'Wired' Chief Says iPad Will Rescue Magazines

Chris Anderson has seen the future of magazines -- and it's on a tablet. In an address at the American Association of Advertising Agencies' Transformation Conference in San Francisco today, Anderson, the editor-in-chief of Wired, extolled the possibilities for the magazine industry via Apple's iPad and other future tablet-computer platforms. Wired staffers have been working to create a tablet version of the title for six months, with the goal of having it ready in May. "We've been looking for a way to do it better, and the good news is that I think we found it," said Anderson. Presently, online versions of magazines lose "the coherence and majesty of the [printed] medium," said Anderson. Tablets, on the other hand, offer impressive functionality, such as 360-degree views and iPhone-like screen sliding, plus collapsing and layering -- all of which make the user experience vastly more compelling than the Web, he said. Additionally, the success of the iPhone, Kindle and the emergence of cloud computing have paved the way for devices that are less powerful and lighter with a longer battery life than standard laptops, Anderson said. The iPad is just such a device, and it will sell millions of units in its first month and tens of millions in the following months and years, he predicted. "It will take less than 10 years for it to become mainstream," he said.

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