Barnes and Noble Launches Digital Magazine Downloads

Bookseller Barnes & Noble has announced the launch of digital magazine downloads today. The company says the magazines will be at discounts "up to" 90% below normal printed retail. While I don't know the actual figures, I have to believe that printing and mailing make up a decent amount of a magazine's cost.

Years ago I remember some magazine (forget which) providing an immediate digital copy on the day of printing and then your printed copy would still arrive in the mail several days later. This is the model I see working. Barnes & Noble will also offer over 12,000 past issues -- this could be a strong winner for those individuals doing research.

MG over at VentureBeat has the details on Zinio, the company powering these very exciting digital downloads. MG says the issue here is whether people will want to read magazines online. The issue is completely different in my opinion. With the ability to pick up nearly any magazine for pennies at FatWallet (and other cheap subs sites) and/or the ability to get many magazines for free, what's the benefit to downloading the magazine? If you say it's to get the content faster, hogwash -- the content from the magazine is almost always available on the Web site even before the magazine hits the news stand.

For me printed magazines work when the laptop doesn't -- subway and airplanes up to 10,000 feet. How will a digital version replace these? Free with ads or free with print subscription are the only ways this digital magazine option might work.