Week in Review

Short reads on a Saturday morning:

• In case you missed it, there was no Week in Review last week as the iPad launch and thousands of folk, including myself, were waiting for UPS to deliver out iPads.
The TNM iPad Page
4-1: First reviews
4-1: First Look: NYT app
4-1: BBC app?
4-2: GQ, Popular Science
4-2: Le Monde
4-3: Unboxing photos
4-3: Review: NYT app
4-5: Epicurious
4-5: Zinio/VIVmag
4-6: ACU app
4-7: TSA
4-7: Sales
4-8: iAd
4-8: Developer Agreement

While the week started out with the excitement of the iPad launch, it ended with a bit of controversy. On Thursday, Steve Jobs took to the stage once again, this time to preview Apple's new iPhone OS 4, set to be ready for users by the summer. Jobs mentioned that there were hundreds of changes and enhancements to be found in the new operating system including multitasking and the introduction of iAd, Apple's new mobile advertising platform. But once developers started to download the SDK it was clear that Apple is serious about locking Adobe Flash out of the its iPhone OS based products. Developers were not happy with the way Apple is forcing them to toe-the-line.

Adobe, however, has more to lose than just hours of coding. In an SEC filing, Adobe admits that Apple's refusal to play ball could hurt business. “To the extent new releases of operating systems or other third-party products, platforms or devices, such as the Apple iPhone or iPad, make it more difficult for our products to perform, and our customers are persuaded to use alternative technologies, our business could be harmed,” Adobe wrote in its filing.

Lee Brimelow, writing on his Flash Blog, responded with a post titled Apple Slaps Developer in the Face. But his most interesting line might have been the one that has now reads: [Sentence regarding Apple's intentions redacted at request from Adobe]. He does manage to get the last word in, though: "Go screw yourself Apple." Well, I think we'll move on.

• More iPad developments:
a) The iPad has several ways users can read books, either through iBooks or through separate apps. Apple's tablets uses the ePub format, a format that the ePub Working Group already sees needs revision to take into account the iPad's ability to display video and other multimedia.


b) A team from Abilene Christian University became the first school to launch an iPad app for its student newspaper, The Optimist. "Every hour or 30 minutes we could find between classes and other obligations were spent in front of a Mac. For me, personally, in that last week before the app submission deadline, I put in over 60 hours finishing the app," said Rich Tanner, who along with Richard Beaird were the programmers on the project. The app was completed in six weeks, but there are already plans to update it.

• Magazine ad pages continue to decline, falling a further 9.4 percent in the first quarter, according to the Magazine Publishers of America. While declines moderated somewhat, a majority of magazines recorded declines, nonetheless.

Some categories recorded healthy increases, though. Toiletries & Cosmetics grew 7.6 percent, and the Financial, Insurance & Real Estate category grew 11.3 percent.

• In-stat, the market intelligence company, has been bought from Reed Business Information by its former publisher. Mark Kirstein led the team that is backed by NPD Group. "As a nimble, independent and reputable market research firm, we see this change as a tremendous opportunity to better serve our customers with industry leading research focused on the Digital Entertainment and Mobile Internet ecosystems," said Kirstein.

• In case you missed it, Advanstar Communications announced last week that it had signed a deal with HCL Technology, an India-based outsourcing company to take over production duties. The offshoring of production will result in the loss of 100 positions at the B2B media firm.

"In this highly competitive media marketplace, we need to focus on the things that we do well, creating a valuable platform for our clients, while handling other functions through partnerships or outsourcing agreements that will provide the economies of scale we need to operate more efficiently," said Chief Executive Officer Joe Loggia.

In an industry reeling from divestitures and closings, the news landed fairly quietly.

Photoblogging Friday - 14

It's another Photoblogging Friday, and with our contributor Dean Brierly recently back from a trip to Japan, he has brought back a few photos to share.

