Playboy arrives uncensored to iPad, but...

Men’s magazine Playboy arrived uncensored for iPad users by going around Apple Inc.’s App Store, but its app for the popular mobile device may leave much to be, uh, desired. The magazine pulled off the feat with an iPad-optimized Web app, which is not subject to App Store’s restrictions on issues such as pornography and nudity. An article posted on tech site GigaOM said such sidestepping the App Store also means Playboy need not pay a part of its $8 monthly subscription fees in exchange for using Apple’s in-app subscription system. Playboy also gets complete control over its relationship with the consumer, getting access to personal info at sign-up without Apple’s permissions dialog. The web app itself behaves like a native app, detecting the iPad’s orientation rotation. It allows a single page or two-page layout and transitions smoothly between pages with swipe animations. But the article said the app’s downsides include no offline access, and an occasional stutter when switching orientations. Worse for consumers, there are no interactive features within the magazines themselves. The text is also fairly low-resolution, the GigaOM article said. It added the app’s biggest failing appears to be no local caching, so there is no access to any content whatsoever if one is not online. By comparison, most native iPad magazine apps provide offline access once an issue is fully downloaded to the device. — LBG, GMA News