Many iPad users have noted that magazines on the iPad may be disappointing, unintuitive, and even just plain frustrating. There have been a few great implementations, such as Wired’s iPad version, or The Daily. But besides the notable few, it’s been a dissapointing journey to behold. Apple may be doing something to remedy this, however, by releasing an Xcode template specifically for magazines.
The template is an interesting idea, especially if Apple would go so far as to support usage of the template in Pages, allowing for much more intuitive editing and creation of the content that would be available. I particularly appreciated MacGasm’s comments on the matter:
I’m not going to lie, we’ve tossed around creating a digital magazine for the iPad, but as it stands, it’s just not cost-effective for us yet. If Apple were to create a simple template, and support in something like Pages, we’d be more than willing to throw our hat in the ring. As it stands now, a successful magazine not only needs great writers, but now it needs editors, graphic designers, videographers, photographers and programmers. Apple already has a bunch of applications that address things like videography and photography, as well as “desktop publishing,” so if they could wrap all of their applications up with a pretty bow that lets users publish digital magazines to the iPad, they might see a lot of innovation from startups and independent publishers.
I, for one, think this is a brilliant direction for Apple to go in, since they have an indisputable level of style and ease that could greatly benefit the vast majority of digital magazines that are floating around there for the iPad. Currently, I personally cannot see myself replacing all my magazines with an iPad, but with time, and Apple’s unique vision guiding developers along the right path, perhaps the future could be brighter for me in that regard.
What about you? Do you use iPad-based magazines? Would you use them more if they were better? Sound off in the comments!
Electronista via MacGasm
