Entertainment Weekly gets iPad publishing right

I’ve been a subscriber and reader of Entertainment Weekly pretty much since it launched. One thing has always annoyed me, being Canadian, is that the magazine would usually arrive in my mailbox well after being on the newsstand. When I got my iPad I was hoping EW would have some digital edition but it did not.

Just a few weeks ago that all changed with the new EW iPad app (also for Kindle, Nook and Galaxy tablets). Now I get my news the day it publishes. No more week old news!

Sure, I still must endure the arrival of the paper edition but I’ll tolerate that for the odd time I want to save one for memories. Plus, the fairly cheap subscription rate makes it a win over a digital only edition price.

What about the app itself and the format of the magazine? Almost perfect!

The magazine flows well and makes use of iPad features to maximize the content on a page. The images are mostly stunning and very high quality. There are links to trailers and to purchase things which I have not tried but seem appropriate. Even the ads link somewhere and are no more intrusive than in the magazine.

Does anyone know of any other publications that are this well presented on the iPad?

New York Post hates iPad users?

So first off, I am Canadian. I don’t subscribe to the New York Post and I don’t visit their site and content very often. But, until today, I was a follower of their Twitter feed. I happened to click on a story they published about Dick Clark’s New stroke and his recovery. Imagine my surprise when I was blocked from viewing the page because I was on my iPad. I was presented with a message that I needed to download the iPad app. Annoying.

The next stage, after annoying, was “WTF”. I see that the New York Post app is $1.99 to TRY it for 30 days. If you like it you can pay something like $60 for 6 months of access.

If I use my computer and go to their site, I can browse the site and look at articles for free.

Huh?

So because I am using an iPad the New York Post wants me to pay them money to read the same articles I can read for free on a computer?

Well, if I was ever inclined to even consider paying for newspaper content, these guys just moved to the bottom on the list. Fortunately, this one article was the first one I’ve clicked on in probably 9 months so no big loss. But, really? $1.99 to TRY the app? Is it a case that they know people won’t subscribe so they figure they might as well get their $2 now while they can?