this post was submitted on 08 Feb 2010
27 points (70% like it)
47 up votes 20 down votes
Submit a link
to anything interesting: news article, blog entry, video, picture...

26
27
​

iPad secret weapon? Steve Jobs is the largest Disney shareholder. In August Disney bought Marvel Comics. (brainstormtech.blogs.fortune.cnn.com)

submitted 7 months ago by kefs

all 14 comments
sorted by:
top
hotnewcontroversialoldbest

barryicide 5 points6 points 6 months ago[-]

Because as we all know, comic book readers would love having over-priced, locked-down hardware that they can read non-physical copies of their comics on. Comic books are cheap and collectible/show-offable enough that I don't think Apple has any intention to try this.

zmaniacz 7 points8 points 6 months ago[-]

Naw man, think bigger. You're right that your typical comic book collector won't give two shits, but I think there's a large untapped market out there for people who just want to read them and don't necessarily care about collecting. Take me for example! I download the weekly scan releases because I don't want to be bothered with trying to store a bunch of comics and throwing them away feels like a waste. So I end up only paying for nice hardcovers of stories I really enjoy. I would LOVE to pay Marvel $10 a month to get access to all that month's comics on an iPad in full glorious color. Hell, I'll even look at their ads if they want.

This seems win-win to me because in one stroke Marvel drastically expands their potential readership with zero extra cost in publishing or shipping. In my little dream world, it also enable them to experiment with the medium more, or let comics with a smaller readership survive that wouldn't make it if they had to support a print run. How DOESN'T this make sense?

jordanlund 2 points3 points 6 months ago[-]

The pirated version, .CBZ and .CBR files are already filling teh tubez. You can get more or less every comic book made in the past 40 years for free. How Apple will compete with free remains to be seen.

That being said, this goes beyond comic book content. Any magazine content that is best represented in full color (from National Geographic to People Magazine or USA Today) will be a natural for the iPad.

zzcm 1 point2 points 6 months ago[-]

marvel actually offers an attractive though somewhat gimp version of an online comic subscription model. if you go to http://marvel.com/digitalcomics/hq/ for $60 a yr, you get access to their digital comic section. they have a pretty decent selection except alot of the issues arent sequential but they add more each day. i think this can easily be added to the apple store as part of their subscription.

barryicide 1 point2 points 6 months ago[-]

So it sounds like they already have a product that will work on plenty of other internet tablets (there are several Android/Linux tablets that will be debuting at the same time of the iPad).

The only way Apple could use Marvel as a "secret weapon" with the iPad is if they screwed over the current subscription setup and made things Apple-exclusives... which would piss off a lot of the comic nerds that currently have subscriptions (and would refuse to buy an iPad to get them).

RedDyeNumber4 1 point2 points 6 months ago[-]

Not to mention that comics aren't the greatest business model. They make way more money off of merchandise and movies than the actual comics.

ViaConNada 0 points1 point 6 months ago* [-]

Oh I bet they will try it. I don't really think it will work, but they will try it.

Also, except a few books marvel has been putting out shit lately.

evrae 2 points3 points 6 months ago[-]

Is this potential market really big enough to have significant impact?

kefs [S] 1 point2 points 7 months ago[-]

Disney is extremely concerned about turning a young, tech savvy, male audience back to their brands.

jasenlee 0 points1 point 6 months ago[-]

Good catch, I always forget about his ties to Disney until one of these sweet distribution deals comes along and then I tell myself "oh yeah... that's right, he owns the biggest chunk of Disney."

elleon 0 points1 point 6 months ago[-]

I'm for it as long as the iPad can fit in a bag and board

psilokan 0 points1 point 6 months ago[-]

I'm all for it as long as the iPad can fit in my garbage can.

[deleted] 0 points1 point 6 months ago[-]

Right. Everyone reads comic books.

JohnWH 0 points1 point 6 months ago[-]

This is such a niche market, yet really amazing. The only issue is that the hardcore comic book readers would rather buy hard copies (for collection purposes), making this an even more niche market for the casual reader.

If they can get a deal with different magazines, that would be pretty great.... except the majority of my magazine reading is in the bathroom..... but for airplane rides it would still be amazing!

Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our User Agreement and Privacy Policy. (c) 2010 Conde Nast Digital. All rights reserved.

REDDIT and the ALIEN Logo are registered trademarks of Advance Magazine Publishers Inc.