Secrets of the City

Are there any MSM magazines that do a great job with online content? New Yorker? Maxim? Vanity Fair?

Whaddy’all think?

Since you name those three, I’ll say yes to all of them (well, maybe not Maxim). I’ll also add New York, Wired, etc.

And The Rake!

so rex, steve, you’re basically naming conde nast publications. what else?

it’s so hard to look at the MSM on this, cuz they don’t design, they advertise. if i am not looking for something specific, i almost always look at the children’s websites for the best in what’s out there, including editorial design.

so you ask yourself what sort of reader might look at an online mag? would it be weider publications–all those fitness magazines? or a biggie like hearst or conde nast?

my final answer is that magazine buyers want the mag in hand as much as they want the content. the design of online versions is secondary to the actual magazine. not like news which changes every day and becomes almost immediately disposable in the form of a newspaper.

besides all the above, if you don’t get the daily paper, what are you gonna drag into the bathroom–your laptop??

My only original point was merely to say I just want a magazine to put its stories online, and that’s why I included Vanity Fair and The New Yorker, which both put up most of their stories. (I wasn’t trying to make a “design” argument.) And I honestly think of this as a good business decision — if you don’t have something people can link to and send to their friends in email, then you’re restricting how much people can talk about your work. This post is the perfect example — I would link to three stories in the current issue of the mag, but I can’t, and now you’ll never hear about them, and you’ll never even bother checking out the magazine.

Another example: 10 years ago, if you asked media people to name the best newspaper in the country, it probably would’ve been the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal. Now, I doubt that WSJ would make the top five. Why? Cuz you can’t link to it, you can’t talk about it, it’s out of the field of conversation. People just don’t talk about it anymore.

But to look at it from the more complex “how does one build a long-form magazine and an attention-deficit website into one product?” question, I’d say one place to look is Radar, which manages to do different things for different platforms, yet still be “Radar-ish” in general.

I have much more opinion on this matter, but I’m already stretching the bounds of this medium.

i’ve never been to radar before. cool. i’m going back there now!

Is this a copyright violation?

No.

Was just reading about google restarting their scanning project.

Seems lots of people have differing opinions.

Ya know, when I shut down this site, I hope all of you find a home as friendly as this one to visit.

Uhh.. take it easy there cowboy.. was asking an innocent question.

You’re not the only one concerned about fair use you know. Seems like every time it gets analyzed lately we lose more and more rights.

Will be interesting to see how google’s project ends up.