You’re no doubt wondering “Where is the April edition of MacSense?”
In publishing a monthly CD-ROM, we’ve face a quandary: what date should we put on the cover? For over a year, we have been publishing MacSense at the beginning of the month in which it was dated. And distribution was instantaneous—once we uploaded MacSense, it was effectively “published.” But producing a CD-ROM brought with it a new set of variables. There was now a physical production process, and distribution would be measured in days rather than minutes.
The MacSense CD enjoys a swift production and distribution schedule of three weeks—faster than almost all paper-bound Macintosh periodicals available. But due to our old issue-naming regime, the first two issues of the MacSense CD arrived at customer’s homes the last week (or later) of the month in which it was dated.
As a result, a number of MacSense CD subscribers have noted that the issue feels out of date—despite the fact that the content is fresh and more up-to-date than many paper periodicals.
Our jump to CD-ROM has called to fore the necessity to change our issue naming practices, in an effort to be consistent with the rest of the industry. Thus, this April issue of MacSense has been redubbed “May 1996.”
Please note that the change is in name only. This issue remains Volume 3, Issue 3, and issues of MacSense will continue to be delivered at regular and expected intervals.
