Media organizations are “leaving money on the table” if they are not charging for their iPad apps, says Steve Outing. After a month with an iPad, he writes that he likely would have paid for any of the news apps he uses, as long as they were sold as permanent apps, not individual stand-alone editions as Time magazine originally was. “This approach completely misunderstands the device,” he writes. “First, the single-edition iPad purchase is fleeting; psychologically, I resist buying iPad apps that are read or viewed once and then deleted.”
Assuming the app is a one-time download that can contain multiple issues of a publication, Outing suggests that it’s worth paying for if the experience surpasses that of using the news org’s website.
“Indeed, to not charge for the apps seems, well, crazy. If an iPad reader of any of those news brands doesn’t want to pay a couple bucks for their apps, then all he/she has to do is launch the iPad’s Safari browser and go to their websites, paying nothing.”
Source: Poynter.org
Showing posts with label ipad. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ipad. Show all posts
Wednesday, May 11, 2011
iPad news apps lack accessibility and usability
Apple’s iPad and iOS come with several built-in accessibility features that make the iPad relatively easy for disabled people to use. Unfortunately, many news applications were not built to take advantage of these accessibility features, rendering the apps ultimately useless for people who are disabled.
VoiceOver is the crown jewel of the iOS accessibility features (the operating system behind the iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch), and it gives the entire operating system and every application access to screen-reading technology.
Gregg Vanderheiden, director of the Trace R&D Center at the University of Wisconson-Madison, said in a phone call that iOS is the only mobile operating system to come with a built-in screen reader, and that this technology often costs hundreds of dollars or more on other computing platforms.
Testing out apps for accessibility
For this technology to work, apps must be built with accessibility in mind. I downloaded and tested several news apps with this and other accessibility features turned on and found The Daily, The Economist, The New York Times, Wired and USA Today apps to be unusable, and incapable of reading everything that their applications present with these features turned on.
VoiceOver allows users to tap the screen and a voice will let them know what they have selected. Tap a folder, and a voice reads the name of the folder. Tap an application and the same happens. Tap a button in an application or a text box, and theoretically the same should happen. Once users have found what they want, they double tap to select it. In VoiceOver mode, double tap functions as a single tap normally does.
In my testing, some of the icons and text were selectable, while others were not. I was unable to get any of the news apps to select and read the body of the text for me. The Economist does have audio versions of its articles that can be selected by tapping a button, and they work well. But they don’t follow the normal pattern of accessibility. Nonetheless, The Economist iPad app has built-in text-zooming and audio versions of articles, which is more than a lot of other news apps offer.
Oscar Grut, managing director of digital editions, said The Economist is beginning an accessibility review of its iPad and iPhone applications. As part of its review, it’s bringing in qualified consultants who can help identify accessibility issues for different types of impairment. The end goal is to make the iPad and iPhone applications more accessible to wider audiences., Grut told me.
Need for a back button, bigger text
In the course of my testing with VoiceOver on, I was completely disoriented several times and had to tap the home key to go back to the home screen and start over. And I could see what I was doing the whole time. One of the issues that causes disorientation is the lack of a back button or searchability within some of these apps (Wired’s app is the prime offender of this).
Imagine using a news website. You click a few links. Now you want to get back to where you were before, but there’s no back button. Clicking something and being shot to a different section into the Wired app without the ability to go back can be disorienting for someone with perfect eyesight. Using the VoiceOver technology on apps without a back button or breadcrumb trail when you’re blind? Forget about it.
“The lack of a back button is pretty egregious, as is the lack of search,” Raluca Budiu, user experience specialist at the Nielsen Norman Group, said via email. “Especially since the iPad screen is so much bigger than the screens of mobile phones and there’s plenty of space for incorporating these in the interface.”
There are some users who are visually impaired, but not so much that they need everything read to them. For these users, the ability to enlarge text sizes is critical. Some applications, such as Wired’s, do not allow text to be enlarged at all, while others, such as The New York Times’, USA Today’s and The Economist’s, offer a variety of text sizes.
“That is just plain not a good idea,” Vanderheiden said about not allowing text to be enlarged. “There is a huge portion of your readership that is going to have issues with that small text.”
Budiu said one issue that many applications have is that even when they allow the article body text to be enlarged, they don’t enlarge the headline, captions or navigational pages. The New York Times and Economist apps suffer from this issue, while the USA Today app enlarges all text on a page. None of the applications, however, allowed the navigational pages to be enlarged.
All of these applications also work with iOS’s built-in zooming feature, which magnifies everything on screen up to five times. After a certain point, though, the text starts to look pixelated.
iOS also has pinch to zoom, which is a feature built not just for accessibility; it does allow users to use two fingers to zoom in on text, photos and interface items. While this works beautifully on nytimes.com, it doesn’t work at all in The Times’ iPad app and worked in The Economist app for article text only.
One of the biggest accessibility issues with The Daily — something that able-bodied people would struggle with, too — is the need to rotate the orientation of The Daily to discover new features and content. It’s not intuitive, and it requires that a user hold the iPad in order for it to work properly. (I often rest the iPad on my lap while reading). People aren’t accustomed to rotating their computer screens or newspapers to discover new features.
“Often companies think that their app needs to have some cool, unique design element in order to be successful and are ready to sacrifice usability or accessibility for that,” Budiu said. “Unfortunately, fun depletes — that fancy carousel or that unique widget is going be less fun the second time the app is used, and even annoying by the fifth time.”