Dean shot these early morning scenes of an empty Tokyo street (with his Canon EOS 50D with a 17-85mm zoom, for those who like knowing the camera specs). He was in Japan for only a few days and was not able to do much shooting, but we appreciate him bringing back some work for TNM. You can find his own web site at Photographers Speak where he has many interviews with important photographers.

There is another of Dean's photographs after the jump.

A few housekeeping items:

Week in Review will return tomorrow morning for those who missed it last week as we engaged in iPad mania.

Also: you can sign up for the free TNM morning e-newsletter by simply adding your e-mail address to the form found on the upper left corner of each page. E-mail addresses are not used for marketing or sold, etc.

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Dish Network begins shipping Slingbox enabled DVR

Last year I made the leap: after being a DirecTV customer for years, the first one in my area, I switched to Comcast. The reason was simple: I was tired of DirecTV taking away channels without warning. One day I wake up and find out that I have to upgrade my already expensive TV bill just to get what I had received the day before. Worse, the customer service people seem more than happy to end my service rather than take my complaint. So I switched.

But if I had to do it all over again I'd go with Dish Network simply because of this:

We are excited to announce that the ViP922 SlingLoaded DVR receiver (the model ViP922), is planned to be available April 7, 2010! The ViP922 receiver will allow for a high-definition ("HD"), DVR solution for a single TV. With the model ViP922 receivers, customers can enjoy simultaneous, uninterrupted and independent TV viewing between the primary TV in the house and remote viewing on a mobile device or laptop.

Oh my, the ultimate tech toy. If you aren't familiar with the Slingbox, this is what it does: you connect a Slingbox to your cable or satellite box, and after set-up can then stream television content to your computer. Plus, if download an app, you can stream TV to your smart phone (and probably to your iPad soon).

Imagine sitting in an airport waiting for your delayed flight. You take out your iPhone and begin watching your favorite program or content from your DVR.

Now, Dish is offering a DVR with the Slingbox built in. It's not cheap, though: $649 for existing customers, $200-$400 for existing customers. Oh yeah, and there are added fees for an additional receiver, fees for the DVR . . . you know, maybe I've just changed my mind.

Apple's new iPhone OS agreement has developers howling; publishers moving to mobile should take note

Warning, some of what follows may seem like something only of interest to programmers and developers, but it may (and I emphasis may) lead to issues for those publishers moving into mobile media.

Apple yesterday previewed its new iPhone OS 4 to a small group of developers and press, as well as a large group of Internet viewers like myself. You can see the story about the event here. In addition to revealing that Apple will bring multitasking to their iPhone and iPad, they also unveiled their new iAd platform which will bring Apple into the ad sales marketplace, as well as provide developers new tools for creating advertising for Apple's mobile media products.

Later, after the event in Cupertino, developers were able to download the iPhone OS 4 SDK. It's the changes to the developer agreement that has created a controversy and much discussion within the developer community. As John Gruber of Daring Fireball wrote, the agreement seems to prohibit the use of cross-compilers -- those bits of code that allow a program to work on a platform other than the one it was originally written for. An example: a programmer creates a Flash ad but inserts code that allows the ad to be seen and interacted with in an environment where Flash does not work. (If someone has a better way to explain this, please let me know.)

The real world consequences of this, especially for publishers, is that Adobe's Flash-to-iPhone compiler would be prohibited. In addition to Adobe, this might also effect companies like Appcelerator who have introduced its Titanium software as a way of developing native apps.

The reaction from the developer community has been negative, to say the least. There have been rumblings in the developer community in the past to what they have seen as Apple's arbitrary way of approving apps. But mostly these voices have sounded like sour grapes as Apple's iTunes store continued to grow -- now containing over 180,000 apps, and over 1 billion downloads recorded.

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So why is Apple doing this? How will this effect the publishing industry?

Some rather hysterical voices have immediately claimed that Apple is an evil company trying to force its platform onto poor developers who will now have to choose between writing apps for Apple products and writing for the larger market as a whole (Apple's iPhone marketshare has grown tremendously, but the iPhone still only has a sliver of the total market).

