The other day I noticed an oddity on the Home screen of my iPad 2. One of the magazines that I’m subscribed to decided to jump out of the Newsstand folder and place itself on the Home screen.

I’m not exactly sure what caused this — maybe it’s the fact that I haven’t updated this specific subscription since I first downloaded it — but for whatever reason, after I performed a normal power cycle the magazine decided to randomly plop itself smack dab in the middle of my homescreen.

At first, I attempted to move the magazine icon back into the Newsstand folder, but that didn’t work because the icon refused to enter jiggly-mode. In addition, I couldn’t delete the subscription app because tap-and-hold wasn’t working at all. Another aspect of the bug is that one of my favorite apps, Bloomberg TV+, had been removed from the Home screen completely (although it was still accesible via Spotlight search).

What’s more, after performing a full restore of iOS 5.0.1, the same exact thing happened on my iPhone 4, removing the Settings app from my iPhone Home screen not allowing it to to enter jiggly-mode in order to delete the magazine download.

Keep in mind, this bug is not incapacitating, but it is frustrating to see a big fat rectangular icon on your Home screen.

Issue

• Magazine and newspaper subscriptions from Newsstand place themselves on the Home screen after reboot or restore
• Upon attempting to remove the magazine/newspaper download, tap-and-hold as well as app deletion no longer works
• Depending on how many subscriptions have this bug, you will lose the same amount of app icons from your Home screen once the problem arises

Possible causes

• Failure to update effected subscription(s) over a certain threshold of time (unconfirmed)

Fix

• Perform an additional power cycle after you notice the issue on your iPhone or iPad, then tap-and-hold to remove the effected subscription(s)

We’ve decided to cross-post this in the TiPb bugs forum to see if anyone else might be running into the same issue. If you know of a simpler fix — or better yet, a confirmed explanation of what’s going on here — drop a comment in this post or jump into the forums to help other users who may be less fortunate if this specific fix doesn’t work out for them.

Justin Williams from Carpeaqua breaks down the egregiously horrible user experience involved in just trying to get an issue of GQ, Esquire, or Sports Illustrated magazine loaded on the iPad.

Reading magazines on the iPad is an exercise in frustration. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. As great a device and, more importantly, platform as Apple has created, magazine publishers have done nothing short of fumble the snap in their own end zone.

Williams provides a list of 10 things publishers can do to help improve things, and it’s a good list but it doesn’t address the core problem — publishers are the wrong people to fix it.

The record labels didn’t create iTunes. Apple did. The record companies still, to this day, over a decade later, don’t understand the fundamentals of selling content in the digital age.

Jim Dalrymple of The Loop nails it:

The first rule of any business should be “don’t piss off your customers.” Many publishers are failing.

Imagine if, instead of iTunes we had the Warner Brothers app, the Harry Potter Movie app, the U2 app, and a myriad other, fragmented, experientially challenged, old-model ad festooned crapware.

It would be untenable. It is untenable.

Forget publishers. We need iMagazine.

Source: Carpeaqua via The Loop

It lets us more nicely organize those newspaper and magazine apps, and we get to see front page or cover art rather than the app icon, but the apps themselves are still a crapshoot when it comes to quality and design. iBooks are pretty unified — I buy a book and I know how to navigate through it and easily read it, and I know if I put it down on my iPad when I leave home, I can open it up and keep going from the same place when I open it again on my iPhone at work. If I want to read my Trashy Gossip Mag, no such luck.

With Newsstand we sometimes get straight exports from the magazine or newspaper themselves, almost like PDF printouts, ads and all, with little in the way of iOS specific features and nothing that takes advantage of the technology literally at our fingertips. Other times we get more immersive experiences with sound, movies, and easy sharing if we so choose.

And the subscription options are all over the place, but mostly they still don’t match up with traditional options. Why can’t we, universally, buy an issue for the same or cheaper cover price, or subscribe for the same or cheaper yearly option? If I can get one issue of Trashy Gossip Mag for $5 and 12 for $20, shouldn’t we have the same option on iPad?

