[125] in bcs-newton
First Newton Titles From PIE's Starcore Publishing Group
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Albert Willis)
Sat Jul 31 09:30:26 1993
Date: Sat, 31 Jul 93 09:26:30 EST
From: awillis@MIT.EDU (Albert Willis)
To: bcs-newton@world.std.com, newton_pda_group@bcsmac.bcs.org
First Newton Titles From PIE's Starcore Publishing Group
Contact:
Christopher Escher
Apple Computer, Inc.
(408) 974-2202
First Newton Titles From PIE's Starcore Publishing Group
CUPERTINO, California--July 30, 1993--The recently introduced
Starcore publishing group within the Personal Interactive Electronics
(PIE) division at Apple Computer has announced six new titles for the
Newton MessagePad. Some of these titles are delivered on PCMCIA cards
that fit into the card slot at the top of the MessagePad; others are
on a diskette, which can be downloaded as required from a personal
computer. All titles are expected to ship early in the fall.
"This announcement underlines the fact that the Newton business is
not just about hardware," said Ken Wirt, director of publishing, PIE
Division. "We have been working closely with developers in this
venture, and we are extremely pleased with this first portfolio of
titles. I believe that Starcore is now well positioned to contribute
significantly to the acceptance of the Newton family as the principal
standard for the PDA market."
The first titles from Starcore Publishing include the following:
-- Fodors 94 Travel Manager: Top U.S. Cities. Includes 500 locations
per city, including restaurants-- detailing the type of cuisine, the
credit cards they accept, and other travel information and business
services--hotels, sights of interest, airport information. Covers
eight cities, with detailed interactive maps highlighting
destinations and routes. Suggested retail price: $119.95.
-- Fortune 500 Guide to American Business is an enriched electronic
version of the Fortune 500 and Service 500, giving a rich source of
information on all aspects of America's largest companies. Compares
information on topics including sales per employee, five-year
financial performance histories for sales, profits and earnings per
share. Users can take advantage of sophisticated search and sort
options, compare performance of companies and prepare graphs (using
five years of data on two companies) and custom calculations.
Suggested retail price: $99.95.
-- Dell Crossword Puzzles & Other Games contains hundreds of puzzles,
as well as Cryptograms and Word Searches. Suggested retail price:
$79.95. An abbreviated version of this product also comes in a
diskette-based version, with suggested retail price: $49.95.
-- Money Magazine Financial Assistant includes calculation templates
to evaluate a number of the most common financial decisions.
Categories include investments, loans, budgets, property transactions
and so on. Suggested retail price: $99.95.
-- Money Magazine Business Forms makes it easy to fill out the most
used financial forms, including expense reports, project plans and
loan calculations. It has 12 templates. This product is delivered on
diskette. Using the optional Newton Connection, just the form
required can be downloaded from the personal computer. Suggested
retail price: $39.95.
-- Columbo's Mystery Capers--more than 40 brain teasers complete with
graphics and text-based clues. Each humorous mystery opens with a
text introduction and an illustration of the scene of the crime.
Players use the stylus to uncover the potential clues which reveal
important details. Suggested retail price: $79.95.
Apple has been working actively with information providers and
publishers to develop titles for the Starcore portfolio, which is
intended to include products in the categories of general reference,
business/professional, education and entertainment.
The opportunity for publishers is considerable, according to Kenzi
Sugihara, of Random House, who cooperated with Apple to publish the
Fodors Guide title. Sugihara, who is vice president and publisher at
Random House Reference and Electronic Publishing, commented, "What we
are seeing is the opportunity for publishers to reach a very broad
section of the population: We are giving a whole new group of people
the information and entertainment they want in a new, accessible
format."
As well as Random House, other developer partners for the Starcore
titles include: GeoSystems (a subsidiary of RR Donnelley & Sons),
Pensee, PenMagic Software Inc., and Blank, Berlyn & Co.
-30-
Apple and the Apple logo are registered trademarks and Newton,
MessagePad and Starcore are trademarks of Apple Computer, Inc.
END
