TÖKYÖ — Japanese publisher Kodansha Ltd. will start publishing digital editions of its 22 comic magazines by June.
The magazines include the weekly and monthly editions of Young Magazine, Shonen Magazine and Magazine Special.
Kodansha started publishing the weekly version of Young Magazine digitally on Jan. 5 and started sales of Shonen Magazine’s digital editions later that same week. It already sells digital editions of nine magazines, including Morning Two and Afternoon, both of which are published monthly.
The digitalized comics will be distributed through the electronic book sites of amazon.com, rakuten.com and other sites.
Although the market for digitalized books has grown each year, digital edition magazines account for only a small portion of the market. A survey by the All Japan Magazine and Book Publisher’s and Editor’s Association found that the estimated circulation of print edition magazines in the January through November 2014 period declined 7.5 percent from a year earlier.