Grut said the carousel used in The Economist iPhone app has proved to be an accessibility issue, and it’s being rethought.
“It doesn’t work for the visually impaired,” he said. “We’re trying to make sure it works for everyone.”
Developing best practices to make apps more accessible
Vanderheiden said content creators may be intentionally creating applications with inaccessible text because of copyright infringement fears. Some content creators hope that by making it harder to select and access text they’ll be able to cut down on piracy. But will making a product harder to use really make a company more money?
“I really think they’re doing a lot of things out of fear, and if they would just slip over to another model they could thrive,” Vanderheiden said. “I mean iTunes doesn’t copy protect its songs anymore, but it’s just so damn convenient to just buy them.”
Budiu, however, says he doesn’t think these accessibility and usability issues were a conscious oversight. Rather, he believes that many companies and developers are not aware of best practices for usability. Vanderheiden thinks this is part of the issue, too, and said print-driven companies and developers may not think about making products for the disabled.
The good news for users is that all of these organizations, with the exception of the iPad-only The Daily, have websites that work great with the iPad’s accessible, built-in browser Safari. Budiu said her ideal news app would be “an app that is not about the app but about the news.”
An app all about the news, she said, would enable as many people as possible to use it and enjoy it.
Source: Poynter.org
VoiceOver is the crown jewel of the iOS accessibility features (the operating system behind the iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch), and it gives the entire operating system and every application access to screen-reading technology.
Gregg Vanderheiden, director of the Trace R&D Center at the University of Wisconson-Madison, said in a phone call that iOS is the only mobile operating system to come with a built-in screen reader, and that this technology often costs hundreds of dollars or more on other computing platforms.
Testing out apps for accessibility
For this technology to work, apps must be built with accessibility in mind. I downloaded and tested several news apps with this and other accessibility features turned on and found The Daily, The Economist, The New York Times, Wired and USA Today apps to be unusable, and incapable of reading everything that their applications present with these features turned on.
VoiceOver allows users to tap the screen and a voice will let them know what they have selected. Tap a folder, and a voice reads the name of the folder. Tap an application and the same happens. Tap a button in an application or a text box, and theoretically the same should happen. Once users have found what they want, they double tap to select it. In VoiceOver mode, double tap functions as a single tap normally does.
In my testing, some of the icons and text were selectable, while others were not. I was unable to get any of the news apps to select and read the body of the text for me. The Economist does have audio versions of its articles that can be selected by tapping a button, and they work well. But they don’t follow the normal pattern of accessibility. Nonetheless, The Economist iPad app has built-in text-zooming and audio versions of articles, which is more than a lot of other news apps offer.
Oscar Grut, managing director of digital editions, said The Economist is beginning an accessibility review of its iPad and iPhone applications. As part of its review, it’s bringing in qualified consultants who can help identify accessibility issues for different types of impairment. The end goal is to make the iPad and iPhone applications more accessible to wider audiences., Grut told me.
Need for a back button, bigger text
In the course of my testing with VoiceOver on, I was completely disoriented several times and had to tap the home key to go back to the home screen and start over. And I could see what I was doing the whole time. One of the issues that causes disorientation is the lack of a back button or searchability within some of these apps (Wired’s app is the prime offender of this).
Imagine using a news website. You click a few links. Now you want to get back to where you were before, but there’s no back button. Clicking something and being shot to a different section into the Wired app without the ability to go back can be disorienting for someone with perfect eyesight. Using the VoiceOver technology on apps without a back button or breadcrumb trail when you’re blind? Forget about it.
“The lack of a back button is pretty egregious, as is the lack of search,” Raluca Budiu, user experience specialist at the Nielsen Norman Group, said via email. “Especially since the iPad screen is so much bigger than the screens of mobile phones and there’s plenty of space for incorporating these in the interface.”
There are some users who are visually impaired, but not so much that they need everything read to them. For these users, the ability to enlarge text sizes is critical. Some applications, such as Wired’s, do not allow text to be enlarged at all, while others, such as The New York Times’, USA Today’s and The Economist’s, offer a variety of text sizes.
“That is just plain not a good idea,” Vanderheiden said about not allowing text to be enlarged. “There is a huge portion of your readership that is going to have issues with that small text.”
Budiu said one issue that many applications have is that even when they allow the article body text to be enlarged, they don’t enlarge the headline, captions or navigational pages. The New York Times and Economist apps suffer from this issue, while the USA Today app enlarges all text on a page. None of the applications, however, allowed the navigational pages to be enlarged.
All of these applications also work with iOS’s built-in zooming feature, which magnifies everything on screen up to five times. After a certain point, though, the text starts to look pixelated.
iOS also has pinch to zoom, which is a feature built not just for accessibility; it does allow users to use two fingers to zoom in on text, photos and interface items. While this works beautifully on nytimes.com, it doesn’t work at all in The Times’ iPad app and worked in The Economist app for article text only.
One of the biggest accessibility issues with The Daily — something that able-bodied people would struggle with, too — is the need to rotate the orientation of The Daily to discover new features and content. It’s not intuitive, and it requires that a user hold the iPad in order for it to work properly. (I often rest the iPad on my lap while reading). People aren’t accustomed to rotating their computer screens or newspapers to discover new features.
