Just days after Apple released iOS 4.2, the rumors about the next incarnation of Apple’s mobile operating system have begun. According to Mac-centric blog Mac Stories, iOS 4.3 is barely a month away and this time the OS will come with the standard set of bug fixes and a feature that pulls Apple closer to Google-rival Rupert Murdoch.
The big news, however, might be that iOS 4.3 will support in-app subscriptions. This could be big news for the ever-floundering news industry.
According to both Mac Stories and Daring Fireball’s John Gruber, Apple and Murdoch’s News Corp. have been working together to produce an app for the iPad called “The Daily”.
Murdoch described the app to Fox Business as costing 99 cents a week.
“What’s really interesting is the role Apple and iOS are going to play,” writes Mac Stories’ Frederico Viticci. “Apple isn’t building an ‘iNewstand’: instead, it’s a brand new recurring subscription for App Store apps. The Daily will likely be the first app to support it, and this should be announced with a media event.”
According to The Guardian, “the central innovation, developed with assistance from Apple engineers, will be to dispatch the publication automatically to an iPad or any of the growing number of similar devices.”
We may see iOS 4.3 as early as Dec. 9.
