Readershouse Brand Media and Volkswagen to create 'Das', an innovative magazine for the iPad

The Amsterdam-based Readershouse Brand Media (Rhbm) has produced what it states is "the first European iPad magazine" for its client Volkswagen. The highly animated, video rich magazine, called Das, was released late Friday -- just in time for the iPad's launch in Europe and elsewhere.

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Das, the iPad magazine for VW from
Dutch custom publisher Rhbm. →

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If the Telegraph's Shane Richmond (see below) and others wonder about the value of individual iPad apps for publishers Das is part of the answer.

Rhbm is a custom publisher that produces in-house and marketing materials for clients, mostly automotive firms. CEO Kees Beudeker is quoted as saying of the iPad (translation) "it will require time, but the iPad is a serious medium where your content can be directing and producing. It is an important part of the cross-media mix, alongside the Internet and paper."

For their first effort, Rhbm appeared to take a fresh look at the new medium, rather than ask 'how do we port over our existing material to the iPad?'. By taking a fresh look, they have come up with something that is very different than the Condé Nast efforts that have led the pack so far.

Like the initial Sports Illustrated tablet demo from late last year, Das, opens with video immediately. This then leads into a video of Stephan Grühsam, head of communications for Volkswagen who introduces the magazine.

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An example of the use of animation in VM's iPad magazine, Das

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Don't look for high-quality magazine content, this is a marketing piece. But it is a very useful demonstration piece for publishers who need to see something different in order to "get" the iPad's potential. Not only does the app contain lots of video and animate, it also tries to package the content in different ways.

Unless you are about to buy a new Volkswagen, I doubt iPad owners will be returning frequently to the app, but how often does one pick up promotional material once it has been read? This app will have some shelf-life as those who download it rediscover it on their tablets.

The app itself is a bit buggy. My version crashed upon launch, and crashed again later on. The app is so new that there are only a couple of comments posted in iTunes, two of which complain about the crashes. The other recommends restarting your iPad once the app has installed, then says "Now this is what a digital magazine should be."

I don't know about that, but the work from Rhbm is certainly impressive.

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The section on sound is a bit trite, but contains some good ideas.

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Das can be accused of using eye-candy the same way the SI video did, but like athletes, the best way to show a car is moving and this app can do that. More importantly, it does it at app launch, not just by offering the reader the chance to open a video window. While Rhbm may had the advantage of tailoring content to medium, as opposed to tailoring the medium to the content, Das does serve to give publishers (and their art directors and programmers) some real-world examples to which they can refer back when needed.

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Adobe announces digital magazine reader; lays out roadmap for development of digital publishing platform

Seemingly able to make the necessary adjustments Apple's development rules, Adobe Systems today announced that they have introduced a new digital viewer technology that will will enable publishers to create digital versions of their print magazines for the iPad. The technology was used to produce Wired's iPad app for Condé Nast.

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Adobe's technology was used to create the Wired app for Condé Nast. →

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“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, Creative Solutions at Adobe in a statement. “We aim to make our digital viewer software available to all publishers soon and plan to deliver versions that work across multiple hardware platforms. 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.”

Adobe says that the Wired app was created with InDesign and other Adobe technologies. (See full write-up here.)

Adobe also released a "Digital Publishing Platform Roadmap" which illustrates the timeline for new introductions that will support publishers. The roadmap shows that the company's iPad solution will be available in the summer (presumably now), which a multi-platform solution will be ready to support other products by Fall. That would probably include Android-based tablets that many believe will being to appear later this year.

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← Adobe Roadmap
      click to enlarge.

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The roadmap spells out digital publishing solutions for magazine, newspaper, book and retail catalog publishers.

"Publishers around the world are striving to embrace the digital age — to build distinctive brands, develop sustainable business strategies, and achieve greater profitability. They're looking for innovative, cost-effective ways to design and deliver content to fragmented audiences on an ever-expanding array of smartphones, tablets, e-readers, and other devices," Adobe's website proclaims.

The Telegraph uses three articles to say magazines have a ways to go on the iPad

Maybe they have a word limit over at the Telegraph, one of the U.K.'s leading newspapers, because Shane Richmond writes about the experience of reading magazines on the iPad and is forced into three short posts -- I suppose I'll cut him some slack and figure that he (like me) was writing on the go.

In his first post, Apple iPad magazine apps: bringing back the 1990s, Richmond calls efforts from Wired, Popular Science and others "gimmicky" and says they lack "real engagement". What I find strange about the comment is that most of these first efforts for the iPad are rather minimal. So if the magazines lack "engagement" would this be the fault of the app or iPad, or the fault of the magazine itself? How can a print magazine be more engaging that an exact electronic replica of it?

