The “San Jose Mercury News” (http://www.insidebayarea.com/business/ci_16076242?) is reporting that Apple is expected to announce soon a new subscription plan for newspapers, “which hope tablets like the iPad will eventually provide a new source of profit as media companies struggle with declining print circulation and advertising revenue.”
Not surprisingly, Apple wouldn’t comment to the newspaper. However, Roger Fidler, head of digital publishing at the Donald W. Reynolds Journalism Institute in Columbia, Mo., told “The “News” that Apple probably will take a 30% cut of all subscriptions sold through the company’s Apple App Store, and as much as 40% of the advertising revenue from publications’ apps.
Apple has agreed to provide an opt-in function for subscribers to allow the company to share with publishers their information, which includes vital data that news organizations use to attract advertisers, industry sources told the “News.”
Publishers “want the data of their customers so they can integrate it into their circulation database so they know who their customers are,” says Fidler.