Hearst Publications Come To iTunes: $2 Per Month, $20 Per Year
At $2/month or $20/year, the titles are comparable to yearly print subscription costs. Esquire, Popular Mechanics, and O will be the initial offerings, though more are surely in the works. This makes Hearst the first major publisher to go under the Apple subscription yoke, which many have already bucked at. But as people don’t seem to like having to purchase each issue separately, and volume is all-important for publishing, Hearst decided this was the right move.
Will Hearst be the first of many? Will Conde Nast and others wait and see, or hasten to join for fear of losing potential readers? Find out next time on When Publishers Agree.