling it. I've always had an account on Zinio and used it via my home Mac for years. My current subscriptions are: Home Theater, International Tatoo, Macworld, Natl Geo Traveler, Natl Geographic, Elle, Esquire, PC Magazine, iPhone Life and Paranormal every other year I get Country Living. I love Zinio but it works best with WiFi. Sometimes I get MacUser, iCreate, SciFi Now and Trailer Life (they have their own apps). I'm waiting for the other SciFi magazines to come up with an app. With fictionwise I have a subscription to Analog SFF which I have converted into EPUB and loaded on ibooks.
 
hockeynut said:
I am one of those folk who subscribe to a bunch of magazines and the iPad seems like it may be right up my alley.

I have a nook (wife has a Kindle) and we love 'em for eBooks. I am hesitant to move to a screen like the iPad for eBooks as the eInk screens are so easy on the eyes. But for magazine articles it seems to be a marriage made in Cupertino :D

Anyone use their iPad as a magazine reader (Zinio or other)?
Click to expand...

For the near future the iPad's price tag is too high for people to dump their print to go to an all electronic tablet subscription.
 
I use Zinio and I am quite pleased with it. There are some magazines I wish were available but its definitely easier to carry my iPad and I always have access to my subscriptions.
 
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