Apple starts subscription in App Store

NEW YORK: Apple Inc. started a subscription service for publishers of newspapers, magazines and other content applications, allowing them to sell multiple issues through a single purchase in the company's online App Store.

The subscriptions will be sold using the same App Store billing system that lets customers buy individual applications for the iPhone or iPad, the Cupertino, California-based company said today in a statement. Publishers who participate will have to offer their lowest subscription rates within Apple's store.

"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," Apple CEO Steve Jobs said in the statement. Jobs remains involved with strategic decisions while on medical leave.

Apple said it keeps 30% of the subscription fee for any customers that it helps publishers draw. If a publisher brings an existing or new customer to the App Store by selling a subscription directly on its website, it keeps 100% of the revenue.

The App Store offers more than 350,000 applications to users of iPhones, iPods and iPads, the company said today. Customers had downloaded 10 billion apps through the store as of Jan. 22. About $1.1 billion of applications were sold through the App Store in 2010, according to estimates from Brian Marshall, an analyst.