Popular Science Is Now a Fully Digital Magazine

kackle writes: I just received an email telling me that "Popular Science" magazine is no more. That is, it is to be delivered to readers from now on only via ones and zeros. I can't say I had a subscription since its beginnings in 1872, but I did learn much from the rag and will sincerely miss it. "Today, we're unveiling our biggest change in my tenure: Popular Science is now a fully digital magazine," writes Editor-in-Chief Corinne Iozzio. In addition to "redesigned" and "reimagined stories" made especially for mobile devices, Iozzio notes that their various apps "include an archive of 15-plus years of back issues..."

"The mediums may change, but even after all these evolutions and iterations, our core belief remains as fixed and focused as it was in 1872: Embracing science and tech means living in the realm of possibility."

One more year

[backslashdot]

Why didnâ(TM)t they let print get to the 150th anniversary .. even if it was sustained in a lame token manner (print a few copies)?

Re:

[flyingfsck]

This is just a temporary reprieve, tried before by many other magazines. In one more year they will be dead again.

NFT

[backslashdot]

Why didnâ(TM)t they do an NFT?

They were losing money on the print edition

[rossdee]

when you could get a years sub for $5

Re:

[kackle]

Yes! I thought they could have charged about 10 times as much and I still would have subscribed. I used this paper magazine as my time-killer when away from the computer (like when being monitored after getting the vaccine, last week). And I look at "screens" too much now as it is.

Re:

[rossdee]

There is a difference.

A digital version you can download at home and read later while offline.
With the online version you have to be online all the time to read it.

If you don't have an unlimited cell plan you may prefer a digital edition.

Sadly SciAm is not available as a digital download.
Though PopSci, PopMech, Discover, NatGeo, Astronomy, New Scientist and Science News have been available from the Kindle Newstand for many years.

Re: Digital? In 2021 it's called online

[e3m4n]

Content too. Online usually only hosts the primary articles. I always enjoyed the back of the magazine with some electronics projects with the difficulty rating. I would sometimes just do those with my kid for something fun to do. I hope the digital version is the full fledged pdf or whatever copy with every page of trivial tidbits not related to the 3 magazine articles.

Used to love this magazine ...

[King_TJ]

My dad bought me a subscription a long time ago and then I kept getting renewals to it as birthday or Xmas gifts. I think one of my aunts bought one after my parents already sent in renewal money, so I wound up getting the magazine for something like 4 years straight.

To be honest though, I lost a lot of interest in it since the Internet-age came upon all of us. I did accept an offer to get a year of the digital edition for free, not that long ago, and wound up too busy or distracted to even open most of the new issues to read them.

I guess the problem I have is that their general coverage of random interesting science-things is easy enough to duplicate by keeping an eye on a few of my favorite Internet sites. Between such things as links shared on Slashdot, Facebook buddies into science and tech who share links to everything cool they come across, and seeing what's posted over on Reddit -- Pop Sci doesn't often deliver me content I didn't already know about.

Re: Used to love this magazine ...

[e3m4n]

The geeky do-it-yourself projects in the back were cool. Often things I never considered doing but sometimes motivated me to give it a shot.

Can you still send away for helicopter plans?

[chispito]

I loved Popular Science and Popular Mechanics when I was a kid. My favorite part was all the little crazy ads in he back.

Re: Can you still send away for helicopter plans?

[e3m4n]

Remember when comics had those? Ever buy those brine shrimp sea creatures because of the illustrations?

Light-weight and fluffy, but stirred imagination

[caseih]

Lately I've thought the articles in Popular Science and Popular Mechanics were light and fluffy, with few details and a gushing narrative. However I recently found a cache of Popular Mechanics and Popular Science magazines going back to the 1950s--and you can also find them in the Google Books archive online--and you know what? The articles were about the same way back then. So odds are the nostalgia with which I remember Popular Science with fondness stems largely from the vivid imagination of young boy who was thoroughly engrossed by what I read in those magazines. I hope they are still having an effect on young people today, even in digital format.

Interesting articles from the 50s included a piece on the first anti-lock brakes, the introduction of tubeless tires which they didn't know would succeed or not, gasoline fuel injection engines, the arctic military "research" base in Greenland, the introduction of the jake brake, etc. Pretty interesting to re-read about these things as they happened. Interesting how things that are now common today were really wondered about at first.

Back in the day

[westlake]

I found a stack of Popular Science issues from the thirties and fourties. Retrofuturistic covers. But solid in its core coverage of science, tech and mechanics. Automobiles. Chemical experiments. Projects for the photographer, radio hobbiest, craftsman in wood and metal. The adds unique and entertaing. 150-200+ pages. If you want to try a sampling from Google Books begin no earlier than 1920.

Oh no...

[sonamchauhan]

Online-only is where print media goes to die. Seen it so many times before. :-(

I wish there was a way to blend online + print.

I used to communte to school

[DarkOx]

I went to university but it is was a short commute from my parents place so I did not live on campus. It was far enough though that it did not make sense to go home in a lot of cases unless I had pretty large gaps between classes. Usually it made more sense to find somewhere to study / complete assignments - or hang out with friends etc.

I did from time to time find myself with nothing to do however, and one of my favorite diversions was the back issue periodicals section of our library. PopSci was always a

Ciao PopSci!

[kadersin]

Sorry, reading on a tablet is awful. I was glad reading you! Ciao!

Hardly Constant

[ChrisMaple]

In the late 1800's Popular Science published an article by one of the leading Social Darwinist philosophers. Most of the issues I read were in the 1960s, and during that time it seemed like the content fit the name. In recent years it has become decidedly leftist in its content, eschewing interesting technology in favor of highlighting claims of man's contribution to global warming. P.S. has earned its fate.

Was fun while it lasted

[fox171171]

I enjoyed reading it years ago. Subscription price was reasonable, but the delivery fee was high. Magazine was getting thinner and the content to ad ratio was worsening. Combine that with smartphone being able to replace the content and I stopped reading it.