Another woman I met with wanted to launch a tablet magazine about renewable energy. “It’s global and I have all the right connections to get it out there,” she said. “And I’ve found an out-of-the-box software solution to power it.”

Both projects impressed me. From an editorial point of view, they both nailed it. The entrepreneurs’ energy was great. A few years ago I would have been all in with them.

Today, though, my mind has changed. I fear the app-based tablet approach to magazines leads straight to oblivion, at least for individual magazine titles.

Not that tablets aren’t suited for reading. I discover most of the articles I read every day through my favorite iPad apps: Zite, Flipboard, Facebook and Twitter. These apps don’t produce any content themselves. They’re merely curating what’s already out there. My dedicated magazine apps, on the other hand, have been lost among the many other apps on my iPad. I never read them, even those I pay monthly subscription fees for. Here’s why.

Eight apps a day

Last year, Nielsen estimated the average mobile user has 41 apps on his or her smartphone. In April, a Flurry study showed the average smartphone user opens only eight apps a day, with the most popular being Facebook, YouTube and game apps. And according to a 2012 report from Localytics, 22 percent of all apps are only opened once.

Though these numbers are for mobile in general, not just tablets, the picture is clear: There’s not much room for magazine apps. Magazines need extremely dedicated readers to avoid being buried.

Invisible in the stream of information

To make things worse, magazine apps themselves are invisible in the large streams of information governing the web.

When a magazine is organized as an app rather than as a website, its articles can neither be indexed or searched on the web. And even if they could, clicking the link in Google at best takes readers to an app store, not to the article itself — cutting the magazine out of the greatest traffic driver in today’s world.

The pattern is the same on social media. When you can’t link directly to an article, the urge to tweet or tell your friends about it drastically shrinks. And curators like Flipboard and Zite can’t look into, link or grab content from within magazine apps.

Antiquated monoliths

When I nevertheless manage to find the time to open up an iPad magazine, I feel as if I’m holding an outdated media product in my hands. That’s ironic because these apps tend to be visually appealing, with interactive graphics, embedded videos and well-crafted navigation tools. But the gorgeous layout that works so well in print gets monolithic, almost scary, in its perfectionism on the iPad, and I find myself longing for the web. It’s messy but far more open, more accessible and more adaptable to me, my devices and needs.

Most magazine apps also fail in social. They struggle to be “liked,” to attract comments and get shared, because only readers inside the app can fully join in the conversation. The orderly, closed magazine experience runs counter to the great social networking pulse of the internet.

Magazine apps don’t sell

This year, tablets will probably outsell laptops. Apple alone sells 15 to 20 million iPads each quarter. But magazine app success stories are hard to find.

This is shown in the most recent statistics from the Alliance for Audited Media. In the table below I’ve reorganized the numbers, plotting total paid subscriptions for consumer magazines against “digital replica” paid subscriptions. On average, the 25 bestselling digital replica editions account for 12 percent of total subscriptions.

Paid total and digital replica subscriptions on bestselling U.S. consumer magazines ending 06/30/2013. Supplementary numbers. Source: Alliance for Audited Media.

Game Informer, which is owned by video game chain GameStop, seems to stand out with nearly 3 million digital subscriptions. But that’s because GameStop includes a digital subscription with purchase of its “premium” $14.99 loyalty cards, which also offer discounts on video games.

Other magazines are seeing less success in digital. Wired, for instance, launched its tablet edition in May 2010. The total number of paid subscriptions reached 850,000 by the end of 2012 — but only 102,000 of those are coming from digital. Both numbers fade against the number of monthly unique users to Wired’s website: nearly 20 million.

Evidence of success for standalone iPad magazines is even more difficult to find. The grandest attempt to make this new publishing platform work, News Corp’s “The Daily” iPad app, closed after two years of operation. The Daily only cost $0.99 a week, but with just a little over 100,000 subscribers at last count, it couldn’t break even.

For these reasons, entrepreneurs with ideas for tablet magazines haven’t convinced me to get on board. I believe the future for producing quality content for niches is both bright and promising. But it has to be presented openly, socially, in flow — not in closed tablet apps.

