The publishing industry is undergoing a lot of change; just read a few posts on Print CEO by Bob Sacks (BoSacks) and see how - and how fast! Or you could read any number of Pixels vs (and) Paper pieces that have appeard here on WhatTheyThink Going Green.
Today we talk with HP's Andrew Bolwell who heads up the team researching and developing new, online marketplaces for buying and selling custom and niche magazines combined with print on demand fulfillment.
What is MagCloud?
Small independent magazine publishers, online content creators, schools, universities and small businesses can custom publish electronic copies of current and back issues of their magazines and make them available to a broader readership thanks to the MagCloud web portal.
MagCloud takes on the heavy lifting for publishers by providing automated magazine ordering, print management, and advertising aggregation services. Think of MagCloud as a virtual magazine newsstand in the cloud. Readers can discover and order a magazine via the MagCloud web portal and have it delivered right to their doorstep; all while MagCloud is managing the process for publishers.
You may choose to listen to today's audio interview here - it's about 17 minutes - or you can download the MP3 file (17MB) by right-clicking here and "saving" the file.
Listen to it on your iPhone, iPod or other MP3 player. Here are some of the topics we discuss:
The current magazine publishing model is hugely wasteful. More than 62% of all magazines published – nearly 2 billion copies – are never sold. We’re not talking just about paper waste; we’re talking about the manufacturing process, the labor, distribution costs, the whole works.
A lot of the debate on the Internet – print is dead, e-readers vs. print, the Internet is killing the print publishing industry – is nothing more than “red herrings.”
The Internet can have a transformative effect on the print publishing industry as we know it.
MagCloud is a tool for a professional or mainstream publisher to create a publication that is sold before it is printed, but it can also be a consumer-driven self-publishing tool; i.e., YouTube for magazines.
Pricing for MagCloud magazines doesn’t end up in the same tier as the “$19.95/12 issues” model. Advertising is the problem; advertising can be the solution.
MagCloud democratizes publishing like Lulu.com does for books, Snapfish does for photos books, and Spoonflower does for fabrics on demand.
Blogs, wikis, and online communities can go from online to offline publishing and generate new revenue streams.
MagCloud is not a destination site, there is an API to allow someone to embed the process in a website sites for both publication and purchase.
The publishing industry is undergoing a lot of change; just read a few posts on Print CEO by Bob Sacks (BoSacks) and see how - and how fast! Or you could read any number of Pixels vs (and) Paper pieces that have appeard here on WhatTheyThink Going Green.
Today we talk with HP's Andrew Bolwell who heads up the team researching and developing new, online marketplaces for buying and selling custom and niche magazines combined with print on demand fulfillment.
What is MagCloud?
Small independent magazine publishers, online content creators, schools, universities and small businesses can custom publish electronic copies of current and back issues of their magazines and make them available to a broader readership thanks to the MagCloud web portal.
MagCloud takes on the heavy lifting for publishers by providing automated magazine ordering, print management, and advertising aggregation services. Think of MagCloud as a virtual magazine newsstand in the cloud. Readers can discover and order a magazine via the MagCloud web portal and have it delivered right to their doorstep; all while MagCloud is managing the process for publishers.
You may choose to listen to today's audio interview here - it's about 17 minutes - or you can download the MP3 file (17MB) by right-clicking here and "saving" the file.
Listen to it on your iPhone, iPod or other MP3 player. Here are some of the topics we discuss:
