Apple announced the terms of their new digital magazine subscription model yesterday in an agreement with app developer and digital publisher Texterity, which they posted on their web site last night. It clears up a number of concerns to the publishing industry, and finally clears the hurdle for existing subscribers of print content not having to pay again for a digital version of the same magazine.
From the Texterity Web Post:
Publishers can sell print subscriptions, and offer “digital companion” access through an app as long as there is no additional fee for those subscribers. It’s a way to offer another incentive for print subs to stay loyal and engaged. Read the rest of this entry »
The above is my favorite quote from the Harrison Survey on the impact that the iPad and other tablet devices are having on the digital publishing and technology landscape in general. I also thought it interesting that the “early adopter” persona / stigma is in fact changing:
“Early adopters of eReading are more likely to see themselves as fashionable, playful, family-focused and kind, as opposed to the technology and leadership orientation of early adopters in prior technological revolutions”
Other Key Points:
Tablet users spend 50% more time reading magazines, 75% more time reading newspapers, and 25% more time reading books.
Accelerated estimates of 20 million tablets sold in 2011, with 13% of all consumers expressing interest in purchasing a tablet in the next 12 months.
Inevitability of tablets as the delivery mechanism for digital magazines
Comfort with digital payment systems that debit accounts
Multi function tablet devices instead of single purpose e-readers
Continued privacy concerns and acknowledgment of the importance solutions in that space
Is it just me, or does it seem that European magazines are way more active in developing iPad and tablet digital publications?
Recently there have been a slew of digital magazines released in Europe, and Axel Springer Verlag is just the latest examples of this. It would also appear to me that the pricing and subscription models are more consumer friendly in the EU compared to the US, where publishers seem determined to set an example and train tablet users to expect high pricing models for Magazine Content.
So which is the better strategy? Attracting loyal readership with low pricing and making money through sales volume is one way, or hold out for higher pricing and risk fewer readers of the digital editions?
While I think the production costs for digital content may seem high to publishers initially, I feel the exponential growth of the tablet market on multiple platforms is being ignored in the US approach. Production costs may be high, but ultimately the distribution costs are not when scaling to potentially millions of readers. To me the scalability of the digital platforms are the real differentiation to print, where each additional copy costs extra ink, paper, packaging, transportation, distribution, warehousing, inventory and waste copies.
So I guess personally I come down on the side of lower pricing and future volume, even if this initially means subsidizing the effort slightly. Plus, establishing and automating digital publishing work flows is an experience best had in the beginning of the upcoming rush to tablet publishing.
If you’re a regular reader of the Sports Illustrated (SI) publication for the iPad, you may have noticed something unusual / different in the latest issue. The SI iPad edition is now only viewable in landscape mode, no longer supporting portrait mode as it did in previous issues.
I am amazed at how much negative feedback there is for iPad digital magazines that do not offer a way for existing subscribers to receive the iPad content free, or at least for a substantially discounted amount.
The many 100′s of one star ratings dwarf and seem to negate the few good reviews the magazine may have received for interactive content features, and I wonder if this is leading to reducing production costs already and only supporting one orientation.
Sports Illustrated is not the only one suffering, Wired Magazine, The New Yorker, Fortune, Times, the list goes on with overwhelmingly bad reviews.
While the reading experiences are compelling, the lack of subscription business models are really hurting the potential of this entire medium, and I do hope that Apple, the publishing industry and tool providers can come up with a solution, soon…
Click through to read the rest of Matt’s Tinsley’s article…
I think this confirms my hypothesis of tablet devices driving a trend towards the mainstream web adaptation of multi-touch, interactive, “digital magazine” like experiences on the browser…
An Online Forum for Sharing Best Practices and Inspiring Others to Build Highly Effective Digital Publications for Various Business Cases and Markets
BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS–(Marketwire – Aug. 12, 2010) – Today, Zmags Corporation announced the launch of the Zmags Showcase, a website featuring a collection of the best ‘zmags’ selected from more than 100,000 digital publications created by the 2,500 Zmags customers. The Showcase site provides the fast-growing online publication community with examples of highly effective digital publications created for various business cases and markets. In the Showcase, visitors can join discussions, share ideas, vote on the best ‘zmags’, and discover best practices on using digital publications to improve ROI. Read the rest of this entry »
New Version 1.4 of the Tools provides a multitude of new and enhanced features, expanding the creative scope.
