“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.
It’s standard now to invent fake allegations to feed self serving intentions.
Isn’t it amazing how one man’s porn is another man’s Fox News?
Democrats, you can’t live with them and you can’t string them up.
Apple is presenting an option for mobile media. Why must one think the worst of this? iTunes sort of invented a storefront for music distribution and Amazon is similar. I believe the ibook store will merely give readers another way to enjoy reading books.
Apple since 1984, have been giving customers and providers a better option. They are not forcing anyone.
1984? Really?
Oh, and if Apple is censoring content doesn’t mean one can get somewhere else right? I think some censorship is necessary or else we would be freely including disturbing material in kids textbooks.
“It might even determine the political, religious, or ideological slant of what you’re permitted to read.”
You mean that is not happening already on Editorial Boards everywhere be they newspapers like the New York Times or tv like MSNBC or CNN? C’mon, this crap has been happening way long before the iPad was even a twinkle in Steve’s eye! Don’t think for one second that those organizations I listed or others who might list Fox and WSJ or whatever, wouldn’t come to the same conclusion that what we as a public, striving and starving for the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth have been continuously let down by those in control of media. Nothing new here if Apple censures and has to be added to the list.
@MMES
Dont’t forget those fat lawyers waiting for a pic or a line of text that can be useful to collect clients for a dear stream of fights in court.
Looks like lots of brainless Fox News deluded Republicans think they bring credit to Apple and dwell on this site.
Let me remind you all that Steve Jobs is an open minded Liberal in the first degree and the first to despise Republicans and their idealsm.
Publishers should only buy space from Apple. Whatever they decide to put into that space is up to the publishers and their readers. By all means Apple should have the power to police its servers and blow the whistle on content which is in an inappropriate space (say, a main bookstore area rather than an adult-only password-protected area) or, at the very extreme, remove what is illegal under the laws of the land.
@Michael
I couldn’t agree more. This guy’s tinfoil hat is on much too tight.
Gewirtz is so full of BS. ZDNET has been sucking at M$ teat for years. Tell me they do not slant the news.
Hah! The pot calls the kettle black.
Liberal ‘journalists’ have been censoring information for over a century now, twisting facts and obscuring truth to further their own biases in many and varied ways, subtle and not so subtle.
Now that they face a higher power they suddenly realize they won’t be in control for much longer.
I stopped reading ‘news’papers after a succession of articles that I had intimate knowledge about turned out to contain gaping errors and falsehoods. Then, in the worst example of media bias yet, millions of people were duped into believing we’d finally get an honest man into the White House.
I love Apple products and have used them religiously for 20 years. I currently own 1 MBP 17″, 1 iMac 24″, 1 Cinema Display 24″, 1 Mac mini, 2 iPhones, 2 Time Capsules, 5 Airport Expresses, and an Apple TV. You’ll only pry these things, in the words of the late, great Charles Heston, “…from the grip of my cold, dead hands”. But Apple’s insane (and arbitrary) philosophy of imposing it’s values & ideology in regards to app / content distribution both pisses me off and scares the living hell out of me. I feel most people will accept it when it comes to apps, but *if* Apple starts censoring media content via it’s ‘iBookstore’, Jobs better be prepared for the unholy shitstorm that will descend on Cupertino.
iTunes labels “explicit” content then provides uncut. Perhaps the same with books and magazines?
@Nobama
Keep your insane delusions to yourself. This is not a political site.
@ Macintosh
If Apple and Steve were to run their business strictly as die-hard liberals, wouldn’t they allow anything and everything into their store? Isn’t it the right/conservatives the ones that are supposed to do the censoring?
Give me one plausible reason why Apple would start censoring media via its ‘iBookstore’.
I bet you can’t though, because your job is to spread fear, uncertainty, and doubt, not substantiate it. So you can float the idea of Apple censoring media, but you can’t explain why they would.
As for your “I love Apple!’ BS, the only reason you wrote that was in an attempt to make your FUD seem credible. It’s an old technique used by astroturfers to ‘legitimize’ themselves:
“I love Burger King’s food. I’ve eaten it for 20 years. I’m eating it right now. But you know what? I disagree with their insane philosophy of supporting terrorism. I feel most people will accept it when it comes to minor terrorist organizations, but *if* Burger King starts funding Al Qaeda, Chidsey better be prepared for the unholy shitstorm that will descend on Miami-Dade County”.
And then after repeating it on a hundred or so blogs/social sites/fast-food messageboards, McDonalds gives you your paycheck.
I think it is important here to understand that Apple is only intending to control what content that they themselves sell directly through either the iTunes store or the soon-to-be iBookstore. But, since Amazon, Barnes & Noble, The NYT, USA Today, Wired, et. al., will all apparently be providing their own apps, Apple will not be selling or controlling the content that is delivered by those apps so will have no say whatsoever about the content that those apps deliver. So, just relax people because you will continue to get the same type of content (or even better) from those distributors or publishers as you have in the past.
