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Subscriber Information and Revenue Sharing Seen as Hurdles to iPad Newspaper and Magazine Deals

I am not sure Apple can save the day!

I don't read newspapers or magazines anymore, period.

I am not convinced that the problem with the industry is the delivery medium. I think people are abandoning traditional print because of the bias and the historical role of gatekeeper that the editors performed.

I will no longer stand for the information I want to be filtered through whatever bias the periodical has, either right wing or left wing, and I don't think I am alone.

So I say let them die and go away, who needs them?
 
AwakenedLands said:
Is it really a salvation? Would YOU buy a subscription to a newspaper for an iPad? Do you have subscriptions to newspaper websites? I don't know ANYONE who does this. The only people I know who have subscriptions are those who buy the actual newspaper that gets delivered to the door... and the online subscription is free with it.

I don't see this really adding significant subscribers to a news agency where it will save them from their slow death. At most I see it where they have the same amount of subscribers, but now they aren't in complete control of the revenue/customer info.

If I want to read my local newspaper, I can go to their website for free. Or I can use an RSS viewer. There is NO reason for me to pay for this as an extra service.
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I feel exactly the same way, and it's one of the reasons shortly after the iPad announcement I went ahead and ordered a Dell Mini 10v to convert to OS X - it'll be the first time I've owned a non-Mac comp in around 20 years.

I get news info from multiple (free) sources around the web, and for this reason have less than zero interest in subscribing to just one source, with all the bias too inherent in limiting oneself to just one point of view. There are people I guess who subscribe to a particular newspaper, but would I be right in thinking they tend towards the older demographic?

I don't know: anyone out there that thinks subscribing to just one or two news sources, when you can get currently get thousands for free is a great idea, can you explain why? Genuine question.
 
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Michael CM1 said:
the-oz-man said:
Print media has been on life support for nearly a decade and the freaking "gold mine" comes to them in the last ditch effort to save their industry and they are just not happy with it . . . Come on and get a clue! You guy are light years behind what the internet is doing to your industry. Take what you can get and learn to live lean until you can implant yourself in another revenue stream.
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Gold mine? Do you know how much extra cost it will take to develop content for the iPad? To add the nifty stuff like the NY Times demo showed, that's not going to come cheap. Every level of newspaper is cutting pennies here and there to just stay alive. All of this is a crapshoot since not a single iPad has been sold.

I'm heavily biased as a newspaper employee, and I can tell you that this is far from a sure thing. You're expecting people to spend $500 on an extra device to read your content, which right now costs them either 75 cents/day per single copy or FREE on a Web site.

This won't make money for the industry until the gravy train of free news is killed. The New York Times is going to be first down that road. After that, the other big boys must follow. I honestly don't expect people to spend that much extra money for the same thing.

Our publication's readership is skewed extremely old, so this stuff isn't going to help us in the long run unless we can attract new people. Are software developers going to emerge to work with the thousands of smaller papers across the country?
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In a word: yes.
I plan to own an iPad. I would love access to periodicals like NYT & WSJ. I don't want to carry the dead tree editions around with me--it isn't convient with my job and my schedule of leaving the house at 6 AM isn't conducive to receiving a subscription.
These are two of the more significant periodicals in the country and their websites offer limited free content. Web editions aren't as friendly to navigate as the paper versions. Give me an iPad option and I'm likely there.
 
People seem to forget that Apple's 30% has to cover the costs of server storage; electronic distribution; marketing; and card transactions.

Developers who give away their apps for free on the AppStore only pay $99 for their developer subscription, and because the app is free, Apple has to cover any marketing and distribution costs. These free apps are also probably subsidised by paid apps.

30% for selling books and (hopefully, interactive) magazines is a pittance -- all the publisher has to do is electronically deliver one copy of their publication, Apple has to do the rest.

And soon, every major news website will only be accessible if you hand over your credit card details...
 
kresh said:
I don't read newspapers or magazines anymore, period.

I am not convinced that the problem with the industry is the delivery medium. I think people are abandoning traditional print because of the bias and the historical role of gatekeeper that the editors performed.

I will no longer stand for the information I want to be filtered through whatever bias the periodical has, either right wing or left wing, and I don't think I am alone.

So I say let them die and go away, who needs them?
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You don't think these bias are prevalent in the communication sources you get your information from now?

Just because the information is being delivered in a different format doesn't mean the information isn't being filtered by someone who may or may not have the same biases as yourself.
 
