The Wall Street Journal reports that Apple is working hard to get the right content in place before the iPad goes to the customers on 3rd April. After the initial demonstration in January by Apple, there has been no official word from Cupertino on what kind of magazines, books, newspapers and video tie-ups we can look forward to.
The WiFi version of the Apple iPad hits the US markets on 3rd April with rumors of 120,000 pre-orders on day 1 of the bookings itself. Apple sure has the momentum to show to the publishers what a huge market potential the iPad can create and convince them just in time for the launch.
While Apple has got ample of ebooks lined up for their readers with the help of Barnes & Nobles’ Nook. Also tieups with various newspapers shouldn’t be much of a problem too. A mini crisis has arisen for their video categories where it seems that many of the TV companies are unsure about the revenue scale that they can generate via the iPad. At the same time they are pretty much concerned as to how their revenue stream from other traditional sources like cable and satellite companies might get affected. Meanwhile Apple is toying with the idea of dropping subscription prices to $0.99 from the $ 1.99-2.99 charged on the iTunes store.
Also one of the most important factor that has been bugging the media companies is the lack of support for Adobe Systems Flash technology which is used by almost all the existing market publishers for their media content and advertisers for their ads. It is to be seen that how effective Apple is in convincing the media companies to ditch Flash and twiddle their content and customise it for the iPad, which might eventually be the key to the iPad’s success.