PC Magazine has been a denizen of the Information Technology world for over 20 years and has been delivered to my doorstep for almost that long a time. Through thick and thin I have enjoyed reading this monthly publication and have used its website religiously to find reviews of IT products and services.
Last December they announce – quite suddenly – that they would no longer be publishing a print version. Ostensibly PC Magazine was falling victim to the same hardships that other print media were experiencing – fewer readers and rising costs. And with the pending decline in the economy and the obvious reduction of advertising dollars, it was probably their only alternative.
I am not real happy with their decision to move to a digital-only format, but I am frankly irate with the way they went about this transformation.
Following the surprise announcement of the change, I had expected to hear something explaining exactly how PC Magazine – or specifically Ziff Davis, the publisher – was going to fulfill the balance of my paid subscription. One month went by, then two, then three. I would think about it and then forget. So last week, a full four months after the last paper issue crossed my threshold, I decided to visit the PC Magazine website to see if I could find out what was going on. This was almost a complete waste of time as ultimately I needed to send them a digital request for information.
To their credit, the PC Mag folks did reply promptly to my query and explained that they had sent the notice to the e-mail address they had on record. This particular e-mail address was the one I used when I first subscribed to the magazine over 10 years ago. It has been out of use for at least 10 years. Needless to say, I never got the notice.
After three or four e-mails back and forth, I now have access to my three past issues. In the new digital system, the magazine content is apparently converted into a proprietary format requiring the use of a special reader software package provided by a company called Zinio. The glitzy “reader” presents the content in a format that mimics the paper copy complete with faux ability to “turn pages” using your mouse. On first blanch, the text is almost impossible to read, but by clicking on the screen, the focus is zoomed in and the text is then too big to allow easy viewing. The whole experience quite frankly sucks – sorry, I could not think of another word.
I just penned an e-mail back to the Customer Service folks at PC Mag and I am sharing it with you here (see below). It summarizes my experience and my next steps.
As you will read in this blog, I have been heavily involved in the movement to make digital content accessible to people with disabilities and have strongly advocated for the creation of universally designed websites. The Zinio/PC Magazine experience is very far from universal design.
So, as we all deal with the forthcoming changes to news and media industry, we will no doubt encounter more of this. I for one will be keeping watch and providing my opinion.
Here is my e-mail to the PC Magazine Customer Service folks:
Thank you for the resolution of this subscription issue. I have now been able to successfully download the past issues of PC Magazine and begun reading them. I must however express my disappointment and dissatisfaction in the process that I needed to engage in order to find out what had happened to my paid subscription.
At the very least, it seems to me that as you folks were planning to move from a printed to a digital version of PC Magazine you may have warned your subscribers of this eventuality and asked them to update their contact information. I apparently first subscribed to PC Magazine over 10 years ago since the e-mail address you have on record has not been used by me for at least that long a time. I have, over this time used the on-line updates from the website to send me some of the various special reports (e.g. Daily News Alert, etc.) and you had my correct e-mail address for those. Due to having the wrong e-mail information, I was missing my subscription for nearly four months.
I understand and can empathize that this has been a difficult time for many in the print publishing business, but I think you need to be more cognizant of your subscribers and work harder to keep the ones you have. Simply switching to digital from paper without notice was not a good move in my book (no pun intended).
Lastly, I must let you know that I will likely not be renewing my subscription to PC Magazine when it expires. I am very sad about this decision and I would like you to understand my reasoning.
Personally, I don’t find reading periodicals online at all satisfying. I tend to read my magazines and newspapers in location where I do not usually have – or want to have – access to a laptop or other digital device. That has been the beauty of paper! That was what I was willing to pay for. As for the content – you currently offer all of the magazine’s content free of charge on your website without needing to use any silly readers which are cumbersome to use and not universally-designed.
Until someone can find a way to digitally replicate the paper-reading experience, I regret that the publishing industry will continue to die, and I will continue to cling on to the last remaining pieces of paper.
Sincerely,
John E. Brandt
Web Design, Development, Consultation
Augusta, Maine USA
www.jebswebs.com
jeb@jebswebs.com
207-622-7937
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