Publishing industry starting to embrace HTML5

By Mike Flacy September 14, 2011

Image used with permission by copyright holder

Earlier this week, The Boston Globe rolled out a brand new version of its website coded in HTML5 and operating behind a premium paywall. Ideally designed to cut out Apple’s 30 percent cut for revenue generated with a Boston Globe app on the iPad, users can simply so to the Web address in Safari and type in login information to access articles on the site. The newspaper also operates a free site for news junkies at Boston.com, but the premium site offers increased content. Five articles a day will flow over to the free site to entice people to pay the premium cost. The HTML5 version of the site is designed in a similar fashion to an app and reformats the layout of the screen based on the device.

In addition to The Globe’s advancement into the HTML5 age, the Hearst Corporation is currently transitioning all magazine properties, such as Popular Mechanics and Cosmopolitan, into the HTML5 format. The company is starting with Good Housekeeping, a transition that’s scheduled to go live tomorrow. Based on the code used on GoodHousekeeping.com, Hearst will modify all other magazine properties over the next year and a half. Hearst spent the last nine months retooling the site and it now offers access to product reviews that were previously unavailable. Previous criticisms of the site included photos overlapping portions of text and an awkward design to the home page.

The Globe is positioning the pricing of the premium HTML5 site at $3.99 a week or a bit over $200 a year. However, access to the app comes free with any type of subscription to the paper including the Sunday-only model. The Sunday version of the paper includes the most advertising, thus the incentive of a digital edition all week long may increase subscriptions to that plan.

Contributing Editor

By day, I'm the content and social media manager for High-Def Digest, Steve's Digicams and The CheckOut on Ben's Bargains…

Computing

How to pin a website to the taskbar in Windows

A man sits, using a laptop running the Windows 11 operating system.

Windows includes many interesting tools, but if you’re like many people, more and more of your digital life is happening in your web browser and nowhere else. That being the case, you’ll want to keep your most important websites close at hand. The easiest way to access them in Windows is the Start menu and the taskbar, treating them more or less like programs in and of themselves.

Although easy overall, getting a website from your browser to your taskbar is slightly different depending on which browser you’re using.

Web

Amazon’s Big Spring sale: Save on TVs, laptops, appliances, and more

Amazon Big Spring sale promo image

Deal hunter or not, you'll be pleased to know that Amazon's Big Spring sale is officially underway. It's your opportunity to save on a slew of buzzworthy deals, including TVs, laptops, appliances, various electronics, and much more. It shows that you don't always have to wait for Amazon's Prime Day to capitalize on fantastic discounts. If you've been holding off on buying something, hoping for a great deal, now's the time to pull the trigger. Because the sale is so massive, we've gathered a few of our top picks below. However, we still recommend browsing the sale to see what you can find.

What to shop in the Amazon Big Spring sale
For starters, if you want a new tablet, Samsung, Lenovo, and Google during the sale. The Galaxy Tab A9+ is available for 19% to 23% off. Meanwhile, Google's Pixel Tablet is 19% to 25% off, depending on the model. Samsung's , and its gaming monitor is down to $140, usually $190. Or, the beautiful and much larger curved gaming monitor is $700, normally $1,300.

Computing

How to create a Subreddit on desktop and mobile

Laptop Working from Home

Few social media sites are as popular as Reddit. Regardless of what you're interested in, there's probably a thriving community for you to interact with on the platform. Known as subreddits, these communities are home to topics like gaming, world news, science, movies, and more. If you can't find a subreddit with your particular interest, Reddit makes it easy to create your own Reddit community.

Running a successful Reddit community isn't easy – but the process of starting one only takes a few minutes. Keep in mind that you'll want to keep a close eye on your subreddit to prevent it from being shut down or turning into a wasteland with no users, but running a subreddit can be a lot of fun when done properly. If you prefer, you can also create a private community that only your friends can join, giving you a place to hang out beyond Twitter and TikTok.