subscriptions

The day after Apple officially shared details of its new App Store subscription plan, which lays the groundwork for Apple to take a 30-percent cut from publishers who sell content within their apps, Google announced the launch of Google One Pass, its online charging service for newspapers and magazines. Google's rival service offers two big differences from Apple's: content providers will get to keep 90 percent of revenue from One Pass sales and publishers will retain control of consumer data.

Outgoing Google CEO Eric Schmidt, who becomes Google's executive chairman in April, announced Google One Pass in … Read more

With Apple officially sharing the details of its new App Store subscription plan, which lays the groundwork for Apple to take a 30-percent cut from publishers who sell content within their apps, we were waiting for some reaction from content providers. Well, one, Rhapsody, has finally braved Apple's wrath and issued a statement saying Apple's new arrangement was "economically untenable." And while it didn't threaten legal action, it certainly hinted at it.

Here's the full statement from Rhapsody's President, Jon Irwin:

Apple launched a subscription service at the App Store for magazines, newspapers, videos, and music bought through its App Store.

In a move that goes a long way to addressing concerns of many in the magazine and newspaper sectors, Apple said today that publishers will be allowed to set the price and the length of the subscription term. The processing of payments will be Apple's job and handled within the App Store. Apple will collect 30 percent of the revenue.

"Our philosophy is simple," Steve Jobs wrote in a statement. "When Apple brings a new subscriber … Read more

Apple is reportedly on the verge of launching a subscription service for paid apps, and the company appears to be ironing out some final details with publishers who plan to participate.

A number of European newspaper and magazine publishers have been contacted by Apple and informed that they cannot offer free subscriptions for iPad editions through the upcoming service to customers already paying for a print version of their publication, according to a report in Dutch newspaper De Volkskrant. In other words, once this subscription service finally launches, don't be surprised if your favorite magazine does an iPad edition … Read more

Magazines and newspapers are migrating to iOS devices (most notably the iPad) at a steady clip, but there's one problem: publishers don't have a way to sell subscriptions--not yet, anyway.

That may change with the arrival of iOS 4.3, which is rumored to be arriving (or at least announced) as early as this Thursday, December 9.

As CNET's Joe Aimonetti reported last month, this build was already in the works when Apple rolled out iOS 4.2. And despite the latter's brief delay, it appears iOS 4.3 may still arrive on schedule (at least … Read more

As the first major music service to offer caching on the iPhone, Rhapsody has managed to stay quite competitive in the mobile space. And although the company lagged a bit on getting its Android app out of beta, the final product is sufficiently impressive for us to forgive its trespasses in the timing department. Though it may not be as pretty as some other mobile music offerings, Rhapsody's features and performance on the Android OS should make it a top consideration for anyone interested in subscribing to an all-you-can-eat service (or all-you-can-listen-to, as the case may be).

Rhapsody for … Read more

Millions of wireless customers are planning to switch to prepaid service, a new study conducted by Infogroup/ORC has found.

According to the company, which conducted its study for the New Millennium Research Council, 20 percent of wireless customers (estimated to be about 24.6 million adults in the U.S.) will move to "less expensive unlimited prepaid wireless service with no early-cancellation penalty" at some point within the next six months. An additional 10 percent of respondents said they would switch to a prepaid plan if they weren't "subject to an early-cancellation penalty."

The … Read more

Shortly after announcing its gorgeous--but poor-sounding--app for iOS, Napster has released an update for its Android mobile software. Now, Android users who subscribe to the service for $9.99 per month can save playlists and albums for offline playback. With this new feature, the Android app is directly in line with the iOS app in terms of both functionality and interface. Here's hoping the former offers better audio quality, though.

Around this time last year, I was reviewing the Zune HD, Microsoft's last valiant effort to unseat the iPod as the dominant portable media player. This year, instead of a shiny new version of the Zune HD for the holidays, Microsoft is keeping last year's model on store shelves (though a 64GB version was added this year) and focusing its attention on Windows Phone 7. Arguably, it's the right move for Microsoft, especially considering that even Apple admits that iPod sales are on the decline while iPhone sales are skyrocketing.

But as the Zune HD hardware fades … Read more