The End of the World as We Know it?

[Jan van Leyden]

In the current Dragon Editorial Steve Winter talks about the change from print publishing to electronic publishing. While he cleverly avoids any concrete, factual information, the transformation of the former magazines seems not to be finished yet. What's more, WotC doesn't seem to have clear idea of what they want to achieve anyway.

Looks like we'll live through some interesting times...

 

[wedgeski]

I'm not sure what your point is?

This is a public reinforcement of policy and a call for feedback on what we like and don't like about WotC's digitial initiative.

 

[Dannager]

I love this. Winter is touching on a discussion that was had here on ENWorld just a couple weeks ago about the nature of online periodicals. Whether he's read it or not, I'm glad that the people in charge over there understand that it's silly to feel like you need to be tethered to holdover practices from a previous era.

 

[Jan van Leyden]

I'm not sure what your point is?

Given that WotC has become rather reluctant to talk about their plans I'm surprised to find a) a text this open and vague and b) in the editorial of Dragon.

 

[rjdafoe]

Digital is the way to go but not compiling the PDFs and still calling them magazines is not. What is the use of continuing to number them when they are really now just individual articles,

 

[Scribble]

Digital is the way to go but not compiling the PDFs and still calling them magazines is not. What is the use of continuing to number them when they are really now just individual articles,

If you read the post, he mentions they no longer actually call them magazines.

Aside from that- a monthly schedule is probably a good way to go at least for now since it works.

If they can find a better way to do their scheduling they'll probably change.

 

[Klaus]

Periodicals, then?

 

[DEFCON 1]

Digital is the way to go but not compiling the PDFs and still calling them magazines is not. What is the use of continuing to number them when they are really now just individual articles,

Well, the most obvious answer is that it's a relatively easy pagination system for finding and displaying said articles. Your choice on that score is either to divide them up per "issue" like we have now (so that you can see in what months each article arrived), or divide them up by article category like we used to have (which makes it easier to find articles about a specific topic or subject, but doesn't tell us which articles are current or new).

 

[the Jester]

Well, the most obvious answer is that it's a relatively easy pagination system for finding and displaying said articles. Your choice on that score is either to divide them up per "issue" like we have now (so that you can see in what months each article arrived), or divide them up by article category like we used to have (which makes it easier to find articles about a specific topic or subject, but doesn't tell us which articles are current or new).

Or both, with options for sortability.

 

[TerraDave]

So many vague hints and suggestions.

Maybe Dannager is right, and its a reaction to all the chatter on what constitutes an "issue" of a "magazine".


Or, everything is going to twitter and facebook. Probably that.