Apple Debuts App Store Subscriptions

[AnthonyCM]

I wish people would stop saying that iOS is a mall, and that "stores" like Amazon need to pay "rent" (30%). Last I checked, I paid a lot of money for this device. I've never paid to enter a mall. If Apple wants to start giving out iPads for free, then they can feel justified in charging the "stores" "rent".

Having said that, Apple, to the best of my knowledge, has yet to make the correlation between iOS and malls. That was done by people on this forum.

 

[tatonka]

wrong, wrong, wrong.

if the app wants to sell *in-app*, it must pay 30% and also honor the same prices as on their out-app website. if an app wants to sell *out-app* only, and only serve/manage content in-app, they are free to do so.

see?

Stop being so arrogant and try reading the press release.

All we require is that, if a publisher is making a subscription offer outside of the app, the same (or better) offer be made inside the app ...

A company can no longer offer subscription on their website and not offer them in-app as well .. that is what everybody is upset with.

T.

 

[MaxPower49]

They wouldn't have to rearrange anything. They would just say payy 99 cents to stream netflix to your apple device, on top of having to pay 7.99 a month for streaming elsewhere. In order to log into the app you have to have an account, from there you have to have the iOS streaming sub, which you can only buy in the app, and there you go all sides happy (well except for us customers/consumers).

Well, that is rearranging things. And will Netflix risk pissing off customers by raising rates again (they just raised rates in January) just so Apple can put more money in their pockets? Charging customers for something they are getting free usually doesn't go over well with customers.

And even if something like that works for Netflix/Hulu, it doesn't do anything for the e-reader apps.

 

[deconstruct60]

wrong, wrong, wrong.
if an app wants to sell *out-app* only, and only serve/manage content in-app, they are free to do so.

From the press release.

However, Apple does require that if a publisher chooses to sell a digital subscription separately outside of the app, that same subscription offer must be made available, ... from within the app.

If you sell outside you have to sell inside (or just have to not allow access to same subscription content on iOS devices.) . Then Apple throws an additional constraint on top that only their mechanism can be used to sell inside. So selling limited access anywhere, requires exclusively putting Apple's mechanism in your app. Hence, in-app leads to 30% cut.


One simple solution is to stop selling the app. For example put the content in a customize HTML5/Javascript app. No app sold , no need to give Apple 30%. It is kind of goofy to need custom app engines to do this. Even if did custom webkit browser with more customized interface (custom homepage and tuned webcache) than generic Safari. Likewise distributing in epub format then any reader can pick it up.

 

[diamond.g]

Well, that is rearranging things. And will Netflix risk pissing off customers by raising rates again (they just raised rates in January) just so Apple can put more money in their pockets? Charging customers for something they are getting free usually doesn't go over well with customers.

And even if something like that works for Netflix/Hulu, it doesn't do anything for the e-reader apps.

Yeah it doesn't help Kindle.

I guess there isn't much else they could do other than say, sending you a physical certificate that says you own an ebook. From there since sale is tied to a physical object, the in-app purchases wouldn't apply. Otherwise eBay/Amazon/Newegg et al would have to change their 'in-app purchases'.

 

[j-a-x]

The Kindle app won't disappear. Can't they just remove the buying books from within the app/link to safari feature? I'm sure most people wouldn't mind simply going to amazon.com themselves in safari.

That is what I am wondering as well. It's still not clear if simply removing the option of buying the content in the app would satisfy Apple's requirements or if Apple would still require Amazon to use their own "in app purchase" system (since even if there's no link to Amazon.com in the app you can still technically buy the content elsewhere for the app). Why can't they make that clear?

 

[tatonka]

can you imagine a SHOPPING MALL charging merchants rent when all they did was design the building, build the building, wire the building, advertise for the building, and process payments in the building?

its rent, folks. the iphone ecosystem wasnt built with unicorn farts.

That analogy doesn't work. Rent would be the fixed amount you have to pay for your developer account ($99 if I am not mistaken).
To keep your analogy, what Apple does is requiring a percentage of every sale made in one of the malls shops while also requiring that every shop has at least the same offers as the branch in other locations.

 

[MaxPower49]

Amazon Kindle, Hulu+, And Netflix Apps Could Go Dark July 1st
http://appadvice.com/appnn/2011/02/amazon-kindle-hulu-netflix-apps-dark-july-1st/

 

[LagunaSol]

Made sense to me. His car was the transport method for another vendors product.

But what if Buick owned a grocery store, but you decided to get your groceries from someone else. You still transported them in your Buick. Is Buick still entitled to a cut?

The car analogy is silly. Apple sells a device and a retail store. Amazon adds retail markup to books they sell for the Kindle. You bought the Kindle, why should you have to pay Amazon additional profit for content? Where's the anti-Kindle outrage, people?