Should Apple create a proper iNews apps like iBooks with standardized pricing and presentation? Should they go back to just apps, on their own? Or is Newsstand the answer?

Vote in the poll up top and let me know where you stand on everything from pricing to ads to the quality of the content itself in comments!

Time Inc. has announced they plan to bring all of their 21 US magazine titles to iPad and other tablets by year’s end.

“Now is the time for us to make this bold commitment. In the coming year, there will clearly be many more consumers using tablets, accelerating demand for content and driving advertiser interest. We are putting ourselves in a great position to take advantage of these opportunities,” said Maurice Edelson, EVP and a member of Time Inc.’s interim management committee. “Having our entire portfolio available on tablets will create a significant new digital reach for our advertisers.”

InStyle, Real Simple, and Entertainment weekly are among the titles that will join the already available Time, Sports Illustrated, and Fortune.

[Business Wire via Android Central]

Scott Forstall just announced on stage at WWDC a new iOS 5 feature called Newsstand, which integrates newspapers and digital magazines onto the iOS homescreen.

The app resides on the springboard but behaves much like iOS folders. Tap the app and you’re presented with a thumbnail view of each magazine or newspaper you’re subscribed to directly from the homescreen. All downloaded subscriptions are stored on the device for offline viewing. Newspapers look just like paper newspapers, and magazines look and behave like a real magazine.

Newspapers include New York Times, SF Chronicle, Daily Telegraph and many more. Magazine publishers are jumping on board too, with National Geographic, SPIN, Conde Nast, Nylon, The Telegraph, GQ Esquire etc. You can purchase subscriptions through the App Store in a special section, and when downloaded the newspaper or magazine is placed directly into your Newsstand folder.

It’s looking pretty sweet — will you be using Newsstand to replace magazine and newspaper subscriptions?

Many print newspapers and magazines jumped on board with Apple’s subscription model for the iPad, last week, which was surprising because publishers have always been concerned about being unable to gather information from their customers because Apple requires the subscriber to opt into releasing this information. It turns out that many customers are actually agreeing to share their demographic data.

Mark Edmiston, founder of the tablet magazine studio Nomad Editions, heard from other publishers that about 50% of subscribers are opting into sharing some personal information with them. Surprised, he confirmed that figure with Eddy Cue, Apple’s vice president of internet services.

So, all the sudden, what was an insurmountable obstacle no longer is.

It speaks volumes that half of the people who are confronted with the little dialogue box that asks permission to share their personal data say “yes”. People trust Apple and it’s App Store.

What about you? Do you opt in? If so, why? And if you don’t, why not?

[Forbes]

A bunch of print newspapers and magazines seem to be finally jumping on board the iPad subscription train, including The Telegraph (UK), Heart properties including Esquire, Popular Mechanics, and O, The Oprah Magazine, and Time has somehow swung a deal to get existing Time, Fortune, and Sports Illustrated readers free access via iPad.

And, of course, Playboy is coming uncensored (my guess is web app, no iOS-handled subscriptions).

Meanwhile the launched-with-much-todo The Daily has reportedly gotten 800K downloads but is losing $10 million a month.

The big stumbling block was, is, and remains Apple’s insistence that users opt-in to sharing their demographic data with publishers (while the publishers would prefer opt-out since they figure — probably rightly — few users will actively choose to share). Publishers have historically relied on demographics and marketing against them as a key revenue source. Another problem has been getting users to pay for content that they’ve gotten used to getting free on the web — especially when publishers have asked fairly high prices (sometimes higher than print!)

So with more and more heavy hitters hitting the platform, but with everyone still struggling to figure out the business model, what does the future hold for iPad subscriptions? Do we need an iMags/iNews store like iBooks? Or is it just the wrong medium for an outdated message?

What will it take to get you to subscribe?

[FT, WSJ, WSJ, MediaMemo]

iPad magazine sales seem to be in a bit of a slump. Many magazine publishers have made their content available on iPad as it’s an easy way to read content without having to have paper copies littering your home or office. If it’s more convenient, why are magazine sales on the iPad not doing so great?