There is no doubt that Apple is obsessed with the user experience. The last thing the company wants are apps written for one platform and ported over to the iPhone, giving iPhone users a less than perfect product -- one where iPhone users complain that their apps do not run as well as on an Android phone, for instance.

The problem with taking this positions is two-fold: one, it is alienating the developers; and two, it does not guarantee quality -- just look at all the garbage apps available on iTunes now.

"It's so hard to reconcile my love for these beautiful devices on my desk with my hatred for the ugly words in that legal agreement," developer Joe Hewitt tweeted last night. Later he added "Should I just shut up and be happy there won't be any weird looking Adobe Air apps in the store?" (Hewitt was already upset with Apple having quit his Facebook iPhone app efforts late last year.)

That sums up the dilemma: in order to create a wonderful user experience, Apple wants all the apps to function well; but that may only make it harder to get developers to create for their platforms because they must do things a certain way.

Most Mac users who care about this sort of thing, understand Apple's anti-Flash actions. Flash is just not a very good experience on a Mac, and a replacement (or improvement) is desperately needed. But can Apple really get away with trying to kill Flash, even Flash compilers, on its new products? Maybe. But Apple will take a hit at the same time as their image as an innovator competes with cries of "Apple is the new Microsoft" grow.

For publishers this could have consequences. For Wired magazine, it might have real world consequences, right now. Wired did not launch an app on April 3rd, to my surprise. The magazine has been working with Adobe to create a more interesting, interactive magazine. Until now, I've thought they may have delayed launching an app to coincide with a new issue, or to perfect their product. Now, it appears they may be stymied by Apple. As yet no word from Wired, though they are covering the controversy on their web site. (See the Wired demo and Adobe Air videos here.)

For most publishers the question they've asked third party vendors has been "will my app work well on the iPhone?" Developers have sold their services to publishers by bragging that they can provide mobile apps that will work on many platforms -- that is, buy from us and we'll have your magazine on the iPhone, Android and Blackberry immediately.

Now, a publisher needs to go one step further by asking more questions about development practices. Maybe this may not appear necessary, after all, if a vendor no longer can get their apps approved they would certainly have to change the way they compile their apps. But publishers shouldn't be in the dark, either. Many publishers can talk for hours about paper stock, and recyclable ink. But ask them about programming for mobile media . . . well, call my vendor.

There are at least two lessons here. 1) for publishers, don't take short cuts. Care about the user experience of your products, and make sure you won't have your legs cut out for under you when a company like Apple changes the rules. 2) for Apple, the lesson will either be this is how monopolies work, or this is how companies go bad.

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Apple's timing in rolling out its new iPhone OS 4 is kind of interesting. They called the event in a hurry, and rather unexpectedly. The OS won't be available to iPhone users until this Summer, and the iPad version until this Fall. Well, one reason may be that Adobe has scheduled an event for Monday of next week where they will roll out its CS5 suite of products. Those attending the event now have plenty of questions to ask Adobe.

Apple unveils its mobile advertising platform, iAd during iPhone OS event; Apple will sell and host the advertising

Most developer events go under the radar screen. But today's Apple preview of its iPhone OS 4 may be more important than many publishers can imagine.

Today Steve Jobs unveiled seven major changes to Apple's operating system that is used on the iPhone and iPad. The seventh, iAd, introduces Apple into the competitive world of ad sales. Like Google's AdSense (and to a certain degree, AdWords), Apple entre into advertising will be a boon for developers and media companies with mobile applications, as well as the entry of a powerful competitor.

For developers of iPhone and iPad apps, iAd will bring a new, highly interactive mobile advertising platform to their apps. Jobs demonstrated ads for Disney's Toy Story, Nike and Target during today's presentation. Unlike standard ads, these ads do not take you outside the app when you click on them, but launch an app-within-an-app -- basically a pop-up window -- that keeps mobile users within the original app, but introduces a more interactive ad.

