Quote:
Originally Posted by stonetools
In the same way, there really was no business case for Apple allowing booksellers to sell millions of dollars worth of books free of cost on their platform. After all, let's face it, none of those retailers allow Apple or any other retailer to sell on their platforms. Apple was always likely to try to get a cut of that revenue that was coming from the market they created. When that didn't work, they settled for giving their bookstore an advantage. In the end, that was the least inconvenient outcome. We will have to settle for that, but hey, it could have been worse.
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This is just wrong. *Of course* there is a business case for Apple to not charge for e-books bought through Amazon and others. The business case is that it makes the iPad better and brings in more customers. This was Apple's policy until recently, and it seemed to work fine. It's also the policy of Android tablets. And it's also how computers, including macs, work.
The fact that you can identify reasons for Apple to have done what they did does not at all mean that this was the *only* viable approach. And, in fact, it was a stupid approach because there was *no way* that it would be successful. Amazon has the best profit margins in the bookselling business, and they are at about 5%. Demanding 30% was never going to be successful. *Never*.
I am also extremely skeptical that this will help iBooks at all - most people with iPads use the Kindle app to read on, and I don't see this changing anytime soon...particularly since I don't know many people who buy from the app anyway.
I don't think that it will harm Apple overmuch either, as I don't think many people buy an iPad to read on, though.