Winding Road’s (WR) reader interface just keeps getting slicker and slicker. While the articles and photography are no better or worse than a buff book’s (sorry Chris) and you can’t read WR whilst on the toilet, I’m totally into the e-magazine look and feel. I especially enjoy the jump-around navigation. [Quick digression: Why WR chose to integrate with nextautos.com is beyond me. It’s an entirely different gig, confuses the brand and the interface between the sites is a maze mess. Two words guys: Stendhal Syndrome.] I reckon it’s only a matter of time– say a couple of decades– before the “real” buff books follow suit. Meanwhile, it looks like one of TTAC’s favorite car mags, the UK’s Octane, may be headed for e-bookitude. I make the inference via a collaboration (i.e. a pimpatorial) between Octane and RM Auctions. RM’s interactive catalogue for their October 29th sale sets new standards for the e-paper genre. I especially like the animated page turning. But then, I’m a geek. Anyway, if anyone wants to bankroll a TTAC digital mag, let me know.
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you can’t read WR whilst on the toilet
Somebody needs a laptop and wi-fi.
I hope that the print magazines don’t go digital. There’s a time and place for both print and online magazines. Even though I can bring my laptop into the bathroom, I don’t want to. Nor do I want to look at a laptop while I’m eating, in bed, in the airport, on a plane, on a bus, etc. I’d much rather read a print magazine during those times
I like the convenience of online availability, in that I am not required to seek out or dispose of a paper copy, but it does limit the portability somewhat. There are plenty of places I’ll wander around with a $4 stack of papers but would rather not be carrying several pounds and several hundred dollars of laptop.
On another note, I stopped reading Winding Road the day I realized I’d never once read a bad review in it. It occurs to me that this is an excellent metric to judge any publication which reviews products – if they’ve never been disappointed in anything, they’re probably lying.
Robert, I have to agree with you on WR. Once they merged with Nextautos, I’ve stopped reading it. The WR website used to have a nice news section with some reviews and then the “magazine” was published monthly. The Nextautos site is terribly laid out so I’ve abandoned it. That, and in a recent issue in discussing the new direct injection 911 the author confused compression ratio with air/fuel equivalence ratio claiming a higher compression ratio used less fuel. Such ignorance is inexcusable in a car rag.
Besides, if they post anything good, I’m sure Robert will tell us about it. :)
As far a a digital e-zine goes, it has its pros (it fells more like a magazine), but the con is waiting for a monthly mag, as opposed to just posting stuff when you have it like Edmunds IL does. TTAC already has an editorial, and as that was always a big part of a “traditional” mag, so would you have separate editorials for the mag?
First, I enjoy periodic viewings of WR.
But the whole digital magazine thing baffles me. It’s not like when people started publishing on paper they attempted to make them stone tablets.
Digital is a totally new medium with new strengths and weaknesses. I can’t understand why people equipped with powerful modern computers and software persist in creating content limited by preconceived notions from previous eras.
I don’t mean to pick on WR, this kind of thinking exists all over, I just don’t get it.
njgreene :
New mediums imitate old mediums because A) they’re run by the same people B) no one likes to take risks and C) that’s doubly true for companies.
Obviously, a new medium must find its own strengths and weaknesses. Less obviously, the new medium liberates the old to reinvent itself. In that sense, it’s the buff books that must change, not the net. Meanwhile…
I didn’t think I’d like the mag on screen format. But the I’m coming ’round to the idea that the hybrid works.
Obviously, I don’t expect the mag thing for news. But for ye olde reviews and features, it speaks to me. Perhaps that’s because I prefer jumping around these days.
It might also have to do with the lack of quality writing found in car mags. I just can’t bring myself to sit down and commit to a car mag anymore. Flip, flip, flip, read, flip, read a but, flip. If I want some literary “down time,” I’ll read a book.
I also stopped reading Winding Road once nextautos bought them–the site is an un-integrated mess.
What’s interesting is that the online sources, in chasing the portal metaphor (and the ad- and page-views it allows) with magazine-like design cues, are compromising the accessibility of the information they contain.
Eventually, the two are going to converge. Unfortunately, they’re converging on exactly the wrong point.
Have a look at Edmunds.com, and compare it to Parkers.co.uk (which looks a lot like Edmunds used to look) and realize how much becoming like a paper mag has compromised Edmunds’ accessibility. I’m sure their stats are up, but a) I think that has more to do with inertia and general internet growth and b) I’d wager that a lot of people find the site quite frustrating.
