Kobo Reacts to App Store Changes By Developing HTML5 App
For those of you who are customers of Kobo, the popular eReading app, you will have likely already read the email outlining the changes they have made due to the new policies put in place by Apple. You can no longer shop from within the app itself, instead having to shop from their website directly, lessening the convenience and ease –but it isn’t their fault. Apple altered the playing recently, disallowing apps that filtered purchasing through sources other than the App Store itself.
In order to keep their iOS app compliant and available they have made the requisite changes, but it was easy to tell by the tone of their notice and their suggestion that you let Apple know how you feel, that they are less than thrilled. And with over 2.5 million books, magazines and newspapers in their inventory and servicing over 4 million readers world-wide using Kobo, their happiness isn’t insignificant.
Cue their announcement today that they are developing an HTML5 eReading web app.
The new web app will be the full-featured style interface we had become used to, allowing you to read, browse and shop all from a single launch point. By using HTML5, they will be able to create a feature-rich user interface that can be updated at a single point and become available to any user on any device with a web browser. (including the often left-out desktop computers)
The announcement was careful to say that they will still be supporting their existing free eReading apps, assuring us that this new software is simply making Kobo even more convenient and accessible. They also mention that the ability to browse and purchase titles in-app is still available on all other non-iOS versions of their apps.
This new web app is slated for launch later this year.
Will you migrate your Kobo use from the newly maimed integrated app to the new web app? Is this just the beginning of developers finding ways to make their content available to iOS users while circumventing Apple’s attempts to control the revenue stream of would-be apps?
