Apple officially launches App Store subscriptions

When Apple's Eddy Cue, Rupert Murdoch and others launched the iPad-only newspaper The Daily, Cue promised that its subscription model would be made available to other iOS publications soon. Today, Apple has officially launched App Store subscriptions.

Subscriptions are purchased through the apps themselves using the same billing system that the App Store has employed for in-app purchases. Individual publishers are able to set their own prices and lengths of subscriptions. As for Apple, it takes the same 30 percent share that it currently pulls from other in-app purchases.



Customers can manage their subscriptions from a special account page, and cancel a subscription when they're ready. In a press release, Steve Jobs explained the pricing model, saying, "...when Apple brings a new subscriber to the app, Apple earns a 30 percent share; when the publisher brings an existing or new subscriber to the app, the publisher keeps 100 percent and Apple earns nothing. All we require is that, if a publisher is making a subscription offer outside of the app, the same (or better) offer be made inside the app, so that customers can easily subscribe with one-click right in the app."



Note that publishers may not provide links in their apps to purchase options outside of the app (like a subscriber website).



This has been a long time coming. Now for the big question: will people subscribe to magazines and newspapers on their iPads?