“Often companies think that their app needs to have some cool, unique design element in order to be successful and are ready to sacrifice usability or accessibility for that,” Budiu said. “Unfortunately, fun depletes — that fancy carousel or that unique widget is going be less fun the second time the app is used, and even annoying by the fifth time.”
Grut said the carousel used in The Economist iPhone app has proved to be an accessibility issue, and it’s being rethought.
“It doesn’t work for the visually impaired,” he said. “We’re trying to make sure it works for everyone.”
Developing best practices to make apps more accessible
Vanderheiden said content creators may be intentionally creating applications with inaccessible text because of copyright infringement fears. Some content creators hope that by making it harder to select and access text they’ll be able to cut down on piracy. But will making a product harder to use really make a company more money?
“I really think they’re doing a lot of things out of fear, and if they would just slip over to another model they could thrive,” Vanderheiden said. “I mean iTunes doesn’t copy protect its songs anymore, but it’s just so damn convenient to just buy them.”
Budiu, however, says he doesn’t think these accessibility and usability issues were a conscious oversight. Rather, he believes that many companies and developers are not aware of best practices for usability. Vanderheiden thinks this is part of the issue, too, and said print-driven companies and developers may not think about making products for the disabled.
The good news for users is that all of these organizations, with the exception of the iPad-only The Daily, have websites that work great with the iPad’s accessible, built-in browser Safari. Budiu said her ideal news app would be “an app that is not about the app but about the news.”
An app all about the news, she said, would enable as many people as possible to use it and enjoy it.
Source: Poynter.org
Thursday, February 10, 2011
The Daily Is Interesting, But Is It the Future of Newspapers?
THERE’S been a lot of pre-launch interest in Rupert Murdoch’s new iPad “newspaper” The Daily. This is partly because the News Corp. founder is known for making ambitious bets on new technology — even if they don’t always work out, as he found with MySpace — and also because Apple was a key partner, and used the News app to launch its new subscription model for content (it costs 99 cents a week or $39 for a year).
So does The Daily live up to its billing? Is it the future of newspapers? Not really. It does some interesting things, but it also does some very confusing things, particularly around sharing content. And much of it, apart from some bells and whistles, consists of fairly humdrum day-old stories that you might read in, well…a regular old printed newspaper.
The first clue to what you get with The Daily, as more than one person has noted, is in the name itself. It is published more or less just like a regular newspaper, in the sense that the bulk of the content is produced and then published to the app once a day. Although News Corp. made a point of noting at its launch event that the app will be updated throughout the day as news breaks, there was no sign of that happening while I used it for most of the day on Wednesday, and that was while riots were still breaking out in Cairo.
Even though Twitter content appeared in a box in one of the stories (a profile of Rihanna) and had live links, the actual tweets themselves were almost 12 hours old — even after the app updated itself and said it was downloading a new version of the paper.
It’s like a newspaper…but on the iPad!
The result is that you get something that feels very much like a newspaper, with stories about things that happened yesterday. And while you can share stories via Facebook and Twitter, none of the pieces contain any links to anything on the web, making the app feel very much like similar apps from print publications like the New York Times, Esquire and Wired — disconnected from the Internet in a lot of ways. There are live links in Twitter streams in stories (particularly the customizable sports section, which lets you follow teams), and there is a small section of links called “What We’re Reading,” but other than that there isn’t a whole lot of linking going on at all.
There’s also no way to contact the writers or interact with them in any way, as Salon founder Scott Rosenberg noted, apart from posting a comment (which you can also do via audio, an unusual choice).
The general web user can’t get to any articles on The Daily’s website. But when you share a link to a story in the Daily via Facebook or Twitter, people can click through and read it on the site — a “social media passthrough” that the New York Times is also reportedly building into its upcoming web paywall. But with The Daily, when you click through to read the piece, you get what amounts to a screenshot of the app page — an image, rather than text. With some stories, you also get a large warning, complete with a big exclamation mark, that says the story is “missing content available only in The Daily iPad app.”
All of that aside, the biggest issue with The Daily is that even when you share a story, there is little that might encourage anyone to cough up the money to subscribe (a Columbia Journalism Review editor called it “a general-interest publication that is not generally interesting” and added that “great design will not trump lackluster content”). In the inaugural version, there were a couple of features that were worth reading, but they didn’t add much to similar stories that have appeared elsewhere for free. And a surprising amount of what appeared in the app — once you got past all the videos, most of which were devoted to advertising, and the interactive Sudoku and crossword puzzles — was run-of-the-mill news briefs that you might see in any newspaper such as USA Today.
If the content is ho-hum, what are users paying for?
Much of the pre-launch promotion of The Daily suggested that it was going to focus on the content in a way that many newspapers don’t, and that the $30 million or so Rupert Murdoch was spending on the project indicated there would be a higher level of quality. But while the app is well designed and the articles and photos are nice to look at, there isn’t a whole lot on the content side that makes it any better than newspapers that can already be read for free — and whose links can be shared and read without the bizarre restrictions that The Daily has invented to try and convince people to pay for it.
David Weidner of WSJ’s MarketWatch said that “the pricing is right,” and that $40 a year made more sense than $240 a year for the New York Times, and it’s true that the low price may get some to sign up — but the bigger question is, how many?
