All this is why, my friends, I will be bringing a designated amount of money with me to WOTS this Sunday, and will not allow myself to take out any additional cash or use any credit or debit cards. Because as much as I’d like to leave the festival carrying as many books as the guy pictured on the right, I’d probably break my back (and my bank account).

Whether you’re a book lover or a magazine lover, if you live near Toronto, Vancouver, Halifax, or Kitchener, get yourself to The Word on the Street festival this Sunday.

{Photo by Garry Knight}

Of course, the first problem is that for Amusement’s readers to benefit from this feature they must own a home-based RFID reader, such as Violet’s Mir:ror which retails for $59. But the even bigger problem is how this so-called innovation is making consumers resoundingly ask, “WHY?”

The press release issued by Amusement to announce the coming issue asks readers several questions of their own: “What if a magazine of merely 700g could consist of paper, ink, electronic components and digital content all at the same time? What if the contents of a magazine could go on living forever in cyberspace? What if the difference between written and digital text finally becomes one in the same?” And now while I’m aware that these are rhetorical questions, I still feel compelled to answer.

I understand the desire to bridge the gap between the print and digital versions of a magazine, but I don’t see how using a technology that still has such a small home user base is a logical solution. For years magazines (particularly in the design and technology fields) have included CD- and DVD-ROMs as electronic supplements to their print issues. More recently, some magazines have made exclusive online content available only to subscribers, such as New Scientist‘s model of having full text articles from their archives available on their website if you are a subscriber to the magazine. These methods of uniting print and web are useful, successful, and, most importantly, simple. I understand that RFID technology is a new and exciting advancement right now, but until it becomes more mainstream, I don’t see it as a sensible way to bring together print and digital magazines.

What do you think about Amusement magazine’s decision to add an RFID tag with exclusive content to their print edition? If you bought this issue, would you think of the tag as a useful advancement, or would you toss it in the garbage?

Although far from being a work of art (think thrift store Maxim: scantily-clad women and new gadgets, but only 12 pages of it), this innovation should be discussed separately from its dubious quality. Strangely enough, The Magazine originally started publishing their e-zine through a Facebook app and then moved their wares over to their own website. Now readers-on-the-go can visit the iTunes store to buy a “lifetime subscription” for the current sale price of 99 cents (regularly $1.99), allowing them access to all new issues and the mag’s complete archive.

So, of course, the big question: Is The Magazine an odd one-off idea or the beginning of a new trend for online magazines? Although I love my iPod Touch, I’m not actually a fan of most of the e-reader apps currently available for it, as I find that I don’t enjoy reading a large amount of a text on such a small screen. So for me, personally, I doubt that I would opt to read my favourite mags on my iPod, as I’d much rather read my latest issue of Quill & Quire by flipping the paper pages, and the newest articles on Slate by clicking through on my laptop.

I am, however, primarily thinking about magazines that focus more on long articles rather than briefs and pictures. Would a magazine like Maxim or even the photo-heavy National Geographic work better in this medium? I’m still not sure I’d go for it, but I do believe that there would be a market for it and that it’s increasingly becoming a possibility. How do you feel about reading magazines electronically on-the-go? Would you feel comfortable reading long-form essays or browsing through photo journalism on your iPhone?

1. New York Magazine
The New York Magazine website stands out from the crowd as an exemplary online magazine due to its wide array of web 2.0 features. Visitors to the online version of this print magazine become active participants in the website’s offerings through RSS feeds of articles, blogs on various themes including food and entertainment, bookmarking tools, streaming video, and sidebar widgets for tags and popular posts.

All of these tools enable readers to have an interactive visit to the New York Magazine website, rather than a passive one. Tools such as the RSS feeds and blogs are of great benefit to the publisher and editors of the website as they are efficient ways to deliver content to the reader. The bookmarking tools at the bottom of each article act as an easy way for the reader to share the magazine’s content with others, thus increasing traffic to the website. The New York Magazine website also features sidebar widgets for popular tags and posts. This function can be very helpful from a marketing and advertising point of view because it is an easy way to determine what readers are most interested in.

2. Fast Company
A website for a business/technology magazine should, by definition, lead the pack in advanced features, and fortunately Fast Company’s site does not disappoint. The online version of Fast Company features many web 2.0 features including RSS feeds of articles, bookmarking tools, sidebar widgets, and streaming video.

As with the New York Magazine, these web 2.0 features make the site more easily accessible and interactive for the reader and more successful and informational to the publisher, editors, marketers, and advertisers. Most interesting, however, is the magazine’s use of streaming video, not only within their main website, but also through an off-shoot site called Fast Company TV which is a business video network designed exclusively for the web. This site is also a fantastic web 2.0 site with features such as sharing tools, RSS feeds, embed tools, and widgets. Also of note are the diverse sidebar widgets on each page of the site, including photo galleries, videos, the most popular Fast Company stories on Digg, and the most recently active groups within the forum section of the magazine’s site. These unique features help build a larger community aspect to the online version of Fast Company, thus likely helping to build a bigger subscription base for the print magazine as well.

3. Slate
Slate, the sole online-only magazine in this analysis, uses several web 2.0 features to assist the reader in becoming more engaged in the online reading experience. The primary tools used by Slate include RSS feeds of articles, bookmarking tools, sidebar widgets for the most read and most e-mailed articles, blogs, podcasts, and streaming video.

Like the Fast Company website, Slate Magazine also has an off-shoot video site: Slate V. Again, the Slate video website is just as web 2.0-friendly as the original Slate site, if not even more so. Features for this site include RSS feeds, sharing tools, embed tools, and widgets. The video website acts as a major support system to the original magazine site, providing more content for more users. Through this additional venue, the magazine is using web 2.0 to build its brand directly through itself, rather than with an external platform such as Facebook or Twitter.