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A while ago I blogged about newspapers being the killer app for the iPad. I still believe that, but doubting I’ll see a full version of my local paper on the iPad any time soon, I’m currently more excited about the possibility of magazines. Several magazine publishers have already produced magazine apps for the iPad or demoed planned applications  (e.g. Time, Wired, Sports Illustrated, and Zinio who publish a range magazines electronically).

I’ve recently been checking out Zinio on my desktop computer (the interactive version of National Geographic is very nice), and one of the greatest benefits of the iPad obviously is that it can be comfortably hand held for reading, something that can’t be done with a more traditional computer—even a laptop. The larger screen also means it will also provide a much better experience than an iPhone, iPod touch, or other handheld device. But the feature that excites me the most is that publishers are now offering to provide the full content of their print publications in an electronic format. This is something that has been pretty rare in the past, and is my biggest complaint regarding most news/magazine web sites. Of course they will be charging for access to this content, but on a comfortable reading device like an iPad I’d have no hesitation in paying for content I wanted. Plus, with content being downloadable I can get what I’m interested in whenever, and wherever, I am.

Now I just need an iPad. Unfortunately Apple have just released that their international (including Australia) release date has been pushed back from late April to late May. So for the time being I’ll just have to envy those in the US who are already getting to experience the amazing change in publishing.