Can’t say I flip over flip books.

With the tsunami of negative economic fundamentals threading to drown a raft of B-to-B publications, a number of them have made the leap to online publishing in the form of “flip book” versions of their print editions. You’ve probably seen them – the print pages are reproduced exactly as they’re laid out in the print, and a vaguely cheesy animation allows you to “turn” the pages on screen. Does anyone actually enjoy reading content this way? To read these, you generally need to be constantly scrolling and zooming.

Some of these “digital editions” load and display quickly, but others bog down like a dial-up account when all the kids get home from school. Are the publishers simply taking a quick cheap way out, or do they actually feel their audience will be more comfortable with this? Maybe if they’re oldsters? Has anyone seen a version where the print ads shown become links to the advertisers’ website? NOTE: if this hasn’t happened yet please be advised that I just patented the concept.

Interested in hearing any comments, and of course I’m offering our web design services to any publisher now using flip books but who really wants to create a genuine web 2.0 publication.