I stopped reading WR e-mag because every other page was an ad, usually for Meguiar’s. I get that the mag is free, but come on, a little variety?
I read 100% of my car mags in the bathroom. The wife is against me bringing the laptop in there.
Until her attitude changes in this regard (and it won’t), I’ll keep my Car and Driver subscription and will have to restrict my TTAC reading to non-bathroom time.
you can’t read WR whilst on the toilet
Somebody needs a laptop and wi-fi.
Or an iPhone…
I just save it as a PDF and transfer it using Air Sharing (an iPhone app). I can read away in peace…
A question I have asked before, but never got much response. What are some good car mags and what are some good car sites? I am more interested in reviews and technical info.
TexasAg03, let me be the 101st person on this site to complain about how the car mags have gone downhill. Every month I get a new Car and Driver, and every month I am disappointed. The enthusiasm for cars is gone. The witty stories, the good with the bad. The stories seem so watered down, very milquetoast and PC-like.
This month they review a bunch of cars on track. It seems to me that you have to try to make an event like this read so blandly.
Lieberman’s Lambo review on this site reminds me of the enthusiasm for cars that C&D had once. They used to be able to put you in the seat of a fast car and tell you what makes the car special. If C&D wrote the Lambo review, it would have been something like “the car we reviewed stickered at $xxx. We like the color. It ran the quarter mile in 12 seconds which is pretty fast.” See my point? No enthusiasm. Maybe their editor is burned out? I dunno. If I ever get permission to take the laptop into the bathroom, my car mag subscription ends.
I stopped reading Winding Road
originally it was focused on how the car drove – and all their reviews and articles were about that – it was fantastic, they would put into words just what it was like to drive the cars.
Then David E. Davis stepped in, their format changed, and now its basically no better than any of the “buff books” which I’ve cancelled my subscriptions to after becoming sick of their manufacturer kool-aid drinking reviews.
I find the best reviews on here, Jalopnik, and Autoblog. Of the print magazines, I like EVO the most. Unfortunately, the issues are $11 a piece…
For a good read, go check out the Jalopnik review of the Subaru STI. Or Autoblog’s review of the Lamborghini Murcielago.
EDIT: TTAC writes good reviews, too. I’m talking about other sites… :)
Amen, highrpm. C/D has gone way downhill, and they’ve definitely lost that lovin’ feelin’.
*cue music*
Anyway, I really like the e-zine look; I guess it’s a matter of taste.
These digital magazines are good in concept, but the execution leaves a bit to be desired. If I had access to an ISP that provided faster download speeds and could afford to upgrade my computer so that it had more memory and power, then they probably would work better.
The reality is that most of these digital magazines seem to be using ever more complex graphics that use increasing amounts of memory and that take longer and longer to fully download.
I recently started receiving an English magazine called “iMotor” that is especially bad. (I don’t know why I started receiving it, it just shows up in my email.) The magazine is O.K. but takes forever to download, and on several occasions has caused my browser to close. Maybe they have better Internet service in the U.K.
I wouldn’t mind having every buff book under the sun ending up in my mailbox every month if the subscriptions were free. And so I will continue reading (or at least browsing through) Winding Road. The interface amuses me, and the price is right.
WR’s e-magazine format annoys the holy hell out of me. It combines the worst aspects of paper magazines and electronic documents. I stopped even bothering with it; I delete the notifications when they arrive.
Winding Road has a terrible interface –when compared to a Zinio digital magazine. WR’s ads (and they are all the same ads repeated ad infinitum) take forever to load. Also, the writing is generally blander than oatmeal, the “winner” being William Jeanes. His English teacher must have instilled in him: Thou Shalt Not Entertain With Thy Writing.
I’m typing this comment from my iphone and I’m in the bathroom too! The dead tree mags are dead to me.
I was a WR reader from issue #1. Loved their attitude. Like their likes (pro-Diesel, very much UNlike TTAC in that respect!)
I liked WR when it was a PDF… I could read it how and where I wanted. Then they made it that slick web-thing and made it harder to read and less portable.
I also liked reading (and listening to) David E. Davis’ musings. Then he left.
Then they didn’t pay me for two photographs of mine they used – after negotiating and mutually agreeing to a fair price.
Then I seemed to vanish from their “subscription”… meaning I no longer received an email when a new issue came out. (coincidence?)
I haven’t looked at WR in months. I honestly thought they no longer existed.
–chuck