Apple Rejects Sony Reader App

[Joe Johaneman]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://www.tipb.com/2011/02/01/apple-rejects-sony-reader-app-changing-stance-purchases-app-store/' target='_blank'>http://www.tipb.com/2011/02/01/appl...ases-app-store/</a><br /><br /></div><p><em>"According to the New York Times, Apple has rejected a few apps recently including Sony's Reader app, based on the way content is purchased for use within the app. Sony's Reader app is an eBook platform similar to Apple's own iBooks app and the Amazon Kindle app. Content can be found and purchased outside the app, bypassing Apple's iTunes Store and therefore bypassing Apples[sic] slice of the pie."</em></p><p><img src="http://images.thoughtsmedia.com/resizer/thumbs/size/600/at/auto/1296570225.usr105505.jpg" style="border: 1px solid #d2d2bb; margin-left: 100px; margin-right: 100px;" /></p><p>I really hope this isn't true.&nbsp; If Apple goes in this direction, I can see the ebook sellers leaving the App store.&nbsp; Right now, the iPad is the best device for reading ebooks because you can buy from any store.&nbsp; But if Apple takes a cut from every purchase, then the ebook sellers have two choices:&nbsp; charge more for their books on the iPad, or leave the iPad all together.&nbsp; I suspect they'll choose the latter.&nbsp; This doesn't bode well.&nbsp; What do you think:&nbsp; should Apple force ebook sellers to give Apple a cut of every ebook sale?&nbsp;</p>

[Jason Dunn]

Apple is showing their true colours on this issue, and it's the ugly, greedy, controlling side of them. *This* is the company I feel very conflicted about supporting. :mad:

They're pissed that iBooks has such strong competition from Kindle - they want to control ebook distribution in the same way they control music and video content distribution, but they can't, because Kindle is such a massively superior platform, able to put ebooks on a huge variety of devices. Apple refuses to acknowledge that reading on a 1.5 pound, back-lit screen, $500+ device isn't the best way to consume ebooks...but rather than letting people choose what they want to view it on.

This is going to blow up in Apple's face, because their naked ambition and greed are exposed to the world on this issue.

[Sven Johannsen]

The current phrasing on the articles about this don't prohibit your reading content on the iPad purchased outside the app, as some of the stories have implied. It just says the provider must provide an in-app purchase option that goes through iTunes. It would seem that all Sony, Amazon, B&N have to do is provide that button and figure out how to tack Apples charge onto that sale. Bad for the consumer, BUT, you can still go to the provider store, from your Reader, Kindle or Nook, or to the web presence from your PC and purchase content at a cheaper price and read it on the iPad, best I can tell. For that matter I don't see how Apple could easily prevent you from opening Safari and purchasing a book from these services. The in-app purchase button just can't link to the site in Safari.

Seems to me that this is more likely to backfire than provide significant revenue. I do read occaisionally on my iPad, but I buy from Amazon on the web, and my wife does so from her Nook.