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The Telegraph's Shane Richmond prefers the reading experience on the iPad's browser to individual apps. Good thing, too, the Telegraph doesn't have an app on the iPad. →

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Richmond's second post is even shorter, More on iPad magazines: the future is never now, in which is simply referring to this post from Oliver Reichenstein. But then Richmond seems to be coming around stating: "Despite two posts criticising magazine apps, I must say that I do think what’s been done so far shows promise. What I hope to do is temper some of the ‘woo-hoo! the media is saved’ enthusiasm that has been doing the rounds in recent weeks."

Richmond's third post, iPad magazines, part 3: The browser is often better, questions the need for individual apps. Want an answer, here it is: because an app is not a website.

A newspaper has one website, one URL; an app opens up infinite possibilities. An app can be audio/video only, it can be specialized, it can be general, it can be anything you want to be including an abject failure. But a website is one URL that serves the various needs of a publication, and had damn well better succeed at drawing in readers or it will be redesigned.

The New York Times can not dedicate its entire website to real estate, but it can (and has) dedicated an entire app to real estate. A website has to be accessible to everyone, an app has to be accessible only to the owners of the reading device.

Further, how do you read a magazine (or newspaper) online without an Internet connection? Many of the newest magazines apps are self-contained, or nearly so, allowing reading on the go. Then there is the Financial Times app, maybe the smartest media app yet, that allows you to download the latest version before going offline -- brilliant! as the Brits would say.

My guess is that the Telegraph's Richmond will soon begin to love the idea of apps -- it is what makes the iPhone and iPad tick. And if it appears that I'm picking on Mr. Richmond than that is not my intent. It should be remembered that the iPad has been available stateside for almost two months and many early critics of the device are coming around now that they have lived with it.

But the key for media is definitely apps -- whether individual apps, or app written by third parties like Zinio.  Apps will also be the secret weapon of Google TV. While the focus of many reporters is on searching television programming, Google eyes bringing the app experience to the flatscreen not only as a way of bringing in new content, but of capturing television advertising dollars -- and don't look now but here comes Apple, too.

The magazine (and newspaper) "app" is what will allow single title publishers to create empires. Assuming, of course, they stop being old school and adopt the development model of modern publishing.

Morning Brief: Two million iPads sold in less than 60 days;

In case you missed it over the Memorial Day holiday . . .

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Skype said yesterday that users of the Nokia N900 will soon be able to make two-way video calls using Skype. Russ Shaw, the company’s vice president of Skype Mobile told GigaOM that this service will be available soon on other mobile clients, as well. With Apple introducing a new iPhone next week with a front facing camera, this means Skype users who own iPhones will soon be able to video conference.

“We are going to do video calling across all our platforms and are agnostic about the operating system and carriers,” Shaw said.

On Saturday Skype wrote on its own blog that it had released an updated client for the iPhone that will allow users to make calls using the phone's 3G. They also announced that soon they will begin charging for the service (that didn't go down well with iTunes reviewers).

The funny part is that Skype had no idea that their updated app had actually made it onto iTunes. Apple's strange approval process meant that Skype had submitted their update and were waiting themselves to see its appearance in iTunes. On Friday the app appeared catching Skype a bit off guard -- hence the Saturday blog post.

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Apple announced on Monday that it had sold two million iPads in less than 60 days. "Customers around the world are experiencing the magic of iPad, and seem to be loving it as much as we do," said Steve Jobs, Apple's CEO. "We appreciate their patience, and are working hard to build enough iPads for everyone."

In a typical press release for Apple (short) the company brags about its recent successes and then signs off. The company, like Google, gets more than enough press anyway, right?

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The two million mark is a good enough time to review some of those prediction (and post-prediction) stories about the iPad:

Bold Prediction: iPad will Flop -- GottaBeMobile

Bill Gates Joins the iPad's Army of Critics -- BNet

Prediction hell: How dumb do Bill Gates & Microsoft's iPad, Surface predictions look now? -- ZDNet

Why the iPad will fail and help Windows 7 to succeed -- WorldTech24

Microsoft's Courier Tablet Depends on iPad, HP for Success -- GUWiSe

MS Courier, HP Slate Canceled? -- jkOnTheRun

Wall Street expects Apple's 'risky' iPad to sell 1M-5M in first year -- AppleInsider

Apple Sells Two Million iPads in Less Than 60 Days -- Apple PR

Classifieds move from print to online to mobile; watch for developers to seize the opportunity to move in

I hope your Memorial Day is a pleasant one. I have written a couple of posts for today that look at a couple mobile/tablet media apps that were released late Friday (see Newsweek post below). Normal reporting will resume on Tuesday.

My first real management job in the newspaper business was as classified sales manager, leading my teams of inside and outside salespeople. In the eighties newspapers still dominated classified advertising but already realtors were beginning to produce their own publications, and auto traders were nipping away at our automotive lineage.

The greatest frustration I faced as a CAM was convincing management that we shouldn't be complacent. It was hopeless, and eventually I moved on to McGraw-Hill and into trade publishing.

