Adobe Systems has debuted a reader application for tablet computers based on input from Wired magazine, the first to use the format. Adobe's David Burkett said users of InDesign CS5 will be "well on your way" to producing digital publications. The Wired Reader app takes a while to download the first 520-megabyte digital version.
Hoping to marry the design and feel of a print magazine with the "dynamic interactivity of digital media," Adobe Systems has debuted a reader application for tablet computers based heavily on input from Wired magazine, the first publication to use the format.
Available from Apple's App Store for $4.99, the Wired Reader adds video Relevant Products/Services, slideshows and 360-degree panorama images to traditional magazine layouts and allows zooming and rotating pages with touch gestures. Readers can also zoom out to see the full magazine content displayed. For now, the Wired Reader only reads Wired, but other titles are likely to follow.
'Immersive Experience
"Adobe's work with Wired has resulted in a digital magazine format that creates an immersive experience, allowing a publication's unique content, look and feel, and advertising to stand out in the digital realm," said David Burkett, vice president and general manager of creative solutions at Adobe.
He added that Adobe will soon make the design software available to any interested publisher and create versions for other devices, such as PCs and smartphones. "It's safe to say that if you are already working in InDesign CS5, you'll be well on your way to producing a beautiful digital version of your publication," Burkett said.
Adobe also pointed out the program's profit potential, allowing the creation of interactive ads that enable engagement with a brand name within the magazine format and providing incremental revenues.
"Our partnership with Adobe allowed us to re-imagine and rebuild a print issue into an amazing digital-magazine experience on iPad," said Thomas J. Wallace, editorial director of Condé Nast, Wired's parent company. "We expect to use this technology to deliver more of our publications over the coming months."
Big Bytes
In the meantime, said Jeff Orr, a mobile-devices analyst for ABI Research, the application has a limited audience, particularly since, at 520 megabytes, a magazine like the first digital issue of Wired will take a chunk of time to download and may exceed the maximum allowance of a user's data Relevant Products/Services plan if using a 3G tablet.
"It may be good if you are willing to wait for it," said Orr. "I suspect that over time the content will be scaled back so they won't try to deliver such a huge package. Right now, users don't have the ability to download a section of a magazine or a column. Condé Nast will want you to read from cover to cover."
Orr said Apple's agreement to include the Wired Reader in its App Store was "interesting" given the feud between Apple and Adobe over the usefulness of its Flash player, which is not supported on the iPhone, iPad or iPod touch.
"I don't think Apple can necessarily block Adobe as a developer platform," he said. "Adobe's announcement that Condé Nast has used Adobe CS5 tools for the development of the Wired magazine iPad app demonstrates that Apple isn't harboring bad feelings about philosophical differences it might have with Adobe or other application framework developers."
In fact, he said, the Wired Reader stands to boost Apple's iPad sales by adding to a limited supply of content. "One of the concerns at the iPad launch is that there is not a whole lot of content agreements in place because they didn't find a lot of publishers," Orr said
