About Me 0014: Making Money on Line

If the president's budget doesn't get implemented, the government will end up running on a CR for roughly three straight years, a policy outcome few find optimal. But the closer politicians get to the 2012 elections, the less interest there is in governing.

"I find it hard to believe that they're actually going to be able to come up with a budget resolution that will pass both the House and Senate," said federal budget-watcher Stan Collender, a partner in the Washington, D.C. office of Qorvis Communications.

The House Republican leadership might conceivably be willing to find some common ground with the White House, but they've got the Tea Party to contend with, he said.

"Unlike Gingrich in '95 and '96," Collender said, referring to then-House majority leader Newt Gingrich, "these guys don't have the permission to compromise." The Tea Party "defines compromise as collaborating with the enemy.

"So I think there's going to be a shutdown," he said.

The current continuing resolution extends through March 4 at midnight. If there isn't new funding legislation passed by both houses and signed by the president before then, the government won't be able to spend money, and its nonessential parts will closed for business.

All that leaves Obama's fiscal 2012 budget proposal looking relevant "only in the macro sense," Collender said. The five-year freeze on domestic discretionary spending, for instance, certainly establishes a ceiling for funding.

But beyond that, he said, "this is a year when the individual proposals just won't be important."

If Obama's budget proposal dies a quiet death, it'll have few mourners. It has so far been savaged by liberals for slashing social programs and conservatives for raising taxes and not cutting enough.

"Despite his promises to make the U.S. a more attractive place to business in and do business from, President Obama is proposing $129 billion in tax increases on American firms doing business abroad. Not only will these tax hikes make U.S. businesses less competitive, but they would threaten jobs back home as well," complained Scott Hodge, president of the conservative Tax Foundation.

John Irons, research and policy director for the liberal-leaning Economic Policy Institute, had the opposite reaction. "The president's top economic priority should be job creation, but the proposed budget does too little and turns too quickly toward deficit reduction," he said. "The economic context -- unemployment at or above 9 percent for 21 months, unemployment that is expected to remain elevated for years -- demands a stronger response."

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“It is not possible for anyone but Apple to sell e-books at a profit on iOS under these rules,” says Morin, founder and CEO of BeamItDown Software, which makes an e-book app called iFlow Reader and sells books via its own online store.

Apple’s new rules, announced yesterday, say that developers such as BeamItDown must make their products available through Apple’s own store, where Apple takes a 30 percent cut of revenues. The change will affect companies that make their content—everything from books to movies and videos to TV shows—available to owners of Apple devices.

Until now, Morin and others, like Amazon, have sidestepped Apple’s store by employing a clever workaround—when you click on a button to buy a book, you are taken out of the app to a browser, where the transaction takes place.

Morin says Apple has told him in the past that this was perfectly fine.

“The bottom line is that unless the FTC intervenes, this will put us out of business,” says one developer. “Given Apple’s political clout, this probably will not happen."

But now Apple has changed its tune. Its new policy says that booksellers can keep selling books outside the Apple store, but only if they also make the same books available inside Apple’s store as well.

Thing is, most customers will buy via Apple, because it’s more convenient. And that’s where the problem arises.

Morin says he makes less than 30 percent profit on the books he sells. So if he has to sell via Apple’s store, he will lose money on every book he sells. On a $10 book, he will lose $1.15.

Daniel Acker/ Bloomberg via Getty Images

“The bottom line is that unless the FTC intervenes, this will put us out of business,” Morin says. “Given Apple’s political clout, this probably will not happen. But there is no doubt that their practices are anti-competitive. We have a much better e-reader than Apple, but that is utterly irrelevant in the totalitarian world of iOS.”

Even the big guys, like Amazon and Barnes & Noble, will suffer under Apple’s new rules, Morin says. Amazon and Barnes & Noble did not respond immediately to requests for comment. Neither did Apple.

Worse yet, Morin says, Apple’s new policies will prevent small developers from dreaming up new ideas for the iPad. “This is the death of innovation in e-readers on iOS,” Morin says.

Apple’s new rules also have huge implications for companies like Netflix and Hulu, which sell movies and TV shows via subscription. Essentially, Apple is demanding a 30 percent cut of their ongoing revenues from iPads. That’s the price for making their content available to customers who own Apple devices.

There’s no sense fretting about whether or not this is fair. Apple has a right (and, indeed, an obligation, as far as its shareholders are concerned) to extract as much value as possible from the online ecosystem it has created.

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About Me 0014

Thursday, February 17, 2011

Making Money on Line

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