Online magazine

"Ezine" redirects here. For the town and district in Turkey of that name, see Ezine, Çanakkale.

This article refers to online equivalents of magazines. For online diaries, see Online diary and Blog. For online academic journals, see electronic journal

For the magazine of this name, see ONLINE .

An online magazine shares some features with a blog and also with online newspapers, but can usually be distinguished by its approach to editorial control. Magazines typically have editors or editorial boards who review submissions and perform a quality control function to ensure that all material meets the expectations of the publishers (those investing time or money in its production) and the readership.

Online magazines that are part of the World Wide Web, that is, all or part of a website, are sometimes called webzines. An ezine (also spelled e-zine and usually pronounced /ˈiːziːn/) is a more specialized term appropriately applied to small magazines and newsletters distributed by any electronic method, for example, by electronic mail (e-mail/email) (see Zine). Some social groups may use the terms cyberzine and hyperzine when referring to electronically distributed resources. Similarly, some online magazines may refer to themselves as "electronic magazines" to reflect their readership demographics or to capture alternative terms and spellings in online searches.

Many large print-publishers now provide digital reproduction of their print magazine titles through various online services for a fee. These service providers also refer to their collections of these digital format products as online magazines, and sometimes as digital magazines.

Online magazines representing matters of interest to specialists in or societies for academic subjects, science, trade or industry are typically referred to as online journals.

Business model

Many general interest online magazines provide free access to all aspects of their online content although some publishers have opted to require a subscription fee to access premium online article and/or multi-media content. Online magazines may generate revenue based on targeted search ads to web-site visitors, banner ads (online display advertising), affiliations to retail web sites, classified advertisements, product-purchase capabilities, advertiser directory links, or alternative informational/commercial purpose.

The original online magazines, ezines and disk magazines, or diskmags, due to their low cost and initial non-mainstream targets, may be seen as a disruptive technology to traditional publishing houses. The high cost of print publication and large web readership has encouraged these publishers to embrace the World Wide Web as a marketing and content delivery system and another medium for delivering their advertisers' messages.

Growth

In the late 1990s ezine publishers began adapting to the interactive qualities of the Internet instead of duplicating magazines on the web. Publishers of traditional print titles and entrepreneurs with an eye to a potential readership in the millions started publishing online titles. Salon.com founded in July 1995 by David Talbot was launched with considerable media exposure and today reports 5.8 million monthly unique visitors.

In the 2000s, some webzines began appearing in a printed format to complement their online versions. These included Movie Insider, Slate, Synthesis and Lucire magazines.

See also

• List of online magazine archives
• Digital edition
• News site