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[triverse]

Is this the Future of magazines in general?  Is everyone going mad at the idea of iPad's and digital print?

Fast-growing technology publisher embraces its digital future by giving free Apple iPads to its entire workforce

In what must be a media first, Imagine Publishing has today announced that as part of its pioneering commitment to digital mobile publishing it has given a free Apple iPad to all its employees. This unprecedented gift allows everyone who works at Imagine to appreciate and enjoy the company's iPad apps and digital editions, and it hopes it will also lead to a new generation of apps and new iPad-only magazines.

Imagine Publishing was formed in 2005 by Damian Butt, Mark Kendrick and Steve Boyd and is one of the fastest-growing publishers in the UK, focusing primarily on technology markets. Imagine is a worldwide multimedia content producer, with 20 print magazines, 27 websites, 29 iPad apps and a large bookazine operation.

The move coincides with the technology publisher celebrating its first full year of iPhone and iPad digital editions. Imagine currently has
29 apps live on the iTunes App Store, covering all its key markets - creative computing, videogames, photography, automotive and entertainment, with tens of thousands of downloads a month worldwide, many of which are regular subscriptions.

Imagine was the first sizeable publishing company in the world to offers its entire print portfolio as digital edition apps on the iPhone and iPad thanks to its early partnership with tech partner PixelMags, and this is set to continue with more apps planned for 2011.

"Our digital future is exceptionally bright," said Managing Director Damian Butt. "Imagine's print and digital magazines are bought by passionate, well-informed, technology literate individuals who happily enjoy our content in many different formats, including iPad - this gift is the perfect way for everyone at Imagine to join in the digital publishing revolution."

"Imagine is an exciting technology publisher which benefits from both a healthy print portfolio - tactile, glossy, and collectable - and also a
rapidly expanding versatile digital portfolio" added Butt.  "Over a year's worth of sales has shown that we are not cannibalising our print sales, just the opposite - we are delivering our brands to a whole new worldwide audience. Imagine is at the cutting edge and perfectly poised to leverage its high value content on all existing and new digital platforms. At Imagine we don't fear the digital future - we embrace it."

Creative Director and co-founder, Mark Kendrick, said of the iPad gift: "We felt strongly that each employee at Imagine should have the gift of a free iPad from us, not only in order to enjoy our expansive digital magazine and bookazine portfolio, but because we hope this initiative will spark a multitude of new creative ideas for magazine and apps in the future."

Imagine Publishing is one of the UK's fastest-growing consumer specialist publishers. Formed in May 2005, Imagine now publishes 20 regular print magazines, 29 digital apps on the iPad/iPhone, and 27 websites in the videogames, computing, entertainment, motoring and photography markets. An Imagine magazine is purchased every ten seconds.

[KiwiArcader]

The question in my mind is what are they planning for their older titles in terms of digital distribution? A lot of companies are getting on the bandwagon now with current content but seem to have no real thoughts on much more than the previous six months titles let alone those produced 2 or more years earlier. What will it take for the likes of Imagine or Future Publishing to realise that all their products deserve preserving for future generations to enjoy. That's why people like Roger Kean are to be commended for ensuring all their old products are digital preserved.

One can only hope Imagine take the same stance. Time will tell .....

[Nreive]

The question in my mind is what are they planning for their older titles in terms of digital distribution? A lot of companies are getting on the bandwagon now with current content but seem to have no real thoughts on much more than the previous six months titles let alone those produced 2 or more years earlier. What will it take for the likes of Imagine or Future Publishing to realise that all their products deserve preserving for future generations to enjoy. That's why people like Roger Kean are to be commended for ensuring all their old products are digital preserved.

One can only hope Imagine take the same stance. Time will tell .....

Imagine Publishing already have been distributing their back catalogue digitally.  They have been selling their back catalogue of magazines eMag DVDs, including the likes of Retro Gamer and games TM.  These DVDs have PDF copies of the mags with extras bundled in.   

[KiwiArcader]

Sure .... but their removing the ads on the retrogamer mags means they are not preserved properly as far as I am concerned. I'd like to know if they did the same with the Games TM PDF's though.

[triverse]

In the end though, the publications they are releasing in digital form are their property to do with as they see fit.  I agree, it could be better if the ads were preserved too, not sure why they were removed, but at least they are releasing the full magazine as far as other content.

[KiwiArcader]

Fair comment.

It's just that ads in my mind often set the tone of the period as much as the content itself. Often they could be termed works of art in themselves so it seems somewhat mystifying if content is still preserved in their archives that they wouldn't include it. Those E-Mag page logo's are so yuck!!!

But you are right. At least they ARE making old content available .... even if a tad thin on the ground at present. I hope they gave their staff copies of all the Retrogamer and Games tm mags for their iPads 

[triverse]

I totally agree with you Kiwi, the ads are as just as much a part of the mag as the original content.  It is sad that the few companies that are re-releasing their past issues in digital form are not releasing the ads too. 

The only thing I can think of for this being done is due to bandwidth costs. 

[KiwiArcader]

Yeah ... well ... if you look hard enough you can acquire their Retro Gamer mags but after checking one out I was hugely disappointed. It looks like they sacrificed any sort of quality to keep the file size down. Images, especially the smaller ones, are just horrible to look at. If that's what Games Tm issue are like too then they haven't done anything in my eyes that remotely could be called preservation. Just how difficult would it have been for them to put a 200MB sized issue on the DVD rather than a 20MB abomination? Looks like I still need to look at acquiring hard copies of these mags ....

Such a shame when you WANT to support the companies but they put out sub-standard digital products which don't do their print copies justice at all.

[Nreive]

Sure, they may not be preserved to the quality that we're used to, but that's how they're distributing their back catalogue and I can't see it changing.  Their first thought of these eMags was undoubtedly profit, not preservation - they are a commercial business after all. 

Ads are removed from the PDFs because of potential rights issues.  I'm not sure of the ins and outs of this, but I recall Future Publishing stating to CPC Oxygen that they would have to remove any ads from their Amstrad Action archives if requested by any of the companies involved.  Although I don't think anything has come of it.  This is companies covering their backs by having a 'better safe than sorry' attitude.

With 50 issues on one DVD, I'd imagine the games TM mags suffers the same problems.