Quincy Jones Speaks the Truth, Will Try to “Save” Vibe

Yesterday came word that Vibe Magazine was folding.  Not all that surprising in this climate.

Now comes word that the magazine’s founder, Quincy Jones, is trying to take the title back and create an online-0nly version of Vibe.  One can argue that plenty of magazines are or will try this approach and will or already have failed.

That said, it is refreshing to hear someone from Jones’ generation say something like this:

“We gotta get into the 21st century you know,” Jones said. ” “Print and all that stuff is over, we gotta remember that. The Chicago Tribune, The Seattle Post Intelligencer. The Miami Herald. They’re over the same way as the record business. We have got to get into this century.”      LINK

If more publishers and studio execs would make the same admission they might at least have a fighting chance in the digital age.  But I’m not going to hold my breath.

The Notificator Beat Twitter by Over 70 Years

BoingBoing points out a great story from the archives of Modern Mechanix magazine, a description of a device known as the Notificator:

The user walks up on a small platform in front of the machine, writes a brief message on a continuous strip of paper and drops a coin in the slot. The inscription moves up behind a glass panel where it remains in public view for at least two hours so that the person for whom it is intended may have sufficient time to observe the note at the appointed place. The machine is similar in appearance to a candy-vending device.   LINK

It seems one of these devices was actual put into service in London in 1935 and according to a lengthier description of the device, it looks like it was in service until sometime in 1938.

Sadly, it looks like none of the original paper rolls survived.  That would have been a priceless archive of information about the daily lives of Londoners in the 1930’s.  Actually, it would probably look a lot like my Twitter stream, and thus prove worthless from an historial perspective.

If nothing else, the existence of the Notificator, which is really just a fancy bulletin board, proves that humans have always had the desire to broadcast even their simplest needs into the public ether.

Conde Nast Takes Big Risk Pulling Back Online Efforts

It is being fairly widely reported that dead tree media giant Conde Nast is pulling back on plans to launch new websites for a number of it’s key magazines includng Details and GQ.

Conde Nast recently took a bit of a hit online recently, finally calling it quits on tween-girl site Flip.com – though I’m not sure it was ever a central effort.

The question is, while it is surely a tough time financially for Conde Nast, is it wise to circle the wagons around the shrinking print editions and ignore the obviously expanding world of digitial media?  There are very few reasons left to buy magazines and  the number of reasons is not likely to go up as technology expands.

We will have to see if this is just a calculated delay by CN while they figure out their strategy or is just burying of heads in the sand?

Zinio On the iPhone – Free Magazines (even Playboy…)

Image via Wikipedia

Ok, I am not sure how they are able to do this but if you go to www.zinio.com/iphone in your iphone safari browser you can read perfect digital scans of tons of major magazines (even Playboy and Penthouse…).

Can’t tell is these are all the most recent newstand issues or if they are only letting you get a look at previous issues but either way this is pretty cool and the interface is neat to.

Looks like another nail in the coffin for Dead Tree Media.