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Mag Publishers, Apple Battle Over Subscription Apps

New York Post, Sunday, August 1, 2010 10:33 PM

Only three months ago, Apple CEO Steve Jobs was being hailed as a potential savior in the publishing world for getting magazines involved in the launch of the iPad. Now he's involved in a behind-the-scenes tug-of-war over annual subscriptions and the question of whether to share customer data with the publishers. As a result, there are no annual subscription offers on the iPad, only single-copy sales of titles such as GQ, Time, Sports Illustrated, Vanity Fair and Wired.

All publishers say they hope to offer subscriptions at some point. But that is not happening, creating tension between publishers and Apple. The rejection has reverberated across the publishing world. Publishers are unlikely to budge. Subscriptions not only generate a consistent revenue stream, but they also furnish a treasure chest of demographic information. Wired sold more than 100,000 iPad versions of its June issue at $4.99, in addition to the 74,000 copies it usually sells on newsstands.

Read the whole story at New York Post »

apps, magazines

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