Today, most people associate help-wanted advertising with Monster.com and CareerBuilder, real estate listings reside with Realtor.com and local publications and websites, personal property and miscellaneous categories are dominated by Craig's List, and the auto category seems to be spread out everywhere -- including newspapers in many markets.

Mobile presents, therefore, a threat to not only the newspapers who still have a sliver of the classified market, but also the online companies that have arisen in the last couple of decades. The opportunity to aggregate online information into new mobile forms also presents developers (as well as publishers that transform their companies into app development machines) with the opportunity to enter and dominate the market.

As of today there are dozens of dedicated real estate apps for smartphones (mostly the iPhone), the vast majority of them coming from the new online players in the space: Zillow, Realtor.com, Homes.com and the like. The New York Times is one of the few newspaper companies to jump into the space with their own app.

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From smartphones to tablets

One of the companies that early on saw the value to moving into mobile was web-based Zip Realty, headquartered in the Bay Area. Their iPhone application uses maps and A.R. to produce a more interactive tool for buying and selling a home.

This last week Zip Realty updated their app and now the app is universal so that iPad owners can use take advantage. Without a camera, the tablet version can not use this feature, but the added display size is a big advantage when trying to judge the attractiveness of a property.

This is one reason why the tablet may serve a different function in the real estate segment than the smartphone. An iPhone can be carried around, and when the customer finds a property for sale quickly open an app on their phone and get additional information -- not only about the property for sale, but also about comps, schools, etc.

A tablet, on the other hand, is a perfect browsing tool -- like your Sunday newspaper, I suppose, but with more listings, more pictures, more information.

Because of this, the few apps that have launched for the iPad in the real estate category have been more like real estate magazines (with the exception of the Zillow and Zip apps). In facet, some have been just that -- real estate magazines such as Atlanta Homes & Lifestyle from PixelMags, Angeleno Interiors, the Modern Luxury Media title developed by Blue Toad, etc.

One that is both a functional real estate tool and a magazine was the Propriétés de France app released on Friday by Aden Classifieds, a leading online classified company from France. Their dedicated iPad app takes advantage of the added real estate (sorry for the pun) afforded by the tablet display to present properties in a grand style.

In fact, this is one app where the screenshots I took are not as attractive as the ones the company uses in iTunes -- after all, when you can show beautiful properties along the Mediterranean and in the Alpes there is no reason to submit boring screenshots to Apple.

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Classified advertising used to be the lifeblood of most newspapers -- and it certainly was when I was a CAM. The loss of the classified, in my opinion, has had a far bigger impact on modern newspapers than all the content aggregation and other online developers of the past decade, though you simply can't tell that to all the journalism gurus out there that insist its all about content.

The opportunity to win classified advertising back to newspapers was lost years ago, if there ever was that chance to begin with. The opportunity to be a player in classified advertising, though, exists whenever new mediums are created by technology. The smartphone and tablet markets are just evolving now and both established and new companies will compete in the space.

Newsweek releases iPad app, discounts issues

With first bids due no later that 5:00 PM ET on June 2nd, Newsweek staffers are preparing for new ownership, while at the same time moving forward with new projects such as developing the weekly news magazine's first iPad app. Released late Friday, the app is free to download and gives readers access to a small special issue, Politics in the Age of Obama, as well as five issues, each priced at $2.99.

The special issue is described by Jon Meacham, editor of Newsweek, as "our inaugural offering" for the iPad -- meaning, I assume, that the issues offered of sale are merely issues ported over to the device.

"Every generation makes its own mark, only a few, however, profoundly change the future," Meacham writes in grandiose fashion in the editor's intro. "For nearly six centuries, the generation that gave us Gutenberg and the printing press has shaped humanity in an infinitely of ways."

"It is clear that we are now living in a time and among innovators who are likely to be remembered as the Gutenbergs of a new age. As digital platforms take the place of the printed page as the central means of media, Steve Jobs's iPad is a landmark development," Meacham writes.

Later Meachan states that Newsweek plans to "make for use of this emerging technology," referring to the iPad. But that is for the future, for the issues offered, including the special issue that is their "inaugural offering" does not really take advantage of what the medium can do. Yes, the photographs do pop from the "pages" as the tablet's display can render color and resolution in greater clarity of detail than the printed page might. But the short special issue includes no embedded or streamed video or audio, and wouldn't Obama have been a good subject in which to use these tools?

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Left: Cover for special issue included for free in Newsweek's iPad app.
Right: photographs and cartoons (B&W!) are used extensively throughout.

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Despite the fact that the "cover" price of $2.99 per issue represents a discount off the cover price, some early reviewers of the app have panned it as still too expensive. Frankly, anything other than free will get negative reviews on iTunes, so I'm not sure these complaints are valid.

But the pricing does reflect a decision (I believe) to go after single issue buyers, rather than subscribers.

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