Print should be a shining beacon in a sea of criminality
BoSacks Speaks Out By Bob Sacks Feb 25, 2019 Last week I wrote a sober article about the state of digital fraud invading our lives, our families, our jobs and our psyche. I wasn't wrong, as each day new intrusive assaults are discovered. Last Friday we received news of yet another of what seems like weekly Facebook abominations. Now it has been revealed that Facebook collects intensely personal information secretly from thousands of popular smartphone apps and just seconds after users enter their personal information. Facebook gets it, even if the user has no connection to Facebook. More surveillance for a profit. George Orwell in the book 1984 wrote: "If you
The logic behind Apple’s give-us-half-your-revenue pitch to news publishers
Magazine publishers are on board with Apple’s new subscription news service. Newspapers aren’t. By Peter Kafka Feb 13, 2019, 6:31pm EST SHARE Apple SVP Eddy Cue runs the company’s media business. Drew Angerer / Getty Images Apple says it wants to help save journalism. All it wants in return is half of all the revenue journalists make when they sell their stuff through a forthcoming new Apple subscription service. Cue internet outrage. The argument, made by everyone from my colleague Casey Newton to Apple blogger John Gruber: 50 percent is way, way too high — “insane,” in Gruber’s words — given that Apple normally takes 15 percent to 30 percent of the revenue
It’s nearly 2020 and print publishing still matters: How print and digital can build better subscriber experiences
Rumours of the death of print media have been greatly exaggerated. While online publications have been experiencing tremendous growth in recent years, the fact is that 58 per cent of subscribers still describe themselves as primarily print-oriented, and 60-80 per cent of publisher revenues are still generated from print. It’s true that the majority of print-first subscribers are older, but that doesn’t mean younger audiences won’t pay for print. They will, and they do. The New York Times reports that while its own base of print subscribers is holding fairly steady with only slight declines year over year, its digital subscriber base