The pending Apple tablet, if it really exists, seems to be sparking a lot of thinking in the publishing industry, especially in magazines. We have seen how News Corp. may be pulling out of Kindle distribution because of the control Amazon insists on having over content, subscriber information and pricing. Evidently magazines don’t want to get into this bind once they digitize.
A recent article from Advertising Age discusses this conundrum facing the publishers:
They saw how Apple dictated music prices on iTunes, where for a long time the world learned that every song was worth 99 cents, no less and no more. And they’ve watched Amazon exert total control over the magazine and newspaper subscriptions it sells on the Kindle, refusing to provide publishers any information about their own subscribers through the Kindle Store.
Retaining control over pricing and customer information is vital to the magazine industry, the article says, and evidently some consideration is being given to creating an industry storefront that could live on various ereading platforms.
IF said storefront allowed me to download a real file I could read on the device of my choosing and keep forever (i.e. nothing that expires or is DRMd to the gills or any such nonsense) I would certainly increase my magazine purchases dramatically. My biggest obstacle t buying magazines is storing them. I threw out a ton of them before I just stopped buying altogether and I browse at the store and never buy. If I could have them as ebooks just like all my other ones, I could buy again…
Here’s an article about attempts to create such a storefront:
http://mediamemo.allthingsd.com/20091002/publishers-like-time-inc-s-hulu-for-magazines-proposal-what-will-apple-and-amazon-say/