Sports Illustrated iPad app locks in landscape mode

Sports Illustrated, still sore over Apple’s refusal to allow iPad magazine subscriptions (the way it wanted to do them, at least), seems to be taking a “We’re going to take half our balls and go home” approach. Peter Kafka at All Things Digital’s “MediaMemo” section reports that the most recent issue of the Sports Illustrated iPad edition no longer supports viewing the magazine in portrait mode. Instead, when you turn the iPad into a portrait orientation, you get a little error message at the bottom saying “This page is intended to be viewed in landscape mode. (There’s nothing wrong with your iPad—just turn it horizontally.)”

Josh Quittner guest editor of the digital Sports Illustrated, explains that landscape is simply better for viewing large pictures, and more importantly it saves iPad designers the extra work of having to lay out two different versions of each magazine issue.

Why not add more designers? Well, if we were able to build a real business, with subscriptions that offered our iPad versions to readers at a reasonable price, that would be a no brainer. But we can’t yet, so the best approach for us is to experiment with the format, marshal our (human) resources and start building products on other platforms that will allow us to scale up as our business grows.

You could call it a passive-aggressive publishing protest, I suppose. As Kafka points out, it’s not terribly likely to change Apple’s mind.

Meanwhile, Apple’s discussions with publishers over the proposed “iPad newsstand” digital store continue, with publishers still skeptical over Apple’s insistence that it not have to share subscriber information that magazine publishers need in order to be able to sell ads. The Wall Street Journal reports hearing from anonymous sources that “Apple could announce a print-subscription offering as early as the next month or two,” though one said they may want to wait until next year when the next iPad comes out.

Either way, unless Apple is willing to give a little on its subscription data policies, they may not see much adoption. I don’t think that magazines consider this sort of thing as optional as Apple would like.

(Found via Ars Technica.)