John Gruber, Daring Fireball:

Carly Page, The Inquirer:

Speaking with The Inquirer, a Google spokesperson confirmed that the Nexus 7 won’t feature these three categories, which will remain an exclusive in US for the time being. They said, “The UK version will feature all of the options currently available in the UK Play store”, which means users of the Nexus 7 will be limited in their choices movies, apps, games and books.

I wonder if the iPad Mini will have music, magazines, and TV shows in the U.K.?

Obviously Gruber is asking a completely rhetorical question here, but the truth is that this sort of thing has been Apple’s biggest strength … Regardless of who is to blame, Google and Amazon remain almost completely U.S. centric with many of their media-related services.

Even app distribution on Google Play can be ridiculous in this regard — it’s bad enough navigating the sea of device compatibility issues, but it’s also not uncommon at all for Android apps to be restricted to the U.S. only for inexplicable reasons — Netflix and Starbucks come to mind as examples of Android apps that took an unreasonable amount of time to expand into international availability, despite the iOS versions already being available in other relevant markets (i.e. Canada).

On the other hand, Apple nailed the international distribution model at least eight years ago, and has been rapidly expanding throughout the world ever since. Sure, iOS app developers can also limit their apps to only certain countries, but it seems very few actually do, for whatever reason.

Even if I were seriously considering a tablet other than an iPad, this would be a huge disincentive to me as a Canadian user. I already have a Kindle Fire which I picked up out of curiosity, and it’s virtually useless up here.