Send in the cloud

Some interesting news from MagCloud, the HP-run service that offers print on demand for magazines. As of today, they’re offering a few new services:

Firstly, and long overdue: worldwide shipping. (UPDATE: only for single issues though. If you want to buy more than one mag, you have to pay separate shipping each time.) Not sure how cost-effective the rates are, but if it’s affordable, it makes the entire service far more attractive for publishers all over the world. Recommended purchases for those new to the party: Strange Light, Onè Respe, and the Life Woodstock reprint (sadly without the ads of the day). Even custom publishers are using it.

Secondly, perfect binding. For a flat rate of $1, on-demand publishers can now perfect bind any mag (only saddle-stitching has been allowed until now). I’ve not seen a sample yet to know how it holds, but it’s an important step towards making professional-feeling magazines. Publishers can upload their own spines, or let the MagCloud system generate it for them. Minimum page count is 20; it also increases the maximum size of a MagCloud mag to 384 pages, and means that magazines no longer have to have page counts in multiples of four.

Thirdly, and most left-fieldly, an iPad application. An opt-in for all publishers on MagCloud, readers can download the free MagCloud app, and then select the magazines they want to read, which are downloaded for offline reading within the app. They’ve created an interface that allows for portrait and landscape viewing, with a simple zoom function, and downloads are a fraction of the size of the print pdf. And if you want a printed copy, you simply hit the “Buy in Print” button at the top right, and an iFrame opens up to a shopping cart on the MagCloud website.

Though I haven’t played with it yet, the app sounds pretty basic. There are no functions to copy/paste text or to share pages with anyone, and you can’t transfer your downloads to read on any other device. There’s also no option to sell digital editions within the app – right now, all those who opt in have to offer their iPad editions for free, though I’m told that a pay-for option is in the works.

When it first launched, I mentioned that a tie-in with Issuu would make sense for MagCloud. Seems like they’re simply making their own competitor. If HP only made printers, I’d say that this was a curious move. However, as a huge company with so many fingers in so many technological pies, perhaps only a company like HP could offer such a joined-up selection of publishing possibilities.

By the time that the iPad app reaches its second or third iteration, and with a few tweaks to their print service, MagCloud could just be the best thing that ever happened to small magazine publishers, in whatever format they want to publish in. Right now, it’s certainly well on the way.