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By Dan Koeppel This post was done in partnership with Wirecutter. When readers choose to buy Wirecutter's independently chosen editorial picks, Wirecutter and Engadget may earn affiliate commission. Read the full guide to electric razors.
Aussie blogger brings Movember mental health series to WoW blog
From Hollywood celebrities to the guy next door, millions of people have made World of Warcraft a part of their lives. How do you play WoW? We're giving each approach its own 15 Minutes of Fame. Pitched battle in a frantic Battleground feels a little like Armageddon if you're on the wrong side of the wave. Depression can feel the same way to those struggling in its iron coils. Winding together entertaining and informative posts about both is popular blogger Gnomeaggedon, whose WoW blog (which has been tackling PvP topics since the summer of 2008) is working through a special month-long series on depression and mental health for the mustachioed Movember men's health movement. You wouldn't think someone who's struggled with depression himself and mental health issues in his immediate family would be a big fan of the emotional highs and lows of Battlegrounds. It's one of the questions Gnomeaggedon toys with regularly: "Kind of related to your interview with Lady Erinia -- is depression caused by excessive video gaming, or is video gaming 'self-medication' for depression? I know in my case, my depression began when I was a child. I had no idea, and things like that weren't discussed in my family -- so treatment came 20 years 'late.' And where WoW was an escape from the difficulties of life (as alcohol, etc., had been in the past), most people assumed I had a (stereotypical) problem with gaming." With a backlog of years' worth of posts about being a gnome mage, the PvP lifestyle, and scattered plugs for the awareness of mental health issues, Gnomeaggedon has left an indelible imprint in the WoW blogosphere. We had a cozy email conversation with the Aussie player to explore his enthusiastic support for Movember, how many fellow WoW players -- people you play with every day -- are likely to be touched in some way by mental health issues, and how "cleansing the debuff" of mental illness can make such a difference in people's lives.
WSJ on the iPad will be $17.99 a month
Engadget reports that "people familiar with the matter" have stated The Wall Street Journal will be available on the iPad for a $17.99 a month subscription fee. The source comes from the Journal itself, so it's a pretty good bet this is accurate info. Engadget notes that the iPad subscription price is about $11 a month less than the subscription fee for the paper version of the Journal, but the iPad version of the Journal will still be ad-supported via advertisers like Coca-Cola and FedEx. A few other magazines are leaking pricing info, as well. Esquire plans to offer an ad-free, downloadable format of its April issue for $2.99, $2 less than the paper version's price. Interestingly, the magazine will also be including five free music videos with the issue. Although the electronic version of the Journal is well below the price of the newspaper version, $18 a month still seems pretty steep to me. Then again, I've spent the past ten years getting almost all of my news for free online, so I'm probably not their target demographic anyway. At least The Wall Street Journal has a better pricing scheme for its electronic content than some other content providers; Men's Health is reportedly going to charge the same $4.99 price for an iPad issue as they charge for the print version. If Men's Health offered the iPad version of their issues ad-free for the same price that would be one thing, but its iPad version is both ad-supported and the same price as newsstand issues. This seems like a pretty boneheaded move on their part, but sadly, it's one that I predict many other publishers will make over the coming months until they notice how dismal their sales are. [Via Engadget]
WSJ on iPad for $17.99 a month, magazines to be at or near newsstand prices?
The Wall Street Journal is running a piece that focuses on ad sales for the iPad. Pretty boring stuff except for a few nuggets related to the actual content we crave. Rupert Murdoch already confirmed that his monument to main stream media was coming to the iPad. Hell, they've even been treated to a rare, in-house device to assist with the development of the iPad version of the Wall Street Journal. Now it's quoting "a person familiar with the matter" (wink) who says that The Journal plans to charge subscribers $17.99 per month for iPad subscriptions -- for comparison, the print version of the WSJ costs $349 for 52 weeks or about $29 per month. Not bad, but you can't roll up an iPad to swat the dog. Conversely, magazines appear set to offer weekly or monthly editions out of the gate, not annual subscriptions. Sources told the WSJ that the April issue of Hearst's Esquire magazine (no stranger to new media) will arrive in downloadable format without advertisements for $2.99, $2 less than the newsstand price, and will include five music videos (each containing the phrase "somewhere in Mississippi," oddly enough) to take advantage of the device's multimedia capabilities. On the other hand, a full iPad issue of Men's Health with match the glossy's $4.99 price. Of course, as we heard earlier, publishers will be experimenting with advertising and pricing models to see what works so expect things to be fluid for quite some time after the April 3rd launch.
