.net (magazine)

.net is a monthly Internet magazine published in the UK by Future Publishing. Founded in 1994, .net magazine is published every four weeks (13 issues per year). The magazine is aimed at professional and amateur web designers, and a significant proportion of its readers are full-time web developers. The front cover features artwork from different graphic designers. Digital art and designers are also catered for in the magazine, with a dedicated section called /showcase. In January 2007, the first .net podcast was launched, immediately placing at no.5 in the technology podcasts section of iTunes.

.net was previously sold under the name Web Builder in the USA. In December 2006, it took on the name of Practical Web Design in the wake of that particular publication's closure in the UK.

Artwork is still a key part of the magazine, and it features various web designers' work in a dedicated section each issue.

Content

Usually, each issue contains the following sections:

/inbox

Letters from magazine readers.. A Mail of the Month is chosen by the editorial staff that wins a £50 book voucher for books by technology publisher O'Reilly. ^[1] This section also includes Penny Forum which publishes a joke or surreal thread from the magazines forums.

/feed

Taglined choice cuts from across the web, feed is a combination of news and editorial about the Internet. For example Industry News, Book Reviews, which is the best... and a column by a different industry professional each month. Also included in this section is Net Gamer, which is one of the few parts of the magazine that doesn't deal with web development and the Internet.

The magazine's tutorials in PHP and other web technologies are particularly popular, and in 2004, the tutorial section was moved from the main body of the magazine, dubbed Web Builder, and bound separately. As a result, .net was sold with Web Builder as two magazines in the same package. However, due to negative response from the readership, .net reintegrated the Web Builder supplement.

Staff

.net is currently edited by Dan Oliver. Past editors include Paul Douglas, Dave Taylor, Richard Longhurst and Lisa Jones.

There are currently five full-time staff working on .net magazine. These are editor-in-chief Dan Oliver, deputy editor Tom May, art editor Rob Bowen, staff writer Tanya Combrinck, and editor of netmagazine.com Oliver Lindberg. Regular writers include Craig Grannell, Paul Wyatt, Bruce Lawson, Jenn Lukas, Karl Hodge, Mark Penfold and Gary Marshall.

Redesign

In August 2006 (Issue 152), the magazine was redesigned to include a new themed cover design and a new inner layout. Other changes were the addition of a new section at the back of the magazine called Trash replacing comics by drew and the Hi! Monkey^[2] Soon after the redesign a column entitled Web Drifter was introduced; written by Martin Sargent, it usually contained issues and language considered vulgar by the readership, and it was subsequently cancelled.

In issue 152, the Penny Forum^[3] section was removed but reinstated for issue 153 onwards due to large reader response to its removal. Another addition was Web Pro in the latter half of the magazine. This is sectioned into several topics (web security, careers, search engine news and web hosting) and written by industry professionals. There is also a web FAQ section.

History

.net was compared to Cre@te online following its redesign. Cre@te was very much a style-led magazine, also produced by Future Publishing, but included technical articles as well, attempting to demonstrate the convergence of digital arts with software development.

Footnotes

1. ^ This has been subject of controversy. In issue 154 (October 2006), a letter was published from Lee Crampton pointing out that the image of a pile of O'reilly books used to advertise the prize could not actually be bought for £50. He said: It is akin to the car adverts that which say 'only £6,995' but the small text underneath states 'model shown £10,995. Following the letter (and from issue 154) .net now prints a disclaimer underneath the image noting: All these for £50? You must be joking! Books don't grow on trees, you know.
2. ^ Hi! Monkey was a regular column written by monkey from himonkey.net. Monkey was originally featured in the magazine’s The Brains Behind interview in October 2005 (issue 141). His subsequent columns highlighted monkey’s unique writing style as he expounded on a number of eclectic topics. It ran from issue 143 (December 2005) to issue 151 (July 2006) when the magazine was redesigned. Archives of his columns are hidden on monkey's site.
3. ^ Penny Forum is a short piece with any surreal or joke threads from the magazines forum

External links

• .net official website
• .net forums
• Future Publishing
• .net podcast
• Tradepub Publishing