Yixian said:
Everything the papers are asking for here seems reasonable, hopefully Jobs is flexible.
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I agree also. If anything they just want information they would normally get anyway if a customer subscribed to them. Except :apple: being the controlling overlords they are, want to blank them off take the product off their hands and deny them a critical part of business plan. Customer details.

They are not asking for their app store history or anything else but who is buying from them. Apple treats other companies like mushrooms... feed em ***** and keep em in the dark.
 
Of course it's a deal-breaker; if word gets out that tons of subscriber data were being distributed then in this age of identity paranoia most customers would (quite rightly) refuse to purchase anything.

So I think Apple should stick to its planned limited data policy; other publishers will come around when they realise that they're idiots.
 
At the moment the talks are still limited to the big publishers, is there more news concerning small press and authors to participate in iBooks?

Soon i'll need to make a decision to develop a specific book-app for my publications but iBooks would be the easy and better solution. :confused:
 
louden said:
As a software developer, I'm all in favor of that industry bargaining hard with Apple. Competition will drive down profit taking in that space.

After all, apps helps make iPhones more valuable. Apple wants their cake and eat it to.

I'd like to see a world where "store" owners do more to incent developers to work on their platform. I for one hope Google's Market, Windows 7 ??? and the new Cell Provider's stores all take off. I don't want Apple dictating terms to everyone.
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How fast we forget. Before Apple and the iPhone is was a joke to try to put an app onto a phone. Look we have now. Apple has given devs an SDK, a marketplace, hosting. Apparently that is not enough for some people. :rolleyes:
 
Peace said:
Wow I hope it doesn't stop the big deals being discussed but man I didn't realize publishers mined that much info from customers.

I say the heck with them. They can get info with the pop up ads in their ePublications.
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Here's the problem:

Advertisers represent the real revenue stream; not the reader. Advertisers want to know there ads are reaching their target market; so print media gets as much info as possible on their readers. If they have less info, advertisers will pay less per ad; and publishers make less money. That is why they don't like Apple's terms on privacy and data access.

The information Apple has about their customers is a gold mine; the publishers want in it.
 
louden said:
As a software developer, I'm all in favor of that industry bargaining hard with Apple. Competition will drive down profit taking in that space.

After all, apps helps make iPhones more valuable. Apple wants their cake and eat it to.

I'd like to see a world where "store" owners do more to incent developers to work on their platform. I for one hope Google's Market, Windows 7 ??? and the new Cell Provider's stores all take off. I don't want Apple dictating terms to everyone.
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Yeah that is it. :cool: 30%, yeah that is huge profit taking. I am hoping they don't back down. I am curious to know how much money newspaper and magazines spend on distribution, ink, workers to run the presses, etc. I am sure it is up to about 30% +- a few % points.
 
Newspapers are ice-holes

Keep in mind that newspapers are as slimy as they come. They'll try and get as much as they can for as little as they can. Most of their cost currently is being spent on paper, printing and distribution, and that's a lot more than 30%. Also, they want the data not to stay in touch with their readers, but to resell that marketing capability to the retail advertisers who foot a lot of their bill (from display ads to inserts). Newspapers are all about advertising ($$$) and not content!
 
If newspapers and magazines are so interested in having subscriber data to mine, why don't the just make the user register with them when the app starts? Like a bazillion other apps out there. They could even collect more data about people than they do now, easily. And they could make you subscribe via their website and not via iTunes. So, as I'm typing this, I realized they must be negotiating to have their content distributed via iTunes like music, movies, and books are, with an Apple reader (iBooks?)... Because if not, if they planed on their own apps, their issues are moot. Interesting...
 
meecect said:
It must be hard for Steve to sit in the same room with some of these dumb asses and not hit them with chairs.

Are they stupid? They have an opportunity, through application development, to develop WAY more sensitive tracking information.

These guys have no clue. I hope Apple puts them all out of business.
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ROFLOL, I'm with you. I'm looking for something to throw just reading this article. Thankfully the Zen maintains the inner harmony.

It's all going to be about Steve. If his days are shorter than we might expect (although I thought he looked good in Jan) the iPad is his Newton. I don't don't think any device is more important to him than seeing this take off.

On the other hand his Buddhist beliefs will be unable to allow him to sell our souls for the sake of taking our clothes off for publishers.

It will be a test of Tim's influence. If it goes south and deals can't be made, I could see Tim leaving. That would be VERY bad for us evangelists. :apple:
 
cmaier said:
Yeah, I've seen that and all, but I don't quite get that in the context of this story about revenue models.
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That's because it's not yet clear. And this story does little to clarify it.

