Video Embedded Magazines are Page Turners

American magazine Entertainment Weekly is the first print title to have video adverts included inside their pages.

The adverts feature on small screens built into cardboard and the Entertainment Weekly one contains ads for Pepsi Max and US TV network, CBS. There are also in-built speakers and each chip can hold up to 40 minutes of video content.

Manufactured my Americhip, the technology is still quite bulky; the chip is mounted on a thick cardboard insert and takes several seconds to load. Quite the wait for an impatient reader.

Interactive adverts aren't exactly new either. UK-based companies like Ceros, for example, have been creating page turning, video ads in the form of interactive online magazines for a number of years. Ceros MD, Dominic Duffy, had this to say about the development of video embedded technology:

"It's an exciting time in Media. The challenging economic situation has been a catalyst for media companies to provide alternative formats in which to consume content. This [The video inside Entertainment Weekly] is further evidence of the need to to experiment in order to gain the consumer engagement crucial for publishers and by implication, advertisers."

The chip's manufacturers told BBC News that the trial print run is expected to cost in the region of $20 or £13 per magazine. Granted the video adverts don't come cheap and, as yet, they are still just ads but with over 40 minutes of footage available it won't be long before it's TV and film clips or even music videos being shown along side the Pepsi and CBS adverts.