July 3, 2008


The Future of Magazines

The Magazineer talking about Magcloud:

The web has changed our thinking about media in ways we’re still figuring out. Now we can make media without the bother of putting ink to paper. We can distribute it planet-wide in an instant. And the content can be customized to your tastes, personalized for each reader. It’s so obvious now, but it’s important to remember what a revolution this has been.

But there’s still something about paper. It’s not just because screens suck to read on (they do, but that hasn’t kept us from doing it all day). There is an intimacy about a good book, a pleasure to the glossy pages of magazines, and, ironically, a permanence to paper. (How many times has a website you really loved simply disappeared?)

So what if we could combine the best parts of the web (no waste, personalized content, open to all) with the best parts of print (sexy print quality, permanence, no batteries required)?

For the last year, I’ve been working on a project with HP Labs called MagCloud. The idea is simple, really. MagCloud enables anyone to start a magazine - a real printed magazine - with no giant pile [of magazines].

posted by Andrew Simone in publishing 

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One Response to “The Future of Magazines”

  1. Sheila Ryan on July 3rd, 2008 at 1:02 pm

    I learned of MagCloud just recently (while loitering around Chris Glass’s place) and have not spent much time at the site itself, but I am wondering abut the economics of the thing. Production costs are currently set at $0.20/page, and I believe that there is a shipping-and-handling charge of $1.40 during this Beta period. Let’s say I want to produce a 96-page magazine. That’s $20.60 per issue, assuming I am a devil-may-care sort who opts not to tack on a mark-up for MagCloud to pass along to me. Oh, heck, let’s say that I do — bring the purchaser’s cost up to $25.00. (That’s less than a 15% mark-up.) Okay, let’s say I start out cautiously with a quarterly.

    I’m thinking I’d better pack my magazine with watermelon sex and nipple hypocrisy. And hairy vaginas. Though I guess my name is a kind of selling point, too.

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