Of course it's possible to write dedicated apps for a given magazine, and sell them however one chooses. So on that level, the iPad debut doesn't change the model one bit.

However, since the iPad is considered a more viable magazine platform (and one that readers might pay for), now we're getting this mad negotiation dance about how the money should work. I've even heard that big publishers (Conde Nast, etc.) are contemplating one "master" app for all of their titles, and then charging incrementally for any issue downloaded therein. (Which is nuts for a number of reasons, but that's for another day.)

I wonder -- what precisely is this magical "data" they're collecting, and what's its web analog? Is it really true that publishers are collecting precious data, or is that data actually antiquated, and they're just living in the 1950s in terms of what's possible? Or are they getting something about me that I never (ever) told them?

And how much more private does data get than an online banking app? Why can't a publisher just require what they need going in, and use it however they use it?

Hm.
 
Those shortsighted doofs! I'm sure they already give up a lot more than 30% to newsstand retailers, delivery channels, printers, paper manufacturers... And if they want demographic info on their readers thay can just ask them! Don't they realize that an iPad magazine should be a highly interactive medium! It's a communication device, and you have a direct line to each reader! It beats the heck out of those annoying fall-in-your-lap bingo cards thery have to pay business-reply-mail rates for!

A few magazines will lead the way. The rest will jump on the bandwagon later. But why wait? Why be shortsighted? Get going!
 
midwich said:
anyone out there that thinks subscribing to just one or two news sources, when you can get currently get thousands for free is a great idea, can you explain why? Genuine question.
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Genuine answer - because most people don't access multiple sources, odd as that may sound. It's proven out by polls; a large swath of Americans look to one source for their news, and that tends to be local network TV (and to a lesser degree, cable). A tiny percentage reads a paper at all, and of those, it tends to be one paper. Same with news magazines; people pick one, and that's it.

We're talking about print here, not the web. But if you're curious, and like to bounce around to various sources, don't imagine that you're in the majority.
 
they better get on the bandwagon or be left behind. The internet is an aggressive beast eating up lunch money like cookie monster at Mrs. Fields.
Apple has put together the most awesome package for these guys. Acer, HP,Dell MS aren't anywhere near Apple in this respect. And this is why the itunes store is so freaking successful. Apple put together a tight integrated package. I don't see Steve Ballmer doing what Jobs is doing now. Pressing the flesh and selling a vision.
 
If I was the magazine industry I would be bending over backwards to get my magazine on the iPad. It may suck that you have to play by Apple's rules but its up to them.
 
Goog gravy, you could _give away_ your magazine on the iPad an make a mint! You've got no publishing or distribution costs, you can stick as many paid ads in the magazine as you like or your readers can stand, you can ask for demographic information any time you want, and if you do it right you can have a continuous relationship with each reader, getting a little more precious information out of them in each interaction! Heck. just asking after each article "thumbs up/thumbs down" gets you a TON of info you can data mine.

You gotta be nutz not to pounce on this chance.
 
kresh said:
I don't read newspapers or magazines anymore, period.

I am not convinced that the problem with the industry is the delivery medium. I think people are abandoning traditional print because of the bias and the historical role of gatekeeper that the editors performed.

I will no longer stand for the information I want to be filtered through whatever bias the periodical has, either right wing or left wing, and I don't think I am alone.

So I say let them die and go away, who needs them?
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1) Newspapers/Newsmags always have had a bias -- they are written by humans not robots. That doesn't stop the reader from thinking about what he is reading, being skeptical about facts given out, and choosing alternative news sources and personal experience & knowledge before making a conclusion.

2) Do you assume news found on the web is not biased in some fashion - or only news on paper suffers from bias?

3) What about non-news based magazines that give out tips, hints, and advice, or just explain things -- titles like MacWorld, Popular Mechanics, etc. Not the most intellectual material, but entertaining and useful just the same.

4) What about scholarly "think" magazines & journals that outright claim to have an agenda? Titles like Foreign Policy, Daedalus, Commentary, Reason.

I don't read a lot of newspapers or magazines anymore for a variety of reasons due to personal convenience. However, I think people would rediscover them if they were on an iPad and could be scanned the same way you would a paper version.
 
dear publishers!

if you don't want to give apple 30%, then why do you not publish the files on your own website and charge it directly? every reader will be VERY happy if you make your magazin cheaper, readers will probably subscribe to more than one magazine if it is a fair price! if it is too exensive, the whole thing will fail. and if it fails, apple has a huge problem because then it's similar unsucessfull in this market segment like its competitors (such a shame!)
 
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