TeleRead: Bring the E-Books Home

News & views on e-books, libraries, publishing and related topics

Archive for the ‘Zinio’ Category

Zinio is reaching for the iPhone bandwagon

Friday, April 24th, 2009

By Steve Jordan

This site has mentioned Zinio before (though I think it’s been awhile)… the online magazine reader-slash-service is slowly adding more magazines to its list of subscriptions and single-purchase stock, making it a nice way to move from paper to digital in your magazine reading.

And now, Zinio Labs is working on an app that will allow iPhone and iTouch users to peruse their magazines. The newsstand, issue browse, page zoom and share functions will be included, just like in the full-size Zinio app for the PC. How soon? Sign up for e-mail updates, and I’m sure you’ll find out as soon as the rest of us do. (I’d include a photo, but they’re locked inside their flash-based promo, so you’ll have to see it there.)

Personally, I like the potential of Zinio, though it still has a few bugs and quirks that keep me from throwing 100% of my support behind it. I’ve had issues with text readability on full-size screens, and their download interface can be stubborn on my PC (then again, I have way too many competing apps on my PC, so that may not be Zinio’s issue at all). Also, Zinio’s publishers do have the capability of applying DRM, sometimes limiting your ability to print a page, for example.

On the other hand, I recently discovered an easy way to rotate my laptop screen 90%, allowing Zinio mag pages to assume almost full size (I use F keys as hotlinks), which makes them a lot more useful in my book.

It may be interesting to see how these issues, especially readability of small type, will be addressed on the iPhone. Zinio presents its magazines as-is, not reflowed or recomposed for smaller screens, and it’s anybody’s guess whether or not this will be considered anything but an annoyance on an iPhone.

Posted in Zinio, e-book, e-book ergonomics, iPhone and iPod Touch | 2 Comments » | Read more..