Read the NY Times paper, without paper

This is another nail in the coffin for standalone electronic literature readers, in my opinion. Microsoft Vista will include functionality to replicate the New York Times look and feel in a digital version on any notebook or desktop. Dubbed "Times Reader", the electronic version of the daily paper was demonstrated at the annual American Society of Newspaper Editions meeting. The New York Times is debating on a charge for the electronic version of the paper; my guess is that a limited content edition will be available for free while full New York Times subscribers will likely receive the entire digital edition at no additional charge. Again, just my guess at this point, but it's clear that Vista will support downloading and formatting of newspapers. The Times Reader function includes some great features such as annotating and clipping docs, slide shows of the images and a seven-day archive.

No exact details on if this reader software in Vista will also support magazines, which is likely of great interest to the folks over at Zinio. I've used Zinio for years to subscribe to and read digital versions of my favorite magazines and the experience has been outstanding. Hmm...yesterday it was BitLocker and today it's electronic print media in Vista; are you getting compelled to plan an upgrade to Vista?

-kct

Comments

[Josh Einstein]

Avalon and XML paper are really going to raise the bar on the look and feel of applications that the web will have a very hard time catching up with, in my opinion. I am really looking forward to it.

[Kevin]

The Times Reader is about all harnessing the benefits of the Web today (URL deployment, connectivity, interactivity, dynamic content, etc) while taking content presentation and readability to the next level (sophisticated layouts, pagination, readable column, hyphenation, clear type, optimal paragraph, rich annotations, embedded fonts, etc etc). And, in the NYT's Reader implementation, the reader can be installed on the system to provide offline capability. The content isn’t static - just smarter about caching. When connected, new content flows in.

This is good for readers, publishers and advertisers. Readers get a great reading experience with rich content, mobile and offline. Publishers can actually bring their design expertise to the Web medium and, unlike the fixed document displays of today (like Zinio or PDF), this new reader will adapt the content and presentation to whatever display it’s running on so it's always readable (no scrolling or panning required). Advertisers get much richer and better integrated ad placement opportunties (the sophisticated layout makes this possible).
Wait for the beta and judge for yourselves.

[Dave Rakowski]

Perhaps I'm missing something, but exactly how is this different from what I've been doing for the past 5 years with the Times via Newsstand?

http://newsstand.com/

Dave Rakowski
Allentown, PA

[Pam]

Dave, I was asking myself the same question. However, I am still very interested in the iRex Iliad because of the better battery life I can expect compared to my tablet pc.

[Louis Crowe]

Hi,

I've read your comments on reading papers on the web with interest. What stuck me some years ago was that the problem is that people don't like reading on-screen. We've addressed that quite well at ReadPal. You can also read a lot quiker and with less strain.

Try it out. (You and your readers can try it out for free - trail use or use a coupon "48" to be pasted into the coupon box in the purchase page).

Let me know what you think?

Thanks and all the best.
Louis

[wow powerleveling]

Readers get a great reading experience with rich content, mobile and offline. I do suggest that, strongly, lol~