It amazing to see how far technology has taken us nowadays, even books and magazines are being reinvented with the wonder that in the Internet. When I was a child, I remember reading simple storybooks that transported to a world of fantasy. That itself was magical to me. My parents made sure that I was well equipped with books because back then, it was the only way of developing a child’s mind. Nowadays, children seem more tech savvy than I am with the ability to use digital devices that allows them to download unlimited amount of information and because of this awareness amongst children these days, publishers are now taking notice and have come up with the idea of online children magazines that would help reshape their minds.
Sivek (2011) wrote an article for Public Broadcasting Service about the revolution of online magazines that cater for young children. Apparently established publishers of well know children resources are now venturing into new heights in order to get the attention of their audiences. The purpose for the online venture is to inspire people who put effort in digital magazines for adults and to mould a younger generation in being an urban experienced bunch of reader through digital media. With this, publishers take advantage of educating and informing with the availability of application downloads. Timbuktu as an example off an iPad news magazine that makes boring news seem fun and exciting by designing kid friendly layouts with added video and graphics. This allows children to understand news and learn from it. Furthermore, well-known publishers like Ladybug and Cricket are also boarding this revolution train by offering their versions of children magazines with their very own iPhone app’s. The main concern is the introduction of digital magazine to children and how accessible is it for children. There are also concerns for the difficulty in translating what is on print to a digital form. This then leads to advertising challenges and so forth. However, if done well children will then be able to have interactive opportunities through digital magazines.
In my opinion this is a very good progress that can either have an amazing receiving by the public or could be a complete failure because of the apparent challenges. The publishers have to have the transition of print to digital very carefully because both require different approaches. Walsh (2006)mentions that there are differences between reading print and digital document so even more difference when it comes to translating the two. There is the case of different affordance and also different processing codes. This has to be properly analysed buy publishers. Reep (2006) mentions that document designers have to understand the design features, design principles, graphic aid functions and so on. This understanding will then help with the transition, accessibility and advertising. Therefore these concepts and theories have to be constantly in mind.
References
Reep, DC 2006, Technical writing: document design, Pearson/Longman, New York .
Sivek, SC 2011, ‘Children's magazines cater to true early adopters with mobile apps’, Public Broadcasting Service, 17 May, < http://www.pbs.org/mediashift/2011/05/childrens-magazines-cater-to-true-early-adopters-with-mobile-apps137.html>.
Walsh, M 2006, 'The 'textual shift’: Examining the reading process with print, visual and multimodal texts,' Australian Journal of Language and Literacy, vol.29, no.1, pp.24-37.
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