Microsoft adds a markup to video games you purchase for your Xbox. You bought the Xbox, why should you have to pay Microsoft additional profit for content? Where's the anti-Xbox outrage, people?

The list goes on and on.

Yet Apple participates in this standard business practice and everyone blows a cork. So typical.

Hey, at least Apple gives publishers the option of selling their add-on content outside the App Store. Microsoft and Amazon do not allow publishers the same freedoms.

If you're going to rant and rave about Apple, at least be honest enough to rant and rave even more loudly about Amazon and Microsoft and Sony and Nintendo and many others. 🙄

 

[linux2mac]

Where's the anti-Xbox outrage, people?

Like Windows, I too got fed up with Xbox and went PS3!

 

[diamond.g]

The car analogy is silly. Apple sells a device and a retail store. Amazon adds retail markup to books they sell for the Kindle. You bought the Kindle, why should you have to pay Amazon additional profit for content? Where's the anti-Kindle outrage, people?

Microsoft adds a markup to video games you purchase for your Xbox. You bought the Xbox, why should you have to pay Microsoft additional profit for content? Where's the anti-Xbox outrage, people?

The list goes on and on.

Yet Apple participates in this standard business practice and everyone blows a cork. So typical.

Hey, at least Apple gives publishers the option of selling their add-on content outside the App Store. Microsoft and Amazon do not allow publishers the same freedoms.

If you're going to rant and rave about Apple, at least be honest enough to rant and rave even more loudly about Amazon and Microsoft and Sony and Nintendo and many others. 🙄

I understand the comparason, but fail to understand how/why I have to pay Sony or Nintendo money when I watch Netflix through their devices. We don't, which should prove to be the case for Apple as well.

I am not arguing that Apple shouldn't get it's cut for Netflix.app, but I fail to see why Apple should get a cut for me being a netflix member.

Or why Apple should get a cut for me downloading data off Amazons servers (Kindle books).

 

[tatonka]

The car analogy is silly. Apple sells a device and a retail store. Amazon adds retail markup to books they sell for the Kindle. You bought the Kindle, why should you have to pay Amazon additional profit for content? Where's the anti-Kindle outrage, people?

Microsoft adds a markup to video games you purchase for your Xbox. You bought the Xbox, why should you have to pay Microsoft additional profit for content? Where's the anti-Xbox outrage, people?

The list goes on and on.

Yet Apple participates in this standard business practice and everyone blows a cork. So typical.

Hey, at least Apple gives publishers the option of selling their add-on content outside the App Store. Microsoft and Amazon do not allow publishers the same freedoms.

If you're going to rant and rave about Apple, at least be honest enough to rant and rave even more loudly about Amazon and Microsoft and Sony and Nintendo and many others. 🙄

First of all Apple is not giving any options here. The statement pretty clearly says, if you offer outside the app you have to use in-app to offer it from within the app as well.

Kindle and Microsoft are charging for the purchases from their stores (just like Apple does with the AppStores). Nobody's got a problem with that. What people are upset with is the fact that Apple tries to charge for sales from another stores .. i.e. the Kindle store. Besides at one point in time providing hard- and software (that was both paid for) Apple has nothing to do with those sales. This is not an offer .. this is a requirement.

T.

 

[LagunaSol]

Like Windows, I too got fed up with Xbox and went PS3!

Psst, Sony does this with the PS3 too. 🙁 (I also own a PS3.)

I understand the comparason, but fail to understand how/why I have to pay Sony or Nintendo money when I watch Netflix through their devices. We don't, which should prove to be the case for Apple as well.

I am not arguing that Apple shouldn't get it's cut for Netflix.app, but I fail to see why Apple should get a cut for me being a netflix member.

Or why Apple should get a cut for me downloading data off Amazons servers (Kindle books).

You don't think Netflix pays Microsoft and Sony for the privilege of appearing on their locked ecosystems?

Is it "fair" that Amazon charge you a healthy markup just to allow you to download a tiny text file (Kindle) from their server when the publisher did all the actual work?

Apple gets a cut because they're running the storefront. This is like complaining that Footlocker shouldn't charge you a markup because they don't design or manufacture the shoes.

What is it about retail sales that so many here seem to struggle to understand?

First of all Apple is not giving any options here. The statement pretty clearly says, if you offer outside the app you have to use in-app to offer it from within the app as well.

Completely untrue. And your own statement says it. "As well" = "option."

Apple is giving the publisher an option. Buyers can purchase content directly from the publisher or directly through the app (via Apple). Apple simply requires that both options be made available.

There are no such options with Kindle, Xbox, PS3, Wii, etc., where the publisher is forced (no option) to sell their wares exclusively through that platform's online store. And even if you pay for physical media (an Xbox 360 game disc) from a third-party retail store, Microsoft is still taking a cut (What the???).

