Slash LaneThe joint company will make more than 50 popular magazines — including The New Yorker, Vanity Fair, Time, People and Sports Illustrated — available for a variety of devices, including Apple's iPhone. According to The New York Observer, the consortium has not yet reached a final agreement, though an official deal could be "announced within weeks."
The consortium's alleged plans have been known for some time, though no official announcements have been made. But now, the agreement is reportedly "very close" to becoming final.
Expected to play a part in the new digital distribution product is Apple's still-unannounced tablet device, due to arrive in 2010. In October, people familiar with the group led by Time Inc. said that the associated publishers are targeting Apple's tablet, and have had discussions with the hardware maker about putting their magazines on the device.
Numerous reports in recent months have suggested Apple has been reaching out to content publishers, including The New York Times, McGraw Hill and Oberlin Press, to get them to make their publications available for purchase on the forthcoming device.
The forming of the group of publishers has reportedly been spearheaded by John Squires, executive vice president with Time Inc. Sources allegedly told The Observer that Squires will leave his current position to become the interim executive of the new collaborative company, when it is formed.
Magazine publishers are reportedly wary of attempting to create their own digital distribution methods. But all feel if they cooperate and create a joint business venture, they have a better chance of succeeding.
The deal has taken some time behind the scenes because accommodating a number of devices and form factors has proven to be one of many challenges. In addition to the iPhone and Apple's tablet, the publishers are expected to embrace the Amazon Kindle and Research in Motion's BlackBerry line.
"It’s pretty complicated stuff," one source reportedly said. "The really, really hard part is that you’ve got so many different kinds of devices running on different operating systems. And how do you handle that? The consortium provides one point of contact for the consumer. When you come to the main store, you can get the content any way you want."
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57 Comments
The web browser already is quite well suited to displaying magazine like content. Maybe though people are in the habit of everything on the web being free, so they feel they have to change the medium if they want to start charging. And also, I guess a PDF file often looks better than an HTML one.
It is pretty predictable that iTunes or a section of it will be the most successful vendor of such things. If Apple go into this the way many of us suspect the rivals will be left in the dust and the magazine companies have history to look to now to know who to go with ... Apple. The exact method of display be it pdf or some new format will no doubt all be part of the Tablet's introduction presentation by SJ. I would suspect Apple might come up with a proprietary format allowing features we have not seen before but I could be wrong.
As to getting everything for free as mentioned by ascii, the Apps store model allows for free, very low cost and higher priced. Many may opt for free with advertising within the product to pay for it while others may charge 99 cents. The Apps store is the perfect model to copy right down to add ons, upgrades and subscription built right into the store.
this is probably a smart move for them, but nothing they offer is worth paying for. They are all left wing propaganda arms of the democratic party.
this is probably a smart move for them, but nothing they offer is worth paying for. They are all left wing propaganda arms of the democratic party.
Well then you will be happy to know that Rupert Murdoch wants to charge people for his stuff too.
Seems like all the other media has alligned against Apple after viewing how the music industry was saved, yet creat a cash cow for Apple in their iPods.
I wonder if it will be open and Larry Flynt and Playboy are included?