Source: nytimes.com
So does The Daily live up to its billing? Is it the future of newspapers? Not really. It does some interesting things, but it also does some very confusing things, particularly around sharing content. And much of it, apart from some bells and whistles, consists of fairly humdrum day-old stories that you might read in, well…a regular old printed newspaper.
The first clue to what you get with The Daily, as more than one person has noted, is in the name itself. It is published more or less just like a regular newspaper, in the sense that the bulk of the content is produced and then published to the app once a day. Although News Corp. made a point of noting at its launch event that the app will be updated throughout the day as news breaks, there was no sign of that happening while I used it for most of the day on Wednesday, and that was while riots were still breaking out in Cairo.
Even though Twitter content appeared in a box in one of the stories (a profile of Rihanna) and had live links, the actual tweets themselves were almost 12 hours old — even after the app updated itself and said it was downloading a new version of the paper.
It’s like a newspaper…but on the iPad!
The result is that you get something that feels very much like a newspaper, with stories about things that happened yesterday. And while you can share stories via Facebook and Twitter, none of the pieces contain any links to anything on the web, making the app feel very much like similar apps from print publications like the New York Times, Esquire and Wired — disconnected from the Internet in a lot of ways. There are live links in Twitter streams in stories (particularly the customizable sports section, which lets you follow teams), and there is a small section of links called “What We’re Reading,” but other than that there isn’t a whole lot of linking going on at all.
There’s also no way to contact the writers or interact with them in any way, as Salon founder Scott Rosenberg noted, apart from posting a comment (which you can also do via audio, an unusual choice).
The general web user can’t get to any articles on The Daily’s website. But when you share a link to a story in the Daily via Facebook or Twitter, people can click through and read it on the site — a “social media passthrough” that the New York Times is also reportedly building into its upcoming web paywall. But with The Daily, when you click through to read the piece, you get what amounts to a screenshot of the app page — an image, rather than text. With some stories, you also get a large warning, complete with a big exclamation mark, that says the story is “missing content available only in The Daily iPad app.”
All of that aside, the biggest issue with The Daily is that even when you share a story, there is little that might encourage anyone to cough up the money to subscribe (a Columbia Journalism Review editor called it “a general-interest publication that is not generally interesting” and added that “great design will not trump lackluster content”). In the inaugural version, there were a couple of features that were worth reading, but they didn’t add much to similar stories that have appeared elsewhere for free. And a surprising amount of what appeared in the app — once you got past all the videos, most of which were devoted to advertising, and the interactive Sudoku and crossword puzzles — was run-of-the-mill news briefs that you might see in any newspaper such as USA Today.
If the content is ho-hum, what are users paying for?
Much of the pre-launch promotion of The Daily suggested that it was going to focus on the content in a way that many newspapers don’t, and that the $30 million or so Rupert Murdoch was spending on the project indicated there would be a higher level of quality. But while the app is well designed and the articles and photos are nice to look at, there isn’t a whole lot on the content side that makes it any better than newspapers that can already be read for free — and whose links can be shared and read without the bizarre restrictions that The Daily has invented to try and convince people to pay for it.
David Weidner of WSJ’s MarketWatch said that “the pricing is right,” and that $40 a year made more sense than $240 a year for the New York Times, and it’s true that the low price may get some to sign up — but the bigger question is, how many?
Source: nytimes.com
Is News Corp.'s iPad Daily a Killer App?
News Corp. (NWS) has launched its iPad newspaper dubbed the Daily and the effort will be closely watched. The Daily is either the rebirth of the newspaper or another overfunded launch like Conde Nast Portfolio.
Screenshots: The Daily launch
Of course, the Daily could turn out to be something in between. The big point here is that the fate of the Daily will be determined in months and years from now. In fact, the subscriptions will tell the tale over time. One day of hype doesn’t make a new paradigm for traditional media.
Add it up and we have no idea whether the Daily is the moment for traditional media or just another effort fumbling toward mobile app ecstasy.
As I noted in my Kindle Single, 2011 is the year of media subscriptions. The rub is we don’t know whether consumers will go along for the ride. It’s quite possible that 2011 will merely be the year of trying to do media subscriptions. Simply put, the New York Times (NYT) pay wall and the Daily will be closely watched efforts.
Stifel Nicolaus analyst Jordan Rohan, who has been watching this space for a long time, outlined the ledger for News Corp.’s Daily, Rupert Murdoch’s pet project. Here’s the breakdown.
Pros:
* News Corp. has the resources to differentiate the Daily. If News Corp. can meld newspaper, cable, studio and Internet assets the Daily could sing. Indeed, the presentation outlining the Daily was heavy on the video.
* Apple is a great ally. Apple’s support for subscriptions in iTunes is quite the enabler.
* News Corp. is playing offense, which is a good thing.
* Subscribing to a daily publication makes more sense on the iPad and 99 cents a week—$39.99 for a year—won’t break the bank.
Cons:
* It’s going to take time for consumers to accept an iPad newspaper. Sure, early adopters will check it out. Then what?
* Early hype doesn’t turn into market share, revenue or cash flow instantly.
* Apple is controlling. Rest assured that News Corp. and Apple will clash down the road over apps and subscriptions. That fact could chill the market for other iPad publishers.
* Ads will matter. Subscriptions alone won’t support the Daily alone, but will carry the day initially. What will the ad picture look like and how will the details be handled with News Corp. and Apple?
Source: seekingalpha.com
Screenshots: The Daily launch
Of course, the Daily could turn out to be something in between. The big point here is that the fate of the Daily will be determined in months and years from now. In fact, the subscriptions will tell the tale over time. One day of hype doesn’t make a new paradigm for traditional media.
Add it up and we have no idea whether the Daily is the moment for traditional media or just another effort fumbling toward mobile app ecstasy.
As I noted in my Kindle Single, 2011 is the year of media subscriptions. The rub is we don’t know whether consumers will go along for the ride. It’s quite possible that 2011 will merely be the year of trying to do media subscriptions. Simply put, the New York Times (NYT) pay wall and the Daily will be closely watched efforts.
Stifel Nicolaus analyst Jordan Rohan, who has been watching this space for a long time, outlined the ledger for News Corp.’s Daily, Rupert Murdoch’s pet project. Here’s the breakdown.
Pros:
* News Corp. has the resources to differentiate the Daily. If News Corp. can meld newspaper, cable, studio and Internet assets the Daily could sing. Indeed, the presentation outlining the Daily was heavy on the video.
* Apple is a great ally. Apple’s support for subscriptions in iTunes is quite the enabler.
* News Corp. is playing offense, which is a good thing.
* Subscribing to a daily publication makes more sense on the iPad and 99 cents a week—$39.99 for a year—won’t break the bank.
Cons:
* It’s going to take time for consumers to accept an iPad newspaper. Sure, early adopters will check it out. Then what?
* Early hype doesn’t turn into market share, revenue or cash flow instantly.
* Apple is controlling. Rest assured that News Corp. and Apple will clash down the road over apps and subscriptions. That fact could chill the market for other iPad publishers.
* Ads will matter. Subscriptions alone won’t support the Daily alone, but will carry the day initially. What will the ad picture look like and how will the details be handled with News Corp. and Apple?
Source: seekingalpha.com
Sunday, November 21, 2010
News Corp set to unveil iPad newspaper
WASHINGTON - After months of top secret development, Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. appears poised to take the wraps off a digital newspaper for the iPad called "The Daily."
News Corp. has been tight-lipped about the project but the Australian-born media mogul acknowledged its existence for the first time in an interview last week with his Fox Business Network.
Asked what "exciting projects" his sprawling media and entertainment company was working on, the 79-year-old Murdoch cited The Daily but offered no further information about the tabloid for Apple's touchscreen tablet computer.
Details about the project have been dribbling out in the US media for weeks, however, and The New York Times, citing two employees who requested anonymity, said News Corp. intends to launch The Daily before the end of the year.
The Times said Sasha Frere-Jones, music critic at The New Yorker magazine, would become its culture editor. Others reported to be involved include Jesse Angelo, executive editor of Murdoch's New York Post, Richard Johnson, former editor of the Post's gossip page, and Greg Clayman, the former head of Viacom's digital division, who has been tapped to head business operations at The Daily.
Forbes magazine put the total staff on the project at around 150 and said News Corp. has budgeted 30 million dollars for the first year of the launch.
The Daily brings together three of Murdoch's passions -- newspapers, the iPad and finding a way to charge readers for content online in an era of shrinking newspaper circulation and eroding print advertising revenue.
Murdoch began his career with a single newspaper in his native Australia and while he has expanded into television, movies and book publishing, the News Corp. chairman has always been clear that newspapers are his obsession.
At the same time, Murdoch has a serious crush on the iPad, calling it a "game-changer" and potential saviour of the struggling newspaper industry.
In an interview in April with The Kalb Report, Murdoch called the iPad a "glimpse of the future."
"There's going to be tens of millions of these things sold all over the world," he said. "It may be the saving of newspapers because you don't have the costs of paper, ink, printing, trucks.
"I'm old, I like the tactile experience of the newspaper," Murdoch admitted, but "if you have less newspapers and more of these that's OK."
"It doesn't destroy the traditional newspaper, it just comes in a different form," he said.
Whether Murdoch plans to charge readers a subscription fee for The Daily is not yet known but the News Corp. chief has made making consumers pay for news online his personal crusade.
The Wall Street Journal requires a subscription for full access to WSJ.com and Britain's The Times and The Sunday Times, two other News Corp. newspapers, recently erected pay walls around their websites.
Murdoch has vowed to begin charging for online access to all of his titles and said in August that he believed most US newspapers would eventually end up doing the same.
"You'll find, I think, most newspapers in this country are going to be putting up a pay wall," he said, dismissing arguments that readers used to getting news on the Internet for free would be reluctant to pay.
News Corp. chief digital officer Jon Miller told top technology and media executives at a gathering in Aspen, Colorado, in July that the iPad may allow the news industry to start charging for content online after years of giving it away for free.
"I think we're seeing a fundamental shift in where content is consumed and it's on to these kinds of devices," he said. "These tablets are heavy media consumption devices, much more than the Web by itself and even smartphones."
He said the iPad and other tablets being developed offer "very media rich experiences that I think do allow a re-set, perhaps a do-over for the media industry, a chance to get it right."
Source: AFP
News Corp. has been tight-lipped about the project but the Australian-born media mogul acknowledged its existence for the first time in an interview last week with his Fox Business Network.
Asked what "exciting projects" his sprawling media and entertainment company was working on, the 79-year-old Murdoch cited The Daily but offered no further information about the tabloid for Apple's touchscreen tablet computer.
