PC Magazine is the perfect “airplane” magazine … for me. It takes about an hour to read it cover to cover, and while you’re reading it, you can write on the pages, or tear out pages for future reference, and then discard what’s left over after the flight.
Alternatively, you can read it in your easy chair, in bed or even in … well, you know what I’m talking about. Right? That is, until a few months ago when they stopped publishing the magazine and put the rest of my subscription on Zinio.
Zinio is an electronic magazine service. You can either use your browser to read magazines on-line, or Zinio offers a Windows or Mac off-line reader (but no Linux reader) for those times you’re not on-line. But either way, you need a computer to read your magazines. There are obviously a number of places where a computer just isn’t as convenient as a paper magazine. Right?
I was pretty upset when PC Magazine stopped “paper” publishing – My airplane magazine was gone, and I really don’t like the idea of spending an hour on my PC just to read a magazine about computers. I’m probably going to let the subscription lapse. They’re going to lose me as a customer.
On the other hand, another magazine I only skim just went to Zinio as well. Actually, they’re still publishing both paper and on-line, but I think I know where this is going. I enjoy reading this second magazine on-line because all the links make it easy to jump from article to article without turning pages. So when the printed magazine finally arrives a day or two after the electronic version, I promptly throw it in the recycle bin – I’ve already read it. If they stop printing this second magazine, I doubt I’ll miss it.
Skimming? Zinio is good. Reading cover to cover? Zinio is bad. Check it out for yourself:
