One company that's bullish on the iPad is the New York-based media empire Condé Nast. On Thursday, the company released an of its Wired digital culture magazine. The company claims it has sold 24,000 copies of the app, which goes for US$5 per issue, in the first day.

"We're eight weeks into the iPad experience, so it is admittedly very early, but what we're seeing is exciting," said Sarah Chubb, president of Condé Nast Digital, during one of the panels. "Sales of the iPad were faster and bigger than we expected."

Condé Nast owns a wide array of magazines, such as Vanity Fair, the New Yorker and GQ, but has also dipped into electronic media as well, by purchasing the popular recipe-sharing site and . The company is attempting to cross-pollinate the best of the online world with the best of print, Chubb said.

The Web, however, has its limits for the publication empire. There, online ads provide the major source of income, but online ad rates do not come close to matching those in print. "It's much harder to make serious money without enormous scale online," Chubb said.

For Condé Nast, the iPad opens the possibility of luring in new readers as well as further serving the already loyal readership.