Details about the project have been dribbling out in the US media for weeks, however, and The New York Times, citing two employees who requested anonymity, said News Corp. intends to launch The Daily before the end of the year.
The Times said Sasha Frere-Jones, music critic at The New Yorker magazine, would become its culture editor. Others reported to be involved include Jesse Angelo, executive editor of Murdoch's New York Post, Richard Johnson, former editor of the Post's gossip page, and Greg Clayman, the former head of Viacom's digital division, who has been tapped to head business operations at The Daily.
Forbes magazine put the total staff on the project at around 150 and said News Corp. has budgeted 30 million dollars for the first year of the launch.
The Daily brings together three of Murdoch's passions -- newspapers, the iPad and finding a way to charge readers for content online in an era of shrinking newspaper circulation and eroding print advertising revenue.
Murdoch began his career with a single newspaper in his native Australia and while he has expanded into television, movies and book publishing, the News Corp. chairman has always been clear that newspapers are his obsession.
At the same time, Murdoch has a serious crush on the iPad, calling it a "game-changer" and potential saviour of the struggling newspaper industry.
In an interview in April with The Kalb Report, Murdoch called the iPad a "glimpse of the future."
"There's going to be tens of millions of these things sold all over the world," he said. "It may be the saving of newspapers because you don't have the costs of paper, ink, printing, trucks.
"I'm old, I like the tactile experience of the newspaper," Murdoch admitted, but "if you have less newspapers and more of these that's OK."
"It doesn't destroy the traditional newspaper, it just comes in a different form," he said.
Whether Murdoch plans to charge readers a subscription fee for The Daily is not yet known but the News Corp. chief has made making consumers pay for news online his personal crusade.
The Wall Street Journal requires a subscription for full access to WSJ.com and Britain's The Times and The Sunday Times, two other News Corp. newspapers, recently erected pay walls around their websites.
Murdoch has vowed to begin charging for online access to all of his titles and said in August that he believed most US newspapers would eventually end up doing the same.
"You'll find, I think, most newspapers in this country are going to be putting up a pay wall," he said, dismissing arguments that readers used to getting news on the Internet for free would be reluctant to pay.
News Corp. chief digital officer Jon Miller told top technology and media executives at a gathering in Aspen, Colorado, in July that the iPad may allow the news industry to start charging for content online after years of giving it away for free.
"I think we're seeing a fundamental shift in where content is consumed and it's on to these kinds of devices," he said. "These tablets are heavy media consumption devices, much more than the Web by itself and even smartphones."
He said the iPad and other tablets being developed offer "very media rich experiences that I think do allow a re-set, perhaps a do-over for the media industry, a chance to get it right."
Source: AFP
Friday, November 12, 2010
The most successful newspaper and magazine iPad apps
Top five free/part-free iPad apps (newspapers and magazines)
1) The Times
Publisher: News International
Price: Free for the first 30 days, then £9.99 per month (if bought via Apple). The iPad app is also available as part of a digital-only subscription (£2 per week/£8.66 per month) and is complimentary (as are the websites) to readers with a seven-day subscription to the print paper.
2) Wired (UK edition)
Publisher: Conde Nast
Price: Free to download the library, then £2.39 for the issue.
What you get: The December issue with exclusive interactive content.
3) The Telegraph
Publisher: Telegraph Media Group
Price: Free for a limited time, due to sponsorship by Audi.
What you get: The "best of the Telegraph", including breaking news, sport, business and a daily cartoon.
4) Financial Times
Price: Free to download, but you must be an FT.com subscriber for full access.
What you get: The full FT every day, including exclusive video and interactive features.
5) Monkey
Publisher: Dennis Publishing
Price: Free
What you get: The iPad version of the men’s e-magazine includes videos, games and music previews.
Top three fully paid-for apps (newspapers and magazines)
1) Eureka
Publisher: News International
Price: £0.59
What you get: A special iPad edition of the Times’ monthly science magazine.
2) The Sun
Publisher: News International
Price: £4.99 for a 28-day subscription.
What you get: The entire paper, Monday to Saturday, with breaking news and interactive elements.
3) Esquire (US edition)
Publisher: Hearst
Price: £2.99
What you get: The app includes a "moving cover" featuring actor Javier Bardem, videos and other exclusive content.
Source: iTunes App Store, November 2010
It’s a Tablet. It’s Gorgeous. It’s Costly.
Every time there’s some new hot, heavily hyped gadget from Apple, it takes only a few months for the copycats to crop up. IPod? Zune! IPhone? Android!
The iPad? Well, it came out in March, and the iPad alternatives are just landing in stores now.
Many of them run Google’s Android phone operating system. That’s a shrewd move. Android is mature, polished and free (to the pad makers), and it comes with an existing library of 100,000 apps. Furthermore, any gadget fan who’s used an Android phone will feel instantly at home on the tablet.
In other words, if you make an Android tablet, you can hit the ground running.
The most hotly awaited Android tablet is the Samsung Galaxy Tab, a sleek, sturdy slab, 7.5 by 4.7 by 0.5 inches. The glass front is a 7-inch multitouch screen; the back is off-white plastic.
Samsung sweated the details on this thing. The screen is gorgeous. The touch response is immediate and reliable. The whole thing is superfast and a pleasure to use.
