Apple's Store. Apple's choice of what to allow in the store. Just like Walmart or any other store.
If you don't like it, don't buy an iPhone.
No... if you don't like the fact that Wal-Mart doesn't carry the cereal you want, or if Joe's Grocery doesn't stock kosher products or if McDonald's doesn't have anything on the menu that a vegetarian could eat, you
talk to the owner. "Don't buy an iPhone" is just as simple-minded as "If you don't like what the president is doing, move to Canada". Taking your business elsewhere should be the
last resort, not the first.
My concern about this is less as a consumer than as a producer. No, I'm not a developer of boob-wiggling apps; I'm a cartoonist. Yeah, yeah, I heard Schiller say that the people who create content for their products aren't their first priority; the people who buy them are. I get it. But that content helps to drive those sales.
The comics industry has been longing for something like the iPad. Comics creators are producing material that people seem to really enjoy reading. But between the costs of publishing, and limited distribution channels, it's hard to find an audience and stay in business. The web is a partial solution, but lots of people don't like to read sitting at a computer. A device like the iPad, with a retail system like iTunes that would enable readers to easily buy comics and support their favorite creators, and enable those creators to get paid for their work... it's just what the doctor ordered.
But comics aren't just for kids. Look at a book like Watchmen, which sold hugely last year. Complete with Dr. Manhattan's penis. Now, Apple would probably give Watchmen a pass, since it's an acclaimed book by a major writer. But what about when it was new? What about "the next Watchmen"?
Back during the McCarthy era, the comics industry was confronted by angry parents upset that some of the books being published weren't suitable for children. The "Comics Code" was set up, which limited the range of comics that could be distributed through the stores where people commonly bought them. Because kids shopped there. "You can still get what you want other places," older readers were told. But people didn't want to go to head shops and mail order to get comics with a little nudity or swearing or adult themes. Those books stopped being published. It took a couple decades before publishers were willing to defy the Code and resume publishing comics for people who'd outgrown childish jokes and slugfests.
Apple isn't just a software and music distributor anymore. They're becoming a movie and book distributor. With all due respect to musicians, that's a bigger cultural responsibility. Apple is under no legal obligation to carry anything, of course. But if they chose to apply the equivalent of the Comics Code to the iPad, to keep the entire system suitable for children, they'll be making it less suitable for adults. Furthermore, they'll be doing a disservice to the publishing industry, which
wants to embrace the iPad, but fears that they'll be putting a lot of effort into a system that restricts them from selling the material they believe their customers would enjoy reading.
Prose publishers have more alternatives; the Kindle and Nook work well enough for most of their books. Comics publishers want color, a more hands-on interface, etc. The iPad is IT.
Or it would have been, if not for Apple giving in to the chorus of "think of the children", the rallying cry that nearly killed the comics industry a few decades ago (and a host of other evils). I'm now hearing comics creators using the phrase "it would've been" about the iPad. They're giving up on it, looking elsewhere, for a reader and distribution system that gives them the freedom to give their customers what they want.
Isn't that how a free press in a free market is supposed to work? Why doesn't Apple want to be part of it?