In August, 10,500 users bought issues of Vanity Fair on their iPads. In August, only 8,700 copies were purchased via the iPad. Glamour magazine was in even worse shape with only 2,775 iPad issues sold in October. We all know that paper copies of magazines are on their way out, but shouldn’t that mean that virtual copies should literally be flying off digital shelves?

Part of the issue may be the fact that Apple and publishers still haven’t agreed on a universal, built-in subscription service (Apple wants to handle the transactions, publishers want to know who you are so they can do marketing based on demographic data). So for now, in order to purchase these magazines, you have to buy each issue individually. That can be a hassle. Since there are often steep discounts on the paper copies but none on the digital version, it can also be much more expensive.

As far as from a magazine stand point, maybe they need to switch gears on their own. There are several sport apps available that you have to purchase yearly. What about that type of model? What if a magazine had a few different apps with different price points? For a year subscription, price the app at the cost of a year’s subscription. Then issue updates for each issue. Not an ideal situation but maybe a temporary solution to keep subscribers reading.

Do you guys read magazines on your iPad? Does no subscription model keep you from buying additional issues on a weekly/monthly basis?

Gizmodo

Apple may be preparing a subscription plan for newspapers says the Mercury News. When iBooks was announced alongside iPad, but no similar offering for magazines and newspapers, it was curious. When friction resulted from magazines trying to roll their own subscriptions, it was noteworthy. Now, however, a solution might just be in place:

What makes this so much more complicated than apps or books is that newspaper and magazines aren’t just after transactional money — they want subscriber data. Their business is as much about who subscribes as how much. Apple is much the same, which is why they often talk about how many credit cards they have on file for iTunes accounts. There’s gold in that data, in being able to segment and slice and dice it, aggregate and market on it. Media doesn’t want to lose their subscribers to Apple and Apple doesn’t want to lose their buyers to media. So how will they resolve this?

The Cupertino company has agreed to provide an opt-in function for subscribers to allow Apple to share with publishers their information, which includes vital data that news organizations use to attract advertisers, industry sources say.

It’s not a done deal and it could get ugly. It’s not how media is used to doing business, but then again this is a brave new world of online, app-centric business. Ironically, iTunes rise has disintermediated the traditional media middlemen, yet it’s introducing Apple itself as a new, digital middleman.

That’s it’s opt-in for subscribers is good. Typically when you subscribe to a print edition, you’re automatically opted-in.

What would you prefer, dozens of independent media apps with different accounts and methods of handling subscriptions, like the current print model, or a single solution tied to iTunes to handle all the digital media you want?

[Mercury News]

News Corp. head Rupert Murdoch has repeatedly said he sees a bright future for iPad and iPad-like devices when it comes to media consumption, and now there’s a rumor he might launch a unit specifically to target the new, digital, mobile age. Could existing News Corp properties like Wall Street Journal and New York Times soon be joined by a new generation of publications?

Sources close to the company tell me that the company is considering creating a new purely digital news play that would be designed for the app world and would be available through subscription on devices like the iPad.

This new digital news venture would incorporate text, photo and video, tailored for the iTunes app format …. neither a newspaper nor a news website — it would not be based on any of News Corp’s existing papers.

Of course, publishers and Apple are reportedly still at odds over how to handle subscription pricing, and there’s still a huge disconnect between publishers and consumers when it comes to packaging and pricing (iPad versions shouldn’t cost more than print versions, right?), so the future it does come slowly…

[CNBC via MacRumors]

MediaMemo is saying Time Inc. is having trouble setting up their own subscription service for a Sports Illustrated iPad magazine app:

Last month, the publisher was set to launch a subscription version of its Sports Illustrated iPad app, where consumers would download the magazines via Apple’s iTunes, but would pay Time Inc. directly. But Apple rejected the app at the last minute, forcing the Time Warner (TWX) unit to sell single copies, using iTunes as a middleman, multiple sources tell me.