Consider the publisher: ZDnet. If there is a Web site that appears to be dedicated to sowing FUD about Apple, it’s them. Their publishers are so far up Steve Ballmer’s fat ass that I doubt we would even see their toes dangling out.
Any site whose mantra is “Die Apple scum, Die! Die! Die” is one that I take with a deep grain of salt. Such is ZDnet.
That said, the best way to respond is to use your freedom of speech (that is, before Obama declares that null and void) to politely yet firmly respond to the lies sown by this ZDnet frigtard.
My response to Gerwitz:
Gerwitz and the Big Lie
Consider the source: ZDNet. If ever there was a Web site dedicated to spreading FUD about Apple, it’s these guys. Gerwitz posits that Apple is evil, and wants to block content being sold through its book store for the iPad. To him, this amounts to censorship.
Taking this logic further, I am sure that Mr. Gerwitz would be most satisfied if you were able to purchase child pornography or al-Qaeda terrorism and torture training manuals directly from Amazon or at your local Barnes and Noble. As I understand it now, neither store makes this type of printed and video literature available for sale, which amounts to – you guessed it – censorship. Obviously then, Amazon and Barnes and Noble are evil, because they arbitrarily decide what you may or may not read.
Absurd? Of course. But it is easy to deconstruct the sensationalist FUD that is this wretched article. Perhaps you would like to debate the issue of school textbooks, and what literature public schools and even public libraries allow – or not. Often, very questionable and arbitrary decisions have been made by public authorities on what you or your children can read. Yet, to Gerwitz and the ZDNet, Apple, and by extension, Steve Jobs is the nexus of all evil.
The point is that a vendor of books has a right to decide what they choose to sell, often for business and not ethical or moral reasons. Further, if the iPad is a success, you can expect this will attract competitors more than willing to sell just about anything Apple cannot (hello, Random House) or won’t.
The iPad has not yet reached the hands of consumers, and already there are those like Gerwitz who reminds me of the hunters in an Arctic Spring eager to hunt and club baby seals to death. Mr. Gerwitz, before you jump to too hasty a conclusion, please let this play out. It takes time to open a store and to stock its shelves, even electronic ones. Until Apple makes an overt and explicit statement that they choose what you and I will read, I remain skeptical of the highly skewed conclusions of Mr. Gerwtiz and ZDnet.
You should too.
I fear we are all being played by a Web site that often stoops to being little more than sensationalist click whores. If that is true, and I am increasingly coming to that conclusion, it’s hardly a noble way to make a buck.
thinking for oneself…still the #1 antidote to thought control conspiracies everywhere…
television is insidious because, apparently, it feeds directly into the visual cortex without reasoning applied until after the fact, if at all since that is a high effort, deliberate process. So TV is pumping straight into the brain and unless you make an effort to question what you’re seeing, then you are basically just a passive mind-fscked potato. No wonder people seem so accepting of crap pouring out of the TV. t’s open up and say ahh time. Evil. Who reads nowadays anyway?- it might be a generalization to say this but it certainly doesn’t seem like teenagers do? Scary, it really is.
Most parents want their kids to have access to books and music without overly worrying about content. A lack of selectivity (censorship) means those parents will have to look elsewhere for a store they feel may better serve their kids and even their own preferences. If Apple is making a decision to support those parents, and even adults who don’t want certain things, then Apple is filling the niche. It is then incumbent on others to provide any fully unlocked bookshelf. Apple is choosing whom it wants to serve. It should not be forced to serve a set of customers different from those it has already chosen.
Would Disney have bought the argument, many years ago, that it is not offering adult fare and should? Of course not. Sure, others did offer it. But, prior to Disney, no one really offered what it finally offered.
Each company should be able to select their target audience and customers. That’s what Apple is doing and has been doing. If there’s a market for other things, others will fill it.
“As HMCIV noted, 1984 was a good year for the digital world. Perhaps the author meant FAHRENHEIT 451 ? (Ooh, don’t offend anybody.)”
They were referring to the book ‘1984’.
I would draw the line at censorship of any written content. This is not like the app store, where “family friendly” is something I can understand, if not agree with. But I absolutely will not stand for Apple (or anyone) deciding for me what is appropriate to read. If I want to read Lady Chatterly, or the Story of O, or anything else, that’s my business and no one should be censoring that. Nor should magazines be censored (with the possible exception of X-rated magazines, if they even exist anymore). Subsuming freedom of speech to some arbitrary corporate ethics model is fundamentally wrong, and I will most certainly vote with my dollars if Apple does decide to implement anything involving censorship of the written word.
Republicans, you can’t live with them, you can’t stuff them in a sack.
Quoting: “It might even determine the political, religious, or ideological slant of what you’re permitted to read.”
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Ha! Ha! Ha! This is really too funny… while in many countries (USA included) you’re mostly free to be “like everyone else”!
Have you allready seen a atheist President in USA? No! This is forbidden!