> ..open standards like HTML5 offer enough to give a > good reading experience on most devices

It doesn't matter if it's HTML5 or whatever. If they don't find a sustainable model, then the magazine will not exist and you won't have the content - open or otherwise.

Second: content trump format. But while the focus is on content, the format is equally pleasant, better than most other magazines that spend a good amount of energy trying to imitate their tree-based predecessors.

> Maybe iOS-only is the only way he could get that to work, and that's the right choice for him. > If that's true, I still think it's unfortunate.

To me the only unfortunate thing is for this experiment to fail. Marco is a great writer, and his proposal seems honest and has merit.

Do you think a multi-platform launch would have been possible with about the same effort? That’s the important question here. Also take into account developer experience and what skills Marco Arment has.

We are talking about a small project with limited resources and a developer with a certain skill set. I don’t think you can ignore that.

You can certainly ask for support on more devices and be disappointed that the magazine in the offered format isn’t a good fit for your devices – but I do not understand the apparent moral condemnation of that decision. It seems harmless and morally neutral to me – maybe ill-advised (in that it might doom the magazine), but not morally problematic.