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Print magazine blues

One of the major annoyances with regards to magazines and magazine subscriptions that I’ve found is mostly cost. Being from Canada, I enjoy reading most of the magazines that are available in the US but it is normally pricey, especially when I get a magazine subcription. If you look at practically any magazine subscription pricing, you will notice that any subscription outside of the USA (or the publisher’s home country) that it practically costs an arm and leg. It’s not surprising to find that to get a subscription that you are paying two, three or even four times the price of the same subscription for someone from the home country! In most cases, I end up buying my magazines at the local newsstand since it costs less than a mail subscription. Ridiculous. And, normally, the magazines arrive weeks later, after the issues show up on the newstands. That normally makes me wonder why I bother with the subscriptions when I don’t get any benefit.

Well, no longer. Here comes a great digital solution: Zinio. Zinio is a digital magazine subscription service that offers most of all the popular titles you find at your local newstand with one major exception: the magazines are in digital form. That means, it’s paperless and you don’t actually get the hard copy, or the magazine in paper form.

Digital magazine = same great content

You get exactly the same magazine as if you went to your local newstand and bought it with the exception that you don’t get to feel the paper and flip through them with your fingers like you would with a printed magazine. All the ads, content is exactly laid out in the same way. So you don’t “lose” any content by viewing the magazine in its digital format as opposed to the printed one.

Benefits of digital magazines

There are benefits to having it in digital form as opposed to printed form. Not only are you “saving” the environment by not having it printed on paper, you can store as many magazines as you want on your computer without it taking up any extra space, or weight. Alternatively, you can view many of the magazines online, accessible anywhere you have access to a computer and an internet connection, thus not needing to take that magazine with you, all crumpled or ripped or torn during its trip with you. Viewing it online also doesn’t take up any hard drive space either. If you have a iPod Touch or iPhone, you can access it online directly without the need of a computer. In some magazines, there are “extra” content that the digital form offers that the printed form may not.

Get a free sample magazine from Zinio now!

For those who want to skip over all the detailed review and just want a summary, you can jump to the review summary

To give you an idea of what I mean, here are some screenshots of some of the special content found in the VIV magazine. There may be other magazine that also offer extra media content but I have not looked much into it.

The left image shows a page where there is special content. There are a few circles located at various areas on the picture. Clicking on them will bring up a pop up window with more detailed information.

Again, here’s another page with special content. On the left image, at the bottom of the left page there is something called “Vivify”. Clicking on that will bring up extra content related to that article.

The table of contents also provides a special extra with regards to the cover. The right screenshot simply shows the page zoomed in.

As you can see, being able to view the special content can be beneficial to both the reader and the content publisher and advertiser. Important information about the product on the page can be easily embedded and displayed to give that extra interactive experience that you can’t find in traditional print media.

No waiting. Immediate reading

Aside from the special content, one of the main reasons why I went digital with Zinio is to save on the postage costs of a typical mail subscription AND I can access the magazine immediately. With Zinio, once I pay for the subscription or the magazine copy, I can access and read it right away. No more waiting weeks for it to arrive. I LOVE IT!

Download and read as often as you like

Once the magazine is paid for, it is yours forever. Even if you don’t buy another magazine, you can still log into Zinio and access it. That means, you can download it on your computer and delete it and re-download it again to read again another time in the future. There is no restriction. Or view it online and save hard drive space. It’s up to you.

To give you a better idea of what Zinio offers and how the magazine looks, here are some videos that hopefully will help explain it better.

Palm Discovery review of Zinio (full review) (14 minutes)

Since the original full review was 14 minutes long, I decided to break it down into smaller portions, creating additional individual videos of each component of the Zinio digital print service.

Zinio Media Enhanced Magazine
This video shows some of the media content found in the VIV Magazine providing a much more interactive experience.

Zinio Online Magazine viewer
This video shows the online magazine viewer. Simply log into Zinio.com and view your magazines online.

Zinio Offline Magazine Viewer
This video shows the offline magazine viewer where you download the magazines to your computer and view them offline.

Zinio Digital Books
This video shows a sample digital book and the three free zooms into any page of a book for sampling. All magazines also offer the 3 free zooms to provide you with a sample of the content.

Here are my observations:
I really love Zinio. The magazine looks great and I love how I’m able to access and view them anywhere. I love being able to view them immediately after purchasing without the wait for it to arrive in the mail weeks later. Also, I don’t need to pay as much for the subscription compared to the typical mail subscription. Some magazines offer special features which are very cool. On the offline version, I can highlight and make notes on it, which can be helpful to point out specific points for school, work, projects, etc. I like how it is supported on the iPhone and iPod Touch so you can easily visit Zinio’s website and view your magazines online.