When asked about the onslaught of Android tablets last month, Steven P. Jobs, Apple’s chief executive, scoffed at their size (most are 7 inches diagonal instead of 10 inches, like the iPad). “This size is useless unless you include sandpaper so users can sand their fingers down to a quarter of their size,” he said.
Well, sure, if you’re used to a laptop or an iPad, seven inches isn’t much. You won’t see as much of the map, the e-book or the Web page without scrolling.
But the Galaxy doesn’t feel like a cramped iPad. It feels like an extra-spacious Android phone. And the payoff is huge. The Galaxy is much lighter than the iPad (13 ounces vs. 1.5 pounds), which makes a huge difference when you have to hold it to watch a movie on the plane. And it’s so small you can carry it in a blazer pocket.
You can even slip it into a jeans pocket, although you might walk around looking as if you have a pulled muscle or something. The Galaxy is almost exactly the size of the latest Amazon Kindle — and it makes a great e-book reader, thanks to the Kindle or the Barnes & Noble apps that let you read those companies’ e-books.
The feature list on this thing is eye-popping. This, of course, is the classic Apple-versus-Google “proprietary versus open” argument. Apple controls the hardware, the software and the app store, so everything is consistent, high quality and clean (meaning, among other things, no pornography apps). Google doesn’t monitor what goes into its app store, so the Android ecosystem is unlimited, chaotic and more confusing.
In any case, the Galaxy offers all of Android’s traditional high points, including many features the iPad doesn't have, or doesn't have out of the box. For example, you can customize its nine home screens by placing icons or mini info windows anywhere you like (they don’t have to sit in an organized grid). You can dictate text instead of typing it, or search Google or Google Maps by voice. (On the Galaxy, you can also type using Swype, which I reviewed in July.) You can use Android’s excellent turn-by-turn navigation app — it’s like a car GPS unit with an Imax screen.
There are front- and rear-facing cameras, too — take that, iPad! — with a flash, video, exposure controls and special effects. It’s a little weird to hold up this enormous slate in front of you when you want to take a picture. But it’s also awesome; when have you ever used a camera with a 7-inch screen? You’re practically seeing the enlargement as you frame the shot. It’s a digital photo frame that takes pictures. (The Galaxy stores 16 gigabytes, but also has an SD memory card slot for expansion.)
The Web browser offers the usual two-fingered spread-and-pinch techniques for zooming in and out. Because the Galaxy runs Android 2.2, it can also play Flash videos online (touché, iPad!). Or at least it’s supposed to. After some delay, I got Flash movie trailers and CNet videos to play, but at ESPN.com, the Play Video button just stared at me sullenly. (My Samsung rep says they play fine for him.)
E-mail works well on the 7-inch screen. As usual with Android, though, you process your Gmail in one app, and all other kinds of mail accounts in a separate one. It doesn’t make sense on an Android phone, and it doesn’t make sense here.
As smooth and slick and convenient as the Galaxy is, though, it’s not without its frustrations. When you visit sites like nytimes.com, CNBC.com and Amazon.com, the Galaxy’s browser shows the stripped-down, mobile versions of those sites. According to Samsung, there’s no way to turn that feature off and no way to visit the full-size sites. You can delete the little “m.” in the Web address until you’re blue in the browser, but the Galaxy always puts it right back.
It’s a little odd that you can’t recharge the Galaxy from your laptop’s U.S.B. port. It must be plugged into a power socket.
Another problem: most of the 100,000 apps on the Android store are designed for a phone-size screen, not a tablet. The Galaxy either blows them up, at the expense of clarity, or lets them float in the center of the larger screen with a Texas-size black border.
This problem, of course, was familiar to early iPad adopters: iPhone apps ran on the iPad, but couldn’t exploit the larger screen. But Apple encouraged programmers to come up with iPad-specific versions, and released a software-writing kit to help them along. Google hasn’t done that yet, so it may be awhile before 7-inch Android apps become the norm.
The biggest drawback of the Galaxy, though, may be its price: $600. You could buy two netbooks for that money, or four Kindles —or one 32-gigabyte iPad, with its much larger screen, aluminum body and much better battery life. (The iPad gets 10 hours on a charge; the Galaxy, about 6 hours.)
You can get the Galaxy for $400 if you’re willing to sign a two-year contract for cellular service. All four major American cellphone carriers — Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile and Sprint — will offer it. The Galaxy gets online in Wi-Fi hot spots. But if you want to go online using the cellular airwaves, you’ll pay $20 to $50 a month, depending on the carrier and how much data you expect to use. (Good luck figuring that out. Quick: how many megabytes do you need for 10 Flickr pages?)
You can’t make regular phone calls on this thing. But you can send and receive unlimited text and picture messages (to cellphones) and conduct flaky video calls using an app called Qik. (You can’t make Skype calls, though. Samsung says it’s working on a fix.)
T-Mobile, by the way, wishes to point out the superiority of its deal. If you pay full price ($600), for example, you can sign up for cell service on an à la carte basis — $10 a week or $30 a month, for example — without a two-year ball and chain. And T-Mobile doesn’t charge extra to use the Galaxy as a Wi-Fi hot spot for your other gear, either — a neat, if battery-guzzling trick that would cost you $30 a month extra from, for example, Sprint.