First, at the iPhone 3.0 event in 2009, Apple showed off App Store subscriptions for magazines alongside in-app purchase, but while in-app purchases are now fairly common, I’m hard pressed to find a showcase example for App Store subscriptions. What happened to them? Are publishers not eager to embrace them or has Apple not provided the mechanism?

Second, it looks like Time is trying to go around the App Store for subscriptions, kind of like what Amazon and Audible do for users who buy books via Mobile Safari on the web but can then download their library in-app. Is Time trying to do something similar to that but not getting their app approved?

So what happened? The Time Inc. insiders I talked to don’t have a clear answer, presumably because they can’t get one from Apple itself. One theory: Apple is concerned about the publisher’s plans for the consumer data it would collect with each subscription. A darker one: Steve Jobs loves the idea of digital magazines and wants to control the market for himself.

“Darker” certainly scores the melodramatic points, but Apple had no problem rolling out iBooks while still allowing the aforementioned Amazon Kindle app and a host of other competitors. They’ve let streaming music and video apps in to vie for music money against iTunes.

Due to the opaque nature of the App Store approval process, and Apple’s secrecy surrounding unannounced features and technology, there’s never an easy way to tell if a delay is political, business related, or because Steve Jobs will be announcing some new magazine-focused API for subscriptions in September.

These are huge companies, there’s a lot of money on the table, and a critical amount of personal user data behind it. I’m sure we’ll see a lot of foot stomping and fist shaking, and press leaks to spin the story. I’m sure we’ll hear cries that evil Apple is denying big publishers their control, and big publishers are gouging users for digital copies. Fine. At the end of the day I want what I think most end users want — an easy, secure, privacy-protecting way to get my magazines (and comics!) on my iPhone and iPad at a fair price. Apple wins. Publishers win. We win.

Let’s figure that out, shall we?

[MediaMemo, thanks to everyone who sent this in!]

Apple last updated iLife during the Phil Schiller-led Macworld 2009 keynote but since then, even as iOS, WebKit, and HTML5 have been on the rise, there’s been no sign of another update. Enter Mac4ever, which is rumoring:

• iLife ’11 will be sold for $79
• Release Date of 08/07/2010
• All applications will be 64-bit
• Improvements in iPhoto faces & places
• Improving the integration of social networks
• IWeb will be totally renewed
• New application (mystery!)
• Disappearance of iDVD
• MobileMe gallery in beta (with faces & places)

If any of this pans out, the social media integration will be cool but it’s that mystery app that has us interested. There have long been rumors that Apple would replace iDVD with a WebKit/TuneKit development tool to let users more easily make iTunes LP and iTunes Extras. While those two formats haven’t exactly set the digital world on fire, HTML5 is ramping up significantly thanks in some part to iOS devices like iPhone and now iPad.

Adobe is slowly hedging their Flash bet with some HTML5 tools in DreamWeaver, but an uber-easy iLife app to let us create everything from the above-mentioned audio-video experiences to eBooks and digital magazines? Adobe’s been doing that with Wired and inDesign, but something that didn’t produced huge, static PNG piles but real next generation dynamic content for these next generation devices?

Yes please.

[Mac4ever via Macworld.co.uk via MacRumors]

Rupert Murdoch, head of the massive News corp. whose holding include the Wall Street Journal and FOX, told the National Press Club in Washington that the iPad may just rescue old print-and-delivery-bound media:

“It may well be the saving of the newspaper industry”, by making it cheaper to distribute content to a broader audience, Mr Murdoch said. He expected the iPad to have eight or nine competitors within 12 months.

“There’s going to be tens of millions of these things sold all over the world” He said it would also help bring down the costs of newspaper publishing because “you don’t have the costs of paper, ink, printing, trucks”.

Unfortunately, neither the iPad nor any piece of technology can rescue old media from the old world thinking of its out-of-touch leadership — the people who want to charge as much or more for iPad versions of their newspapers and magazines despite the lack of physical media costs, and who want to merely transplant text from static paper to dynamic displays with no creative thought or understanding of the new medium.

Who and what’s going to save newspapers from that?

