Talk Of The iTown: The New Yorker Is Now Available On The iPad

The New Yorker is now available on the iPad. If you are reading this and are already the owner of an iPad you likely know this. Perhaps you’re even watching the instructional film starring Jason Schwartzman and directed by Roman Coppola. But I think it’s worth noting the news for two reasons.

I have long been a fan of how The New Yorker has approached the Internet. Unlike much of Conde Nast they have long exhibited a fearlessness about the online future and a willingness to give everything a go: they established a website early on, they released the digital edition, they have a Tumblr for goodness sake. All this for a magazine that arguably needed it least: the New Yorker is unique and its readers (whether or not they ever get through the pile stacked in the corner) are a devoted bunch. That’s not to say they shouldn’t have evolved, just a measure of their savvy that they chose to without being forced to by the inevitable encroach of the digital age.

Secondly, I just think you should read the announcement because it is smart and witty, and displays the sort of thinking that among other things, kept them exempt from McKinsey inquisition last summer.

We’re at once delighted and a little bewildered about this latest digital development and our place in it: delighted because of the quality of what the tablet provides and the speed with which the magazine can be distributed, but bewildered, too, because we’d be liars if we said we knew precisely where technology will lead. These are early days. Right now, editing for the iPad feels similar to making television shows just after the Second World War, when less than one per cent of American households owned a television. And yet the general flow of things is clear: the digital revolution is already both long-standing and swift; there will be many more iPads sold; and competitors will inevitably follow.

Also, this anecdote is rather priceless:

Take Mr. Ross, again, and the way he encouraged E. B. White to finish an essay:

Mr. White:

If you get that story done, I’ll take steps to get you a new cushion for your chair.

H. W. Ross

For our readers we will do no less. ♦

Related: A Note To Our Readers [The New Yorker]