“Book publishers, newspaper publishers and magazine publishers are experiencing unprecedented revenue compression and are looking at transforming their businesses away from print as a factor of mere survival,” Gewirtz writes. “If Apple’s iPad has the effect on our print reading matter in the way iTunes did on our music consumption, Apple could wind up the dominant channel by which we get published ‘print’ information.”
“That’s why the issue of Apple picking and choosing what we can and can’t read is so disturbing. If they’re forcing magazines to edit their contents in order to get distribution, then whatever Apple’s then-current (and thus far completely arbitrary) rules would determine what you get to read,” Gewirtz writes. “It might even determine the political, religious, or ideological slant of what you’re permitted to read.”
Gewirtz writes, “Because Apple has indicated that it intends to censor published works that it distributes digitally and because Apple has been absolutely non-forthcoming about any details, we as members of the press are, essentially, obligated to point out what’s happening.”
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Even if Apple does wind up being “the dominant channel by which we get published ‘print’ information,” it’s quite the stretch to imagine it becoming the only channel. That said, Gewitz is perfectly correct that it’s the obligation of the free press to point out what’s happening. With that, we totally agree.
The way I remember it, 1984 was a good year for the digital world.
Nothing about controlling the political and religious message of editorial content will bother Fox viewers.
Interesting point. A little alarmist but interesting nonetheless.
Poor guy totally chose the wrong metaphor, and without specifically pointing it out (you know, George Orwell…), it can easily be taken as the year that marked the beginning of the digital revolution with the birth of Mac.
Apple has said they will censor? I must have missed that memo. Or is the reporter assumming based on Apple’s app stance? Apps are not books and magazines.
Spot on HMCIV!
It seems like this guy is jumping to conclusions. When did Apple ever censor music or decide not to sell music from certain artists? Apps are different… those can have security or stability issues.
Yes indeed. I am, by and large, a huge Apple supporter. However, I do think there needs to be complete transparency in their App/iBook store guidelines. I also feel that some of the rules in place – mostly of the content censoring variety – need to be loosened or dropped all together.
I understand Apple wanting to prevent their iTunes storefronts from becoming an enormous hive of pornography in the same way that the web at large has. However, I feel there are better ways of dealing with that which fall short of an out and out embargo.
Apple will become the porn lovers wet dream yet!
Choice. If I don’t like what is supposedly “edited” then I can go to the Barnes & Noble and buy the book or publication. Why is it people get their panties in so many knots?
The thing is, you can never come up with a perfect set of rules that can be applied universally without exceptions or bad applications.
Apple’s choice is between an all-out ban, and trying to pick and choose. An all-out ban means people complain about censorship etc., but at least it’s equitable; EVERYONE is banned. The alternative of trying to pick and choose will inevitably lead to mountains of complaints about why such-and-such an app was allowed while thus-and-such was denied. It would be almost impossible to maintain any kind of consistency in terms of judgement calls given the sheer number of apps being submitted for review and the number of people required to review said applications in a timely manner.
An all-out ban is less than ideal, but still better than the alternative (I didn’t cover permitting everything because I think most of us can see why that’s a bad thing).
As HMCIV noted, 1984 was a good year for the digital world. Perhaps the author meant FAHRENHEIT 451 ? (Ooh, don’t offend anybody.)
“As a society, we may be at a cusp, a point where we’re transitioning away from a mixed print/digital world to one that’s predominantly digital,” David Gewirtz writes for ZDNet.
I’am happy with the iPad but the term society is out of order here. We need to stop saying and better yet stop thinking things like this. The world is not defined by the way and the amount or the quality of data we read in a device but by how we read and think at all, as individuals and as a society. This digital iPad revolution is significative but very small if it really happens and I hope it will.
On our evening walks through the neighborhood we see in virtually every household a flickering light with people sitting staring religiously in front of it. The television, a magic box, that holds Americans eerily spellbound, without moving, for hours at a time. Night after night, throughout one’s whole life. Americans must have this, without being able to sit in front of this magic box for most of their free hours they would quickly go into withdrawals and get sick.
Orwell? What a joke, we’ve gone well beyond Orwell and 1984 fear-mongering scenarios long ago, and no one even notices it. TV is total thought control, And no one could care less. Steven Jobs is a pipsqueak in comparison.
Good, the distortions of the “press” and the slight to the left and right should be censored. Censored by the public that can quickly fire back as they move to their political objectives.
The quicker people can hammer these papers, new channels, and other. The better off we are. They just fear people with equal or more power than them!
You mean like the way Wal*Mart makes musicians change their music to get on to WM shelves? Like that?
This article is total bull shit. Another alarmist hit-whore trying to spread fear.
Apple has never said that they plan on censoring books, magazines, music, movies or any of the content for which they have no control over available in the iTunes store. When available, they offer both the explicit and “clean” versions of music, and as many will see there are R-Rated movies in the ITS as well. Apple is not going in and bleeping out bad language, or putting black bars over content it finds objectionable – that is in part what the rating system is for.
What Apple has said when they announced the iPhone SDK is what they will not allow: pornography was one of them. Apple created their own mechanism for creating and delivering iPhone apps, and in a way they become a representative for those developers – so it is within Apple’s right to set certain boundaries for what they become responsible for delivering. These boundaries only affect content created by Apple’s SDK and for the app store – not for content created outside of Apple’s own ecosystem.
If people would stop and think about shit before they write, then maybe they wouldn’t be getting themselves into a hissy-fit.
I prefer magazines and books, and will always opt for that choice. Still, I want an iPad- next generation.
Apple has the right to pick and choose what it will sell, not the consumer. I think it’s ridiculous to dictate what apple can or can’t do. In Canada we can’t have crucifixes in class because it offends some religious nutcases. I’m non practicing catholic and I’m not bothered by crucifixes or other religious artifacts. But in this messed up world we have to even sensor the Christmas tree- it’s the holiday tree dontcha know. And forget merry christmas- it’s happy holidays. Let’s go to an extreemist country and sensor their religious beliefs like they done in north America, France, England and other countries. Bet that won’t fly.
So if fanatics get their way with apple, then WTF? So much for our freedom.
Point is, iTunes store is apples store. If you don’t like them apples, buy somewhere else
As HMCIV noted, 1984 was a good year for the digital world. Perhaps the author meant FAHRENHEIT 451 ? (Ooh, don’t offend anybody.)
Well you know what they say…… build a man a fire, he’ll be warm for a day. Set a man on fire, and he’ll be warm the rest of his life
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You may love books and mags, but, will you still love them tomorrow? We’ve only just begun to see what going digital will do for both formats. I’m optimistic that there are good surprises in store.
Secondly, both will have to come down in price …. a lot. And if mags want to charge just a little less than now, they have to drop the ads. Book publishers do well enough without ads. Mag publishers stand to gain much larger sales if they do digital intelligently and less greedily.
Ahh, the sensationalizing media. Can’t they write anything without taking everything to one extreme or another?
The author is getting Apple confused with walmart as far as censoring music and book content.
I don’t believe that Apple will change the text of books or other publications. I have never seen any report that suggests they would until the above blog post.
Yes I can just imagine Murdoch having his mouth pieces censored by someone else when he is so adept at doing that himself. As for ZDNet since when have they ever been objective in anything they write, about as likely as Joseph Goebbels putting the Polish perspective on events.