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Double take: Bilingual tech magazine links its print content with its website

STARTING A PRINT magazine about technology seems like a case of the message killing the medium. But not to Mel Gomez. He just wanted a magazine that spoke to him - in two languages.

STARTING A PRINT magazine about technology seems like a case of the message killing the medium. But not to Mel Gomez. He just wanted a magazine that spoke to him - in two languages.

So Gomez, the director of niche publishing for the Southwest Philly-based Bartash Printing, started Tek Lado, which hit the street Sept. 27, bearing the tagline, "A technology and pop culture magazine for the new bilingual generation."

Tek Lado will publish bimonthly (the next issue is due in late November), but Gomez foresees a switch to monthly publication by April. It's free and can be picked up at red honor boxes around the city. All content, which is generated by freelancers, is aimed at a Philadelphia audience.

"There isn't another magazine like this in the U.S.," said Gomez, who worked as a radio-frequency engineer and had no experience in publishing before coming to work at Bartash.

The first issue's cover story asks, "Who is the Hispanic geek?" The articles, as varied as a profile of local comic nerd Joe Turner and an essay on how the

iPhone affects familial dynamics, are printed in English or Spanish, with the option of accessing the other language via QR code, or "quick-response" code, a matrix bar code that can be read by Internet-enabled cell phones to provide additional content (think of it as a link for your cell phone).

Gomez wants to expand the use of QR codes, linking the content in the magazine not just to its bilingual counterpart, but to additional materials, like extra pictures or videos. There is even a QR code on Tek Lado's honor boxes that links to the magazine's site, tek-lado.com. Gomez said the codes are more prevalent in places like Japan (where the code was invented) and New York, but he wants Philadelphians to see a QR code and think Tek Lado.

"We have a unique responsibility to have our website be as dynamic and active as possible," said Editor in Chief Liz Spikol, who previously worked as the managing editor of Philadelphia Weekly, citing Tek Lado's blog, which provides daily online updates and the QR codes as examples of this dynamism.

But a print magazine, especially one that specifically focuses on fast-changing technology, seems ostensibly counterintuitive. Bartash, which prints about 300 publications but previously had nothing to call its own, certainly sees a future in print: Earlier this year, it created the Bartash Media Group, essentially a return to form for the nearly 60-year-old company that began as a way to print Joe Bartash's newspaper, the Southwest Globe. Gomez said he has other publications in the pipeline, but he's keeping mum on their topics.

Although Gomez doesn't want to pigeonhole Tek Lado as a magazine for only the Latino community, Spikol sees this demographic as a way to bridge print and new media. "There's a duality in the way that Latinos engage in media. Community newspapers, like Al Dia, are very popular in Latino communities. There's a whole group of people who are really attached to print publications," said Spikol. "Some people say that Latinos don't have access to technology, but that's a misconception."

Spikol cited studies that show that Latinos are early adopters of new technologies and start to familiarize themselves with technology at earlier ages than other ethnic groups. She also said that a boom in blogging and social media in the Latino community, along with Internet-enabled cell phones, "facilitate maintaining contact with friends and family, including those in other countries," she said.