Apple has launched a new category in its Newsstand store featuring 20 Hearst magazine titles which will be available to iPad owners before they appear in print or “any other digital edition.”
Hearst, which own titles including Elle, Esquire, Cosmopolitan and Marie Claire, told Mashable that the selected digital issues will available to both subscribers and single-issue purchasers “a couple of days” before the print release.
According to Hearst, Apple suggested the idea as they try to get ahead of other rival digital newsstands such as Amazon’s, Google’s and Zinio’s.
Speaking to Mashable in November, Hearst president David Carey said the success of its tablet editions relied heavily on promotion from digital storefronts: "If your magazines land in the upper carousel of [Apple's] Newsstand, you sell a lot of product. If you're nowhere on that page, you're not going to do as well," he observed.