Seriously, where's the outrage? It's amazing the amount of heat Apple gets when they do exactly what other major companies have been doing for years. 🙄

 

[LagunaSol]

*post merge*

 

[deconstruct60]

Charging customers for something they are getting free usually doesn't go over well with customers.

No rule yet saying can't put up notice that this is to comply with Apple's rules. I don't see the point of Netflix trying to assume responsibility here.

Netflix could also just point folks at streaming through browser. Streaming video from the content provider to the device points more so to deficiencies in core Webkit then need for an app.

When the content is stored on the iOS device so that can view when disconnected from the internet are stronger case for custom app. (e.g, kindle books).

 

[spazzcat]

I wish people would stop saying that iOS is a mall, and that "stores" like Amazon need to pay "rent" (30%). Last I checked, I paid a lot of money for this device. I've never paid to enter a mall. If Apple wants to start giving out iPads for free, then they can feel justified in charging the "stores" "rent".

Having said that, Apple, to the best of my knowledge, has yet to make the correlation between iOS and malls. That was done by people on this forum.

The iPad is your car.

 

[redkamel]

From my reading this applies only to content publishers (ie creators)...not people who deliver content or give access to it.

Take for example Kindle or Netflix...both of which give you access to existing content that you purchase, not regular, new content (which is what I would hope a "subscription" should only apply to). For example, a kindle "subscription" gives you nothing; a book is an "in app purchase" not a subscription (unless you are subscribing to the Economist or something, obviously). Likewise a Netflix subscription gives you access to already created content, not new movies made every month or sent to my phone. I don't buy a "thing" when I buy a netflix subscription.

Kindle might be considered a publisher though. Don't know too much about how these rules apply to anything thats not a periodical magazine or video....since it shouldn't.

 

[tatonka]

Completely untrue. And your own statement says it. "As well" = "option."

Apple is giving the publisher an option. Buyers can purchase content directly from the publisher or directly through the app (via Apple). Apple simply requires that both options be made available.

There are no such options with Kindle, Xbox, PS3, Wii, etc., where the publisher is forced (no option) to sell their wares exclusively through that platform's online store. And even if you pay for physical media (an Xbox 360 game disc) from a third-party retail store, Microsoft is still taking a cut (What the???).

Seriously, where's the outrage? It's amazing the amount of heat Apple gets when they do exactly what other major companies have been doing for years. 🙄

as well means option? Thats news to me!
The interesting portion of my sentence was actually the "have to" which is anything but optional. That is what Steve Jobs is quoted to have said in the press release.

All we require is that, if a publisher is making a subscription offer outside of the app, the same (or better) offer be made inside the app, so that customers can easily subscribe with one-click right in the app.

and a little further in the press release ..

However, Apple does require that if a publisher chooses to sell a digital subscription separately outside of the app, that same subscription offer must be made available, at the same price or less, to customers who wish to subscribe from within the app. In addition, publishers may no longer provide links in their apps (to a web site, for example) which allow the customer to purchase content or subscriptions outside of the app.

I don't see any optional phrasing here .. but maybe you can show me where exactly it says, youre fine if you only publish outside the app.

T.

 

[diamond.g]

Psst, Sony does this with the PS3 too. 🙁 (I also own a PS3.)



You don't think Netflix pays Microsoft and Sony for the privilege of appearing on their locked ecosystems?

Is it "fair" that Amazon charge you a healthy markup just to allow you to download a tiny text file (Kindle) from their server when the publisher did all the actual work?

Apple gets a cut because they're running the storefront. This is like complaining that Footlocker shouldn't charge you a markup because they don't design or manufacture the shoes.

What is it about retail sales that so many here seem to struggle to understand?



Completely untrue. And your own statement says it. "As well" = "option."

Apple is giving the publisher an option. Buyers can purchase content directly from the publisher or directly through the app (via Apple). Apple simply requires that both options be made available.

There are no such options with Kindle, Xbox, PS3, Wii, etc., where the publisher is forced (no option) to sell their wares exclusively through that platform's online store. And even if you pay for physical media (an Xbox 360 game disc) from a third-party retail store, Microsoft is still taking a cut (What the???).

Seriously, where's the outrage? It's amazing the amount of heat Apple gets when they do exactly what other major companies have been doing for years. 🙄

I buy a book from iBookStore: Apple get 30%.
I buy book from Amazon.com: Amazon get 30%.

So now Apple wants 30% from a sale that took place on Amazon.com, just because I can read said book on iOS? Is that accurate? If not please clarify.

 

[spazzcat]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_2_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8C148 Safari/6533.18.5)

Psst, Sony does this with the PS3 too. 🙁 (I also own a PS3.)



You don't think Netflix pays Microsoft and Sony for the privilege of appearing on their locked ecosystems?

Is it "fair" that Amazon charge you a healthy markup just to allow you to download a tiny text file (Kindle) from their server when the publisher did all the actual work?