[Australian via Gizmodo]

The Wall Street Journal reports that, with the iPad arriving in stores and on doorsteps in just a few weeks, Apple is still “scrambling” to secure content deals for their magical and revolutionary new device. Why?

Apple hasn’t yet reached a deal with many major TV producers on the price cut, these people said. Some are concerned a price cut could hurt their existing businesses, these people said, including jeopardizing the tens of billions of dollars in subscription fees they are paid by cable and satellite companies for their traditional TV networks.

At the same time, some magazine and newspaper publishers said they are hamstrung by several factors that could delay the apps they are developing for the iPad from being ready by the time of the device’s release.

iBooks is the exception, but is it because book publishers are smarter, more desperate for the digital age, or just softened by existing devices like the Kindle? 9to5Mac provides our favorite answer to why TV and other companies aren’t racing to embrace the iPad: they’re self-destructively crazy (via the Viacom vs. Youtube lawsuit):

For years, Viacom continuously and secretly uploaded its content to YouTube, even while publicly complaining about its presence there. It hired no fewer than 18 different marketing agencies to upload its content to the site. It deliberately “roughed up” the videos to make them look stolen or leaked. It opened YouTube accounts using phony email addresses. It even sent employees to Kinko’s to upload clips from computers that couldn’t be traced to Viacom. And in an effort to promote its own shows, as a matter of company policy Viacom routinely left up clips from shows that had been uploaded to YouTube by ordinary users. Executives as high up as the president of Comedy Central and the head of MTV Networks felt “very strongly” that clips from shows like The Daily Show and The Colbert Report should remain on YouTube.

Viacom’s efforts to disguise its promotional use of YouTube worked so well that even its own employees could not keep track of everything it was posting or leaving up on the site. As a result, on countless occasions Viacom demanded the removal of clips that it had uploaded to YouTube, only to return later to sheepishly ask for their reinstatement. In fact, some of the very clips that Viacom is suing us over were actually uploaded by Viacom itself.

Dear Hollywood, hire some young, new-media savvy executives, sign deals with Apple, Google, Microsoft, etc. Give us your content, your TV shows, movies, magazines, newspapers, comic books, and everything else at a fair price and under fair terms, and we’ll give you our money with ridiculous abandon. Everyone will be happy. B’okay?

Are you an avid magazine reader? Do you look at your iPhone and think that it’d be the perfect device to read digital magazines? Well, Zinio Mobile Newsstand for the iPhone offers such digital magazines in high-resolution glory. With loads of popular magazines in tow, Zinio Mobile Newstand gives iPhone users a free look at issues that typically cost anywhere from $5 to $10.

How does it perform? Can you actually read anything?

Read on for the rest of the review!

Design/Interface

Overall the design and interface is simple and clear. Touch the magazine you’re interested in reading and you’ll be able to read it in its entirety. There are two different ways to read the magazines and it is similar to its real-life counterpart. You can choose to flip through it page-by-page to see if anything catches your eye in a less-slick form of CoverFlow, or you can click the contents button and select an article that you may have interest in through the magazine’s digital table of contents. Either way works perfectly fine.

Usability

Criticism

Zinio would also be better served if they could create an actual application for 2.0. I found myself trying to flick the screen to move on to the next screen but remembered I was trapped in Safari and had to use the available ‘buttons’. Hopefully, Zinio can add these features and maintain the current cost of the web app, which is, FREE.

Final Thoughts

The high resolution shots take a while to load, to be sure, but the quality of the pages are worthwhile. Every picture is crip and the text is readable. Using both landscape and portrait mode also adds to the versatility of this web app. I would suggest everyone to point their browsers to www.zinio.com/iphone to take a look at this great web app.

PROS:

• Magazines in its entirety
• High Resolution Pages
• Simple, Intuitive Interface
• Variety of Selections

CONS:

• Text isn’t readable in ‘CoverFlow’ mode
• Even Wi-Fi is a little slow
• No notification of ‘What’s New’ or which edition it is
• Trapped by Safari

FINAL RATING: 4.8/5