Subscribe to the Philly Enquirer, get a free tablet…
The newspapers have been talking about this for years. A decade before the iPad, the newspaper industry had begun evaluating the economics of publishing to e-Ink tablets as a replacement for paper. One of the leaders was Hearst Corporation, having made significant early investments in the development of e-Ink technology and funding of a stealth startup called “Firstpaper”. At CES 2010, 23 e-ink tablets were introduced, including Hearst’s “Skiff” eReader, Plastic Logic’s “Cue” and the Copia eReader. I was at Hearst during 2009-2010 and we had run a live test of our eReader with a German newspaper, publishing a digital edition daily to 150 subscribers using our prototype 8.5″ x 11″ e-ink tablet. During this period we were in serious discussions with dozens of US and international papers including The NY Times, The Wall St. Journal and The Financial Times. Once the iPad was officially announced, virtually all interest in e-ink among newspaper and magazine publishers evaporated (as did funding by Hearst). It’s noteworthy that the Amazon Kindle has continued to thrive, and to some degree the Nook (Barns & Noble) – both primarily focused on books. The end of paper and ink as the primary medium for publishing is clearly on the horizon so it will be interesting to see how the Philadelphia Enquirer’s effort fares in an iPad world.