Apple gets a cut because they're running the storefront. This is like complaining that Footlocker shouldn't charge you a markup because they don't design or manufacture the shoes.

What is it about retail sales that so many here seem to struggle to understand?



Completely untrue. And your own statement says it. "As well" = "option."

Apple is giving the publisher an option. Buyers can purchase content directly from the publisher or directly through the app (via Apple). Apple simply requires that both options be made available.

There are no such options with Kindle, Xbox, PS3, Wii, etc., where the publisher is forced (no option) to sell their wares exclusively through that platform's online store. And even if you pay for physical media (an Xbox 360 game disc) from a third-party retail store, Microsoft is still taking a cut (What the???).

Seriously, where's the outrage? It's amazing the amount of heat Apple gets when they do exactly what other major companies have been doing for years. 🙄

I buy a book from iBookStore: Apple get 30%.
I buy book from Amazon.com: Amazon get 30%.

So now Apple wants 30% from a sale that took place on Amazon.com, just because I can read said book on iOS? Is that accurate? If not please clarify.

Would you buy that book if you didn't own an iPhone or ipad?

 

[redkamel]

Apparently Apple won't allow that-it has to be the same or cheaper, so Apple's more likely to get to skim off the top.

Yes

I don't know what a "Puick" is, but Apple doesn't incur any more expense either.

sure they do, they update the software and manage the subscription software.[/QUOTE]

And yet amazingly Windows, OS X, and Linux have all survived for decades without anyone skimming 30% off the top of programs sold for them. I guess that's not possible, and actually there have been no PCs since they were introduced and quickly died out in the 70's.

Those are desktop programs you buy once, not mobile content subscription

You're not forced to buy things from Target if you don't want to, you can go over to K-Mart. You are forced to buy things from Apple if you use iOS.

Thats not really a meaningful analogy because a lamp for my house is different from a program on my phone. Also, the subscription agreement is not between customers and Apple. And you are not "forced" to buy anything. You can still get the subscription off the publisher for the same price. Which will likely either be the a unified price because they will either increase all subscription costs to cover the iOS subscriptions or, cheaper since they offer 2 subscriptions, one including iOS and one without. I see your point that the cost to subscribe on iOS will go up and people are forced to pay it...but still, buying an item is different than a constantly updating program.

Huh? Again, why do they have this right? Microsoft, Apple, and others brought in millions of customers on their PCs, and didn't try to skim 30% off the top of their developers while doing so.

It is quite basic. Apple is astonishingly greedy.

They have the right because they own the distribution system, the "store" if you will. Much as Wal-mart and Target and Trader Joes have the right to make rules for their suppliers to follow if they would like access to that market. Note I am using the analogy you used earlier correctly: seller-supplier, not customer-store.

Apple is not "astonishingly greedy", I would say it is about as greedy as any other company. I would say they have a strong philosophy about making their products work and the customer happy, unlike other companies. Have you seen the Android App store? It is appears to be somewhat lacking compared to itunes, which was there first, took the gamble, and continues to sit in its positions well. For this they charge 30%, just as any premium store charges its suppliers.

 

[linux2mac]

Psst, Sony does this with the PS3 too. 🙁 (I also own a PS3.)

At least the PS3 is quiet ( I have slim version) and doesn't sound like a F-14 Tom Cat taking off a flight deck like the 360 when I turn it on. LOL

Plus its worth it to me for Uncharted 2 ( I can't wait for 3).

 

[diamond.g]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_2_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8C148 Safari/6533.18.5)



Would you buy that book if you didn't own an iPhone or ipad?

Yeah. The only reason I don't have a Kindle now is because I can read the books on my iPhone (for the time being anyways, still plan on getting a Kindle). I have tried to just use iBooks but find that most of the books I want are not in the iBookStore. If Apple had the same book library that Amazon has I would probably be looking at getting the iPad more seriously.

 

[jim2011]

At least the PS3 is quiet ( I have slim version) and doesn't sound like a F-14 Tom Cat taking off a flight deck like the 360 when I turn it on. LOL

Plus its worth it to me for Uncharted 2 ( I can't wait for 3).

Well the 360 slim is even quieter imo than the slim PS3...

 

[cmaier]

Yeah. The only reason I don't have a Kindle now is because I can read the books on my iPhone (for the time being anyways, still plan on getting a Kindle). I have tried to just use iBooks but find that most of the books I want are not in the iBookStore. If Apple had the same book library that Amazon has I would probably be looking at getting the iPad more seriously.

Indeed. This may all be a backdoor attempt to get the publishers to let Apple sell their stuff in the ibookstore by threatening their income stream from other sources (since other sources, like Amazon, will either have to raise prices (and decrease demand) or push back on the publishers to give amazon a bigger cut).