A dialog about magazines: Popular Science

MvT: With all these companies trying to come up with the next big thing in print, it would be interesting to look at what they are concocting. We could buy these magazines, read them, and then critique what we like and don’t like. Maybe we do a few reviews.

CK: Good idea. We can see how they’re designing these magazines to appeal to their readers. Let’s read these magazines as we’d read any other magazine. You know a real world and contextual evaluation.

MvT: Popular Science just came out with their magazine on the iPad. Let’s review it now.

CK: Let’s do it. They are the first iPadished magazine that did things somewhat right.

MvT: or, at least, it is the first magazine we looked at so far.

CK: You know, the design company that worked on this has a cool video of their creation on-line.

MvT: I saw that. Made with their HD camera with a nice depth of field.

CK: Clearly a designer, with all those artsy knickknacks in the background.

MvT: Clearly.

CK: But anyway; cool video that explains the overall interaction model with some fancy After Effects pants.

MvT: Let’s talk about the good stuff first.

CK: Right. It’s a nice simple translation of what print can do on a tablet. They simply turned the magazine in 2 layers; one with high-res photos.

MvT: and one with the article on it. I like it.

CK: You can clearly see how this is easy with regards to production; just create your two layers per page in Photoshop or InDesign. No need for a really new platform.

CK: Keep it simple. It feels very linear though.

MvT: Yeah there is not much in the form of jumping around.

CK: Hello…hyperlinks. I see URLs in the magazine but they’re not active. Can’t tap and see more.

MvT: That must have been a hard cut.

CK: It hurts. They clearly will add that as soon as possible.

MvT: Clearly.

CK:Same for the table of content; there is so much more potential here to make something out of that. Nice zoomed out thumbnails, cool clippings, you know the drill.

MvT: Talking about the drill; where are all the other table stakes. social, 3d, interactivity,….dare I say: hyperlinks.

CK: It is just Print 2 point O. I guess it didn’t occur to them they are on an interactive platform. Or they only wanted to make a printed magazine a little better online. Similar to what Quicken initially did for check writing.

MvT: It is difficult to balance the desire to keep it simple and editorial with adding more interactivity, but they will need to do something.

CK: Right. The NY Times guys are pretty good at creating interactive informational content. Maybe look there for inspiration.

MvT: Inspiration?

CK: Yeah, inspiration.

MvT: Did you see that you have to tap left to hide the article and look at the nice photograph. But then you have to tap right to see the article again.

CK: Oh, I see. I get it now. Isn’t there some law broken here? Was it Fritz law?

MvT: Yeah good old Fritz von Lichtenstein. It would have been a lot better if you could just tap on the same spot to see the article again, or am I missing something?

CK: I think you got it right.

MvT: : You know, I sometimes read a magazine from the back to the front, just to get a different perspective on the content; see whether I missed something.

CK: Did you try upside down? Oh, not easy on iPad. The magazine keeps flipping over. You see that?

MvT:Last thing; costs.

CK: Yeah, so why do I want to pay 500% more for something I can’t put at the bottom of my bird cage? I want more from this magazine, if I’m paying more, the same, or less.

MvT: They clearly need to figure that part out.

CK: Btw, why are we not doing this review as a video? It would have been way funnier for people to see us, sitting side by side in these bathroom stalls.