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Issue 6.6

COLUMN

Thoughts from the Publisher

Issue: 6.6 (September/October 2008)
Author: Marc Zeedar
Author Bio: When RBD publisher Marc Zeedar was a kid he used to create magazines just for fun. Now he's doing it for a living! You may contact him at editor@rbdeveloper.com.
Article Description: No description available.
Article Length (in bytes): 3,918
Starting Page Number: 5
Article Number: 6600
Related Web Link(s):

http://rbd.magcloud.com/

Full text of article...

Six Short Years

As a kid I never understood when adults talked about how "quickly" a huge span of time like ten years passed; now I comprehend. It seems like just months ago I launched RBD and now we've just finished our sixth year.

Obviously lately we're making some radical changes in how we deliver our content, but I am convinced these changes are for the best long-term. I am looking forward to watching RBD grow and prosper and become an even more central part of your development process.

Improvements

You'll notice that with this issue the table of contents has been expanded to two pages, so now we've got room to elaborate on the contents of our columns. This has been much requested and should make finding articles easier. (Note that the whole issue is four pages larger, so you haven't lost any content space!)

I also added a handy index to our advertisers in case you're looking for an advertised product. Be sure to let them know you saw their ad in RBD!

More changes are coming: I'm considering a redesign of the magazine to use more color, among other improvements.

Keep the Feedback Coming

As you can see in our Letters section, the feedback to our "digital-only" move is divided, though the majority are in favor of the move and I am extremely pleased with the results so far. Please continue to send me your thoughts and suggestions of what we can do to help you.

Print Issues Via Print-on-Demand

I am delighted to report that RBD is now available in print form via MagCloud, a new third party print-on-demand service for magazines. MagCloud is still in beta as I write this and currently don't ship outside the United States, but they are working hard to change that.

I received my test copy of issue 6.5 from MagCloud and I must say, "Wow." I am impressed. The entire magazine is in full color. Graphics and photos look great: it's as good or better quality than you'd get at the newsstand. I had not thought color would make much of a difference for a primarily text-based publication like RBD, but I am really surprised at how much more readable it makes the publication. Part of that is the thicker and higher-quality paper (which, by the way, is not glossy, so there is no glare). MagCloud's printing is significantly better than any printed version we used to offer.

However, that quality does come at a cost: MagCloud is not cheap. Expect issues to cost you about $20 with postage. It will also take a week or so for printing and delivery.

If you're really wanting print, however, this is an excellent way to get it. I am extremely pleased with the service and I hope that as volume increases, the costs will go down.

You can see which issues are available via MagCloud (and even subscribe to an RSS announcement feed) here:

http://rbd.magcloud.com/

Please note that I also still have plans to produce an annual perfect-bound book of each year's worth of issues. I'll use a different service for that, with a black-and-white interior, so the cost should be much less (under $50 for a 300-page book).

In This Issue

We've got some unusual features this time, with articles on teaching programming to your child, remote support, the exciting Formatted Text Control, using better variable names, and watermarking digital images. Enjoy!

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