A couple of months back, I expressed some reservations about a multi-publisher service that had been dubbed “Hulu for Magazines” (HfM). Today, Teleread features a post examining the loose concatenation of Time Inc., Meredith, Conde Nast, Hearst and News Corp.
Echoing our thoughts about HfM, Chris Meadows asks, can a partnership that has no business model, no lead and apparently three or more competing options for display devices actually succeed?
He might ask another question: why do we need publisher-specific devices? Seamless integration, content interoperability, standard formats and breadth and depth of content that surrounds a community… yes. A magazine device? Not so much.
By the way, this week, you just can’t get a digital-content post out with mentioning News Corp.
Edited December 8 to add: an announcement.