Enough of my raves. Here are some not so glowing observations.

No support for Windows Mobile, Palm, Symbian or Android

First of all, I am somewhat disappointed that a lot of mobile devices and smartphones like Windows Mobile, Palm, Android and Symbian are NOT supported, although there is support for iPhone and iPod Touch devices. I would even prefer to at least be able to download and view the magazine in a pdf file or even a propriety format with a mobile Zinio reader or viewer app but there isn’t such an option. So, I am stuck with only being able to view on my computer or online with a computer. In this day and age of mobility and smartphones, I hope that Zinio will re-consider and offer support for other mobile devices.

One page printing

Second, although I can understand the reasoning behind being able to only print one page at a time (for copyright reasons), it can also be frustrating when you need to have an article of a magazine printed out for your school work, etc.

Manual zooming

Third, although it may not seem tedious to zoom in on a page the first few times, if you are going through an entire magazine, it will get very tedious. I am hoping that perhaps Zinio can allow you to set a specific view or zoom that will be displayed when you view the individual pages. So, for example, if I tend to view the magazine on an overview style that shows two pages at a time, then allow me to do so and be able to zoom in when I want to view them a page at a time. And, if I am someone who wishes to view the magazine on a page by page basis to set it that way so that I will flip them one by one. Being able to have the same thumbnail overview feature that the online version has in the offline version could also help. That way, I can figure out which pages interest me and view them. The main irritant of viewing digital print is that our computer monitors and screen are set in landscape and the pages are in portrait. So, unless we can set it so that our monitors are in portrait or the the print is in landscape, we will continue to have this problem. Perhaps optimize the magazines for computer viewing so that it will render at the best zoom and yet also show all the content? I don’t know.

And last, sometimes it takes a while to load on the Zinio website. I log in and wait, and wait, and wait. It doesn’t happen every time I visit, but some times, but when it happens, it’s very frustrating to keep waiting.

Review Summary

Zinio is a very interesting solution offering magazines in a digital format and solving the typical problem of adding more paper to the landfill. Since the magazines are in digital format, there is no wasted paper after you have finished reading it. As well, since it’s in digital format, there is no added bulk or weight and you can store as many digital magazines as you can fit on your computer’s hard drive. Or better yet, view them online and you don’t need to take up any space on the hard drive. The magazines are accessible online anywhere that you can have access to the computer and the internet and offline if you download them on your computer for viewing at your leisure. If you have an iPhone or iPod Touch, you can access the magazines online without the need for a computer! The other benefit is that you can have instant access to all the magazines offered all around the world. No more ordering through your local newsstand and paying high prices for importing it. And no more waiting. Pay for it and view it immediately. That’s the most amazing thing, being able to access many international magazines that you normally weren’t able to before, and at a very decent price.

Zinio offers samples of popular magazines including Businessweek, VIV, Cosmopolitan, Reader’s Digest, etc so you can download a full sample issue absolutely FREE! So what are you waiting for? Get a free sample magazine issue and start enjoying the world of digital magazines! Try Zinio Now! Experience digital with a free magazine. Choose from BusinessWeek. Men’s Health and more! You may find that you may not go back to the printed version any more. Digital books - New on Zinio!

Check out the local Zinio offerings for your area:

Zinio Australia – popular magazines - now digital. Get Good, Business Week, Hello, Esquire, Dive Pacific, Real Groove and more!

Zinio Brasil – Revistas digitais para mantenerse mais atualizado sobre as notícias do Brasil e do mundo: Veja, BusinessWeek y mais.

Zinio Canada: Featuring Maclean’s, The Hockey News, The Economist and more - your favorite magazines, now digital!

Zinio Deutschland – Ausländische Zeitschriften im Digital Format: BusinessWeek, Science, Playboy, Le Point und mehr.

Zinio España – Revistas españolas y internacionales en formato digital: Hola, De Viajes, Playboy, Quo, Motociclismo y mucho más!

Zinio España-Catalá – Revistas digitals de referència de l’escena catalana i internacional: Bonart, Enderrock, Hola i molt més.

Zinio Mexico – Revistas Mexicana y internacionales en formato digital: Hola, Cine Premiere, Playboy, Businessweek y mucho más!

Zinio UK– Hello, MacUser, Personal Computer World, Organic Garden and Home, Uncut; your favorite UK magazines, now digital!

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