Fairfax Media announced on May 30 that they are releasing iPad applications for The Herald and The Age tomorrow. The applications will have less advertising than the company's websites and will be presented as a news magazine with big pictures and stories culled from newspapers and their websites.

Readers can download magazines a week after publication and will be free until December. The application will be sponsored and subscriptions will cost about $9 per month. Like the rival The Australian, the app will be available through Apple's online App Store which will add its standard 30 percent cut.

iTWire reported that Fairfax now has the capability to build applications for its other newspapers and expand its reach to android users. The new way of selling papers are just a herald of a change in the economics of the news. Print subscribers would pay less for iPad apps. Fairfax says it took its time researching how to use the app, and got feedback from its readers about what they wanted to read.

Stephen Hutcheon edits The Herald app. The app will take only five to 20 seconds to load the front page and minute or two to download the entire issue. Fairfax has remained mum about the development costs but the company already has five initial sponsors including Telstra.

The head of Fairfax's metropolitan media division, Jack Matthews has said that selling The Age and The Herald on tablets were more lucrative because of the 30 percent distribution fee Apple adds to subscriptions sold through the App Store. Matthews also added that "We're coming out net ahead,''

This doesn't mean that Fairfax is giving up on print. The expense of getting print subscribers to convert to apps by giving them tablets is just not practical economically.