Adobe Systems Inc. on Friday announced that its Digital Publishing Suite will support both Apple’s in-app subscriptions model and Google’s One Pass. Adobe DPS is currently available as “pre-release technology,” though Adobe says commercially shipping tools will be available shortly.
[ad#Google Adsense 300×250 in story]Aimed at content creators like magazine and newspaper publishers, Adobe’s Digital Publishing Suite combines together hosted services, Content Viewer technology and integration with Adobe’s existing Creative Suite 5 software – Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Acrobat, or other software depending on the specific collection. Adobe bills the technology as an “end-to-end solution for digital publishing.”
Adobe indicates that the Digital Publishing Suite supports the ability to tie into existing e-commerce and fulfillment systems. The current pre-release version supports Apple’s App Store subscriptions when used with a publisher entitlement server; broad support for App Store subscriptions and Google One Pass is coming “in the very near future.”
Both Apple and Google introduced new subscription systems within days of each other earlier this month. Apple first tipped its hand with the introduction of News Corp.’s “The Daily,” a daily digital newspaper making its debut on the Apple iPad.
Apple is asking publishers for a thirty percent cut of subscriptions acquired using in-app means; some publishers are saying that’s too much, despite other models like Amazon.com’s Kindle, in which Amazon asked for much more. Google is asking for a smaller 10 percent cut.
But Apple’s model differs in erring on the side of the customer when it comes to protecting personal information – App Store customers are being given the ability to manage all subscriptions from a single account screen in the App Store, and Apple is making it voluntary for customers to provide name, e-mail address and zip code to the publishers. Google is passing through One Pass customer information to the publishers.