TypeEngine Teases A Platform For Newsstand That Looks A Lot Like The Magazine

TypeEngine Newsletter:

The Magazine is absolutely an inspiration for what we’re building. We applaud Marco’s decision to strip away all the cruft from what makes up a digital magazine. His app is wonderfully simple, which we think is the way forward for digital magazines. And simple things tend to look somewhat alike.

By the same reasoning, all print magazines look alike. They all have a cover and a back, pages, and some sort of content in between. Similarly, our publishers will have full control over the typographic, branding, and color choices of nearly every element in their application. Our publishers are providing the personality – and the content. So really, TypeEngine-created apps can and will look like the unique publications they really are.

Naturally, Arment isn’t very happy. I agree with TypeEngine in the sense that magazines look similar structurally with covers and back-pages, but print magazines do not look the same aesthetically. Every magazine does not use a red font for page titles or a single button in each top corner, for instance.

TypeEngine could have side-stepped this entire controversy by just using a more visually-unique theme in their promotional shots.