Back in the mid-1960s, the three TV networks all made much of their conversion from black-and-white to “Now in living color!” broadcasts. It was like that transition in “The Wizard of Oz,” when Dorothy awoke after being carried away in the tornado.
The screen of my parents’ old box black-and-white set had the faint image of an Indian head burned in, the nightly midnight test pattern that proved the old man did fall asleep in front of the TV. During prime time, NBC’s peacock rustled his cartoon body, and his flat gray feathers fell away revealing (Gasp!) vivid, life-like color!
Imagine, for a moment, what today’s 70-inch flat-screen 1080p HD screen would do to someone in that tube-type, test pattern era.
Thus goes technology.
Where some guy named Gutenberg and his hand-carved moveable type gave birth to my business 564 years ago, this magazine now goes from computer to press instantly (the USPS screws up delivery from there).
It was only 30 years ago that “personal computers” invaded the workspace. My first was a bulky IBM with a green-screen that ran something called “DOS;” Windows didn’t even exist yet. We wrote and edited all of our stories on those PCs; copyediting was accomplished by swapping massive six-inch floppies from office to office, the first server system, if you will.
Finished stories were then “coded” with typography instructions – bold, ital, type size and font – and then transmitted over (Gasp!) a contraption attached to my office phone called a “modem.” A 1200-baud modem. Literally one step above postage stamp, but much slower than a fax.
Thus went technology.
A few years ago, Apple introduced us to an entirely new form of personal computer – the iPad tablet computer. Pencil thin, 9.7-inch HD screen with significantly more computing power than many laptops. It’s your PC, your game system, your TV, your radio, your stereo, your instruction manual, your entire reading library, your Web browser, your email, your daily newspaper and your favorite magazine – and you can carry it with you anywhere and everywhere you go.
And now all you need to do to get your favorite magazine is go to the Apple app store (or the Android or Kindle app stores), search for “Tire Review” and download our free maga- zine app. Then go ahead an open it – and be prepared to be amazed.
Unlike others, the Tire Review app delivers to you entire page-for-page issues of this magazine – and all issues from 2013. Some of you may be reading this very column on your tablet right now. Each month, about mid-month, the most current issue will automatically appear on your tablet or smartphone; you literally have to do nothing more than sit back and read.
Plus, all daily industry news that we post to our TireReview.com website is automatically routed to your Tire Review mobile version. Cool tools that come with the tablet and smartphone version of the magazine allow you to copy/paste/email important stories to your staff and colleagues, and mark pages for future reference. Looking forward, well the technology sky is the limit. More on that later.
It’s all yours, you don’t have to share it or hide it from the rest of your staff. Back issues always reside on your mobile device, right at your fingertips at any time, anywhere. Best of all, if the rest of your team is clamoring to see the latest issue of Tire Review (and who doesn’t?), they can simply download their own app and leave you alone.
All kidding aside, our goal is to make your relationship with Tire Review easy. And part of that is delivery, making sure you and your team can access Tire Review whenever and wherever they want.
Pew Research tells us that nearly 35% of all Americans own a tablet computer, a number that will surely climb once Christmas 2013 is counted. The number grows by age group (49% for those ages 35-44), income level (56% for those making more than $75,000 per year) and education (49% among college grads).
The fastest growing group, though, is the next generation of store managers and owners – the 18-24 age group, where tablets have already reached 37% absorption.
Never fear, we are not doing away with your magazine. But we do want to be where readers want to be.
The monthly paper-and-ink version of the magazine will still come to your door every month like clockwork, the desktop/laptop digital version of each issue will still be accessible from our website each month, and now you can get you monthly issue of Tire Review on the single most portable computers on the market – weeks before the USPS delivers your paper-and-ink copy.
Thus goes technology.