Jon Lund is COO and partner at knowledge-sharing startup memit and chairman of the Danish Online News Association. Follow him on Twitter @jonlund.

In addition, the NYT’s upcoming lower-priced digital product will be called “Need to Know” and is getting its own editor.

The digital magazine aims to capitalize on the success of interactive features like “Snow Fall.” It and the new dining initiative will be led by Sam Sifton, who was national editor and previously the paper’s restaurant critic. Abramson explained these projects:

“His first assignment is to create an immersive digital magazine experience, a lean back read that will include new, multimedia narratives in the tradition of Snow Fall and last weekend’s compelling account of the Arizona fire, as well as some of the best reads published during the previous week. As the new Need to Know project is aimed for quick and periodic dips into the news, the new digital magazine would be a need to read. … The second assignment puts Sam’s incredible depth as a food editor and food writer to use in creating a new dining news product, separate from our current dining report and section led so expertly by Susan Edgerley, who has already drawn up some very exciting ideas for expanding our dining coverage and will surely be an invaluable partner on this project.”

“Need to Know” refers to a separate initiative: The NYT’s lower-priced digital subscription, which hasn’t been released yet but which is far enough along that Abramson has assigned an editor to it:

“Meanwhile, the development of Need to Know is far enough along that what this project most needs to launch is a brilliant editor to sculpt its content. I have asked Cliff Levy to take a leave of absence from his post as deputy Metro editor to accomplish this. Having just invented the hugely popular New York Today for mobile users, Cliff has the perfect gifts to make N2K absolutely stellar.”

In addition, the NYT is creating “the newsroom’s version of a skunk-works team”:

“Arthur Gregg Sulzberger will also take a leave from metro to be the editor in charge of a new ideas task force, which will function as the newsroom’s version of a skunk-works team, a creative team that will think up and propose new ways to expand our news offerings digitally.”

NYT spokeswoman Eileen Murphy told me that the availability and price points of the digital magazine, food publication and “Need to Know” and haven’t been decided yet — though she said the plan is for “Need to Know” to launch sometime early next year.

Here’s Abramson’s full memo:

“Dear Colleagues,

As part of my strategic push to have the newsroom take a leading role in developing new ways to present our journalism in digital forms and to create new products, I have made various changes in the structure and leadership of the newsroom. My goal has been to find the best digital talent in the newsroom and appoint people to very senior editing roles that report directly to Dean and me.

Before I get specific, it’s worth noting that we are by far the most read newspaper Web site, thanks to all of your heroic work and innovation. At a time when mobile traffic is nearing half our visits, we are reaching a much broader array of readers. Many recent moves, including the new ones I am announcing today, help solidify and expand our achievements.

First, by way of background, I promoted Tom Bodkin to deputy managing editor and he has also assumed the important role as the company’s design director (a joint report to me and Mark Thompson), insuring that his brilliant journalistic sensibility infuses all of our news products. I also asked Larry Ingrassia and Ian Fisher to become assistant managing editors and to focus on and lead our main digital priorities. Next, I asked Aron Pilhofer and Steve Duenes to become associate managing editors to help invent the best possible interactive experiences and dazzling presentations of our digital journalism. Meanwhile, Rebecca Howard has already energized our burgeoning video efforts and will soon be adding key members to her team.

The push continues. Sam Sifton has agreed to leave his post as national editor, where he has so expertly guided our coverage of immense national upheaval to become a senior editor and the creative mind in charge of two new ventures. In all of his editing roles, as well as in his writing, Sam has been an inventive and inspiring creator of the best digital journalism. (As culture editor, he was, among desk heads, one of our most forward thinking Web-first journalists).

