Cosmopolitan, the sexy woman's magazine , sets the pace online, too
Here's a spot of good news amid all the angst about print v online publications. Cosmopolitan magazine in the US has reached 100,000 paid digital subscriptions.
iPhone app: Cosmo's Sex Position of the Day
Thats's a lot less than its 1.5 million newsstand sales. But AdAge calls it a "milestone" and says the Hearst magazine has beaten other brands to the mark. "It's a good sign for magazines' digital ambitions in general."
Even more interesting : Cosmo doesn't give print subscribers free access online. They have to pay $19.99 extra for the digital sub . And that figure is more than the $15 annual print subscription. Other magazines bundle free access online with their print subs.
Cosmo Editor-in-chief Kate White said, "A couple of years ago, the big question was what's going to happen to magazines like Cosmo in the future. There was a little bit of anxiety. What this has done is say that our content will rule and will thrive. Women want our content, and they'll get it on a variety of platforms."
Cosmopolitan has been available online since 2005 but its digital circulation has zoomed with the arrival of the iPad, Nook and Kindle Fire.
A key moment in Cosmo's digital journey, says AdAge, was in December 2009 when it introduced an iPhone app, Cosmo's Sex Position of the Day, based on the best-selling book "The Cosmo Kama Sutra" and featuring 77 sex positions.