My paper subscription to The Economist magazine just started. A quick check of its iPad app revealed that subscribers to the paper edition are able issues for free (normally $5.99 per issue). The digital magazine has a different navigation style compared to the two TIME Inc. magazines I’ve read (TIME and Entertainment Weekly). Its contents section is separate from its contents in that you cannot simply swipe out of the contents page into the first pages of the magazine. However, once you get to any particular article, the entire magazine is available without returning to the contents section.
The most interesting aspect of this magazine app, however, is that each of its articles has a downloadable audio reading associated with it. My initial guess was that it was some kind of text-to-speech system. However, this guess was wrong. Each article is read by a human being. There are a mix of female and male readers. And, each does a very good job reading each article. This is great for those times when you just want to lie back, close your eyes, and still be able to learn something new about the world.