Renowned newspaper and magazine publishers around the globe are using WoodWing´s Digital Magazine Tools to create and publish stunning iPad Apps. The new Version 1.4 of the Tools provides a multitude of new and enhanced features, expanding the creative scope.
WoodWing Software, one of the innovation leaders in cross-media publishing solutions, today announced the release of Version 1.4 of its Digital Magazine Tools for iPad, supporting both Adobe CS4 and CS5.
WoodWing´s Digital Magazine Tools for iPad are used by many renowned newspaper and magazine publishers around the globe to create iPad issues of famous publications, including Time, Sports Illustrated, Life and Fortune; the Asian newspapers South China Morning Post and Kompas; Veronica Magazine in the Netherlands and many more. A list of iPad Apps created with WoodWing´s solution is available at www.woodwing.com/en/digital-magazine/ipad-gallery.
Expanding the creative scope The new release provides publishers with a number of new and enhanced features, enabling them to create iPad Apps that are even more attractive to the reader. Scrollable elements dramatically increase the creative leeway. Assigning audio files to pages provides for automatic sound when pages are opened. Two-finger swipes to switch to the next story and more.
New features are available for the design of a table of contents – a vertical list that pops up in a separate window. A new scrubber in the page navigator similar to the navigation used in iBooks.
Furthermore, the Digital Magazine Tools 1.4 allow for new extension possibilities. Custom Page Objects allows third parties to add their own functionality to the digital magazine code. Web elements can be shown embedded in the page, as a pop-up in the application or in the Web browser outside the app.
High Acceptance by Publishers around the Globe “We are very pleased with the high acceptance of our tools by publishers around the world,” said Erik Schut, President of WoodWing Software. “In addition to the creative features, they appreciate the fact that they can create their iPad Apps using existing teams. Based on the very positive customer feedback and the great iPad Apps already done with our tools, we can say with confidence that WoodWing is a driving force in the iPad Publishing segment. And we keep our promise to provide enriched versions of our Digital Magazine Tools for iPad each month.”
CCI, a provider of leading newsroom solutions especially for newspapers, offers WoodWing’s iPad Reader App under an OEM agreement as part of their solutions.
About WoodWing WoodWing creates the most progressive solutions available on the market for the production of print and online publications. Rapid growth worldwide and success across the full spectrum of small to large publishers demonstrate that WoodWing markets the best tools for the best price. WoodWing Software is located in Zaandam, The Netherlands, and has regional sales companies for Europe, the USA, Asia-Pacific, and Latin America. Customers are served through select partners.
Apple’s policies have created two classes of app citizens. First, the top 1% of apps that deliver unique value, showcased effectively by Apple and drive significant revenue. Second, is the other 99% of apps, which deliver the sheer size numbers that are great for PR (“App Store exceeds 100K apps!”) and taglines (“there is an app for that!”) but are effectively filler, struggle to monetize and generally slide down a descending scale of crap. The argument from industry observers is that between the 1% and the 99% there are a large number of high quality applications that get lost in the ever-widening chasm. My argument is that the policies also create a perverse monetization incentive to deploy the largest amount of crap apps as possible.
If you have not come across this great report from Morgan Stanley yet, it is a must read for internet marketers, mobile strategists, web and app content developers
Apple announced the terms of their new digital magazine subscription model yesterday in an agreement with app developer and digital publisher Texterity, which they posted on their web site last night. It clears up a number of concerns to the publishing industry, and finally clears the hurdle for existing subscribers of print content not having to pay again for a digital version of the same magazine.
Posted by JuergenB 
The above is my favorite quote from the Harrison Survey on the impact that the iPad and other tablet devices are having on the digital publishing and technology landscape in general. I also thought it interesting that the “early adopter” persona / stigma is in fact changing:
If you’re a regular reader of the 
