RFID magazine links online and offline

The first internet-connected magazine is using technology within its printed pages to create an innovative way of linking readers to its online content.

Using an RFID tag buried within its pages, the French entertainment magazine Amusement has collaborated with RFID specialists Violet to lead readers to exclusive online content that is otherwise inaccessible to web users.

Readers can touch the magazine on an RFID scanner, such as the Violet Mir:ror, obtained separately from the magazine, and this sends a signal to the server triggering access to certain online applications.

Although magazines have long offered a mixture of online and offline content, the traditional exclusive web-based content has typically been reserved for subscribers with password accounts. By offering something for the reader who prefers to pick up a magazine at the newsstand, Amusement’s new model is connecting with the often marginalised casual reader.

Blog driven publishing is born

Perhaps ‘new media’ isn't killing off 'old media' after all. The Printed Blog is the world’s first daily newspaper comprised entirely of blogs and other user generated content.

The Printed Blog seeks to change the way people share and interact with news from the world around them, and hopes to play a role in reversing the fortunes of the sinking newspaper industry by using digital media.

Since the emphasis is on user-generated content rather than top-down reporting, the website is designed to function as a “hub” to connect with blogs, articles, photography, music, events and other content that YOU deem worthy of sharing with your own community.

The result is a revolutionary newspaper that reads and functions like a web feed, yet can still be enjoyed on the train or spread across the breakfast table. The Printed Blog is currently being beta tested in select locations, but once fully launched expect to find a copy of this unique and pleasurably tactile newspaper at a news stand near you.