His first assignment is to create an immersive digital magazine experience, a lean back read that will include new, multimedia narratives in the tradition of Snow Fall and last weekend’s compelling account of the Arizona fire, as well as some of the best reads published during the previous week. As the new Need to Know project is aimed for quick and periodic dips into the news, the new digital magazine would be a need to read. (This is a different product from the Sunday magazine, where Hugo Lindgren has been unendingly creative in digital presentations and he will surely be a counselor to Sam).The second assignment puts Sam’s incredible depth as a food editor and food writer to use in creating a new dining news product, separate from our current dining report and section led so expertly by Susan Edgerley, who has already drawn up some very exciting ideas for expanding our dining coverage and will surely be an invaluable partner on this project.

Meanwhile, the development of Need to Know is far enough along that what this project most needs to launch is a brilliant editor to sculpt its content. I have asked Cliff Levy to take a leave of absence from his post as deputy Metro editor to accomplish this. Having just invented the hugely popular New York Today for mobile users, Cliff has the perfect gifts to make N2K absolutely stellar.

Arthur Gregg Sulzberger will also take a leave from metro to be the editor in charge of a new ideas task force, which will function as the newsroom’s version of a skunk-works team, a creative team that will think up and propose new ways to expand our news offerings digitally. He, too, has displayed impressive creative inventiveness and leadership as a national correspondent and as a Metro reporter and editor.

Sam, Cliff and Arthur will have the needed resources to build teams for creating compelling news content for these initiatives. Besides reporting to Dean and me, they will all work closely with David Perpich and other business side colleagues. All three have proven skills at producing the best journalism, leading teams and working collegially with Times colleagues.

We will make sure not to leave either National or Metro bereft. Alison Mitchell, after a fabulous run as Weekend editor, (and in olden times created a splendid Education report and directed the Washington bureau’s congressional coverage) will take over the leadership of the national desk as National Editor, where she also had a stellar run as deputy. National Editor is the job she was born to do.

More to come.

Fondly, Jill”

The service offers unlimited access to over 80 magazines on iPad, up from 39 at launch. Users can choose between an “unlimited basic” subscription, which offers access to monthly magazines like Glamour, Wired and Food & Wine for $9.99 per month, and an “unlimited premium” subscription, for $14.99 per month, that also includes weekly titles like People, New York, New Yorker and Sports Illustrated.

Next Issue Media, which started out in 2009 as a joint venture of Condé Nast, Hearst, Time Inc., News Corp and Meredith, was initially only available for Android 3.0 (Honeycomb) tablets before expanding to iPad — and, potentially, a wider audience — last July.

The Windows 8 launch is “the first time we’ve worked closely with a platform partner,” CEO Morgan Guenther told me. The app integrates features like “snap view” and multitasking from Microsoft’s interface; the software giant is also providing marketing and will feature the app in the Windows App store. “We saw the importance of moving beyond the tablet,” Guenther said, and Microsoft was a “motivated partner.”

Next Issue hopes that users will use the platform across devices. A single subscription can be authenticated on up to five devices. “With greater choice as to where, when and how they access their magazines, users can seamlessly switch from their tablet at home, to their Ultrabook on the road, to their company PC,” John Richards, senior director of Windows app marketing for Microsoft, said in a statement.

Less than half of Next Issue’s users pay

Discovery remains “an issue” on iPad, Guenther said, partly because the Next Issue iPad app isn’t available through Apple Newsstand. The company projects that by the end of this quarter, it will have about 120,000 total users — 50,000 of whom are actually paying for a subscription. Of that 50,000, about 60 percent have a premium subscription, Guenther said, and 40 percent have a basic subscription. The remaining 70,000 or so users are “authenticators” — users who already have a print subscription to a magazine and are accessing the print version through next Issue’s app.

In the next quarter, Next Issue plans to add Facebook integration and social sharing, followed by the integration of “clipping” technology that would let users virtually save individual articles or images from magazines. Guenther also says the library will expand to about 100 titles in the next couple of months.

Though Next Issue originally launched on Android, that platform hasn’t been much of a priority, Guenther said — to the extent that there are only 36 magazines available, less than half the number of titles available for iPad and Windows 8. In the next few months the company will “refresh” the experience on Android, Guenther said. It also plans to expand to Android smartphones and iPhones.