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The first thought that hit me, however, was will ad agencies develop these ads? Media companies have been slow to get into developing, now will interactive ad agencies embrace this HTLM5 based platform (still no Flash) and develop complex ads for their clients?

More importantly, Apple will now enter the media sale market, representing the iPhone and iPad platform to clients and their agencies. Apple said, during the Q&A, that they do not want to become a worldwide ad agency, but they apparently want to become a worldwide media sales giant.

"The average user spends over 30 minutes every day using apps on their phone. If we said we wanted to put an ad up every 3 minutes, that's 10 ads per device per day. That would be 1b ad opportunities per day," Engadget quoted Jobs as stating. "This is a pretty serious opportunity, and it's an incredible demographic. But we want to do more than that. We want to change the quality of the ads, too."
iPhone OS 4.0 changes:
1. Multitasking
2. Folders
3. Enhanced E-Mail
4. iBooks for iPhone
5. Enterprise Changes
6. Game Center
7. iAd
But Apple will get quite a chunk of this new revenue stream, splitting the ad revenue 60/40 with developers. And who is a developer? For many media companies this would be the third party vendor that created their app. Conceivably, a media company would split the 60 percent with them, as well. But for developers who now have to depend on either AdSense and AdMob ads, or no ads at all, this would be a new way to monetize their free apps.

Last year Apple was in negotiations to buy AdMob. Eventually Google picked up the leading mobile advertising company -- snatched it away, according to Apple -- and Apple eventually acquired Quattro Wireless. Now, the FTC may decide to block Google's acquisition on competitive grounds. This move by Apple may make it easier for the Federal agency to approve Google's acquisition.

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The most widely anticipated change to the iPhone OS was the first introduced by Steve Jobs today: multitasking. Apple has apparently found an elegant way to achieve mulitasking, though the feature will only be able to used on the latest editions of the iPhone and iPod touch -- owners of older models are out-of-luck.

Other upgrades to the OS include the introduction of folders, allowing iPhone users to have up to 2,000 apps on their phone), enhanced e-mail (universal in-box, and the ability to have more than one Exchange account), iBooks for iPhone, enterprise upgrades and Game Center, a social gaming network much like XBox offers.

The new iPhone OS will be available to iPhone owners this summer, while the iPad version will be available for download in the Fall. The OS is free for all iPhone and iPad users, while the iPod touch users are required to pay $10 for the upgrade.

Jetcast announces its new media player will have built-in applications store, ability to monetize content

Jetcast today launched a new media player for Internet broadcasters that incorporates an applications store.

The company's new UniversaPlayer is designed to be used as an Internet broadcaster’s primary or secondary media player, and can stream content such as Shoutcast, Icecast, MP3, WMA and other formats.

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← Jetcast's UniversalPlayer.

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“With Jetcast’s new UniversalPlayer, Internet radio broadcasters now have a turn-key solution for monetizing their online content,” says Jeff Pescatello, Co-Founder of Jetcast. “The only thing Internet broadcasters need to do is promote their stations, the monetization occurs automatically.”

Jetcast, which introduced its own ad network, ReplaceAds, now brings an integrated app store to broadcasters. "It allows us to create more revenue opportunities for our broadcasters. Our broadcasters can now earn from virtual currency, subscription services, premium local advertising, search and more. The potential for new revenue is limitless,” CEO John Williams said.

Update: I asked the company about their apps. "Our Apps are designed to run inside the UniversalPlayer platform. The Apps are designed to make the UniversalPlayer platform more usable for the listener and to provide functionality for the App derived from the platform itself. There will be widgets dressed up as Apps (i.e. weather, job boards, etc.), and Apps (i.e. games, rock trivia, etc.) that may or may not interact with the stream. We are not exactly sure what developers will build, but we are excited to find out," Williams said.