So yes, the dawn of the would-be iPad is upon us. But the Android tablet concept represents more than just a lame effort to grab a slice of tablet hype. As with Android phones, it represents an alternative that’s different enough to justify its existence. You’re buying into a different approach to size, built-in goodies like cameras and GPS, and the more freewheeling Android app store.
With the Samsung Galaxy Tab, you’re also buying delicious speed and highly refined hardware. It’s just a shame that you’re buying all that for $600.
Tuesday, November 9, 2010
3 strategies emerge for charging for iPad publications
Apple has been talking to publishers about launching enhanced subscription tools for the iPad, but simply allowing subscriptions is not enough. The iPad needs a digital newsstand for newspaper and magazine sales and subscriptions.
Right now there are a number of obstacles separating the needs of publishers and the expectations of consumers regarding iPad-based publications. Apple is right in the middle of the problem and the solution.
To start, until recently it was not possible to purchase a subscription to a magazine, such as Newsweek, through iTunes. Even now, consumers can't automatically renew subscriptions; they must manually re-purchase at the end of each term.
For publishers, allowing Apple to process their iPad subscriptions means giving up 30 percent of the revenue and losing access to customer data for those readers. That makes it difficult for publications to provide free access or discounts to their current print subscribers.
And with publishers experimenting with subscription approaches, consumers face a confusing array of options. Some publications are paid downloads, some are not. Some offer subscriptions, some don't. Some sell individual issues through Apple's iTunes store, and others circumvent iTunes partially or entirely.
And, for many of these apps, it is nearly impossible to decipher what you'll pay for -- and how -- until you download and install the app.
In the last six months -- accelerating recently -- I've seen the emergence of three general subscription options for the iPad:
For instance, the New York Post app is a paid download that includes a 30-day subscription. Renewals are handled within iTunes.
The Columbus Dispatch can be downloaded for free, but users must register to get access to a 14-day trial. Past that, users need a subscription, which is handled by the publisher.
The Wall Street Journal is a free download but full access is restricted to print subscribers, also handled directly by the publisher.
And of course some publications, like USA Today, are entirely free.
What publishers and consumers need from Apple is a real digital newsstand, which would allow:
It is easy to forget that only a year ago tablets were still a distant vision for most publishers. But 4 million iPad sales later, it is time for Apple, and the publishing industry, to figure this thing out to everyone's benefit.
Right now there are a number of obstacles separating the needs of publishers and the expectations of consumers regarding iPad-based publications. Apple is right in the middle of the problem and the solution.
To start, until recently it was not possible to purchase a subscription to a magazine, such as Newsweek, through iTunes. Even now, consumers can't automatically renew subscriptions; they must manually re-purchase at the end of each term.
For publishers, allowing Apple to process their iPad subscriptions means giving up 30 percent of the revenue and losing access to customer data for those readers. That makes it difficult for publications to provide free access or discounts to their current print subscribers.
And with publishers experimenting with subscription approaches, consumers face a confusing array of options. Some publications are paid downloads, some are not. Some offer subscriptions, some don't. Some sell individual issues through Apple's iTunes store, and others circumvent iTunes partially or entirely.
And, for many of these apps, it is nearly impossible to decipher what you'll pay for -- and how -- until you download and install the app.
In the last six months -- accelerating recently -- I've seen the emergence of three general subscription options for the iPad:
- App downloads and subscriptions handled through iTunes. Newsweek has taken this approach.
- App downloads via iTunes, with single copy sales handled by iTunes and subscriptions handled by the publisher. People was one of the first to offer such hybrid print/tablet access. Each issue costs $3.99 in iTunes, but People enables print subscribers to log in to the app for free access.
- App downloads via ITunes, with subscriptions and single-issue sales handled by the publisher. The Oklahoman has taken this approach, which means Apple does not get a percentage of sales.
For instance, the New York Post app is a paid download that includes a 30-day subscription. Renewals are handled within iTunes.
The Columbus Dispatch can be downloaded for free, but users must register to get access to a 14-day trial. Past that, users need a subscription, which is handled by the publisher.
The Wall Street Journal is a free download but full access is restricted to print subscribers, also handled directly by the publisher.
And of course some publications, like USA Today, are entirely free.
What publishers and consumers need from Apple is a real digital newsstand, which would allow:
- One-stop shopping for multiple publications
- The ability to buy a single issue or subscribe
- Capability to connect print and tablet subscriptions, including any package discounts
- A central location to access purchased or downloaded publications
- Sales via iTunes or a publisher's own circulation system, with royalties adjusted appropriately
It is easy to forget that only a year ago tablets were still a distant vision for most publishers. But 4 million iPad sales later, it is time for Apple, and the publishing industry, to figure this thing out to everyone's benefit.
Source: Poynter.org
Monday, October 25, 2010
iPad users most likely to engage with ads
iPad users are more willing to engage with advertising and pay for content than users of other devices, according to a study by Nielsen. More than two thirds of the 452 iPad owners surveyed have bought a chargeable app for their device, with games being the most popular purchase. Some 57% say they would engage with advertising if it led to free content and 49% claim they are more likely to look at an ad if it displays video content. More than a third are interested in what ads can do on their tablet, but only 8% have actually made a purchase through their device.
The cheapest iPad retails at USD499 but despite its hefty price tag Nielsen claims owners of Amazon’s Kindle e-reader are wealthier. The research firm says 28% of Kindle owners earn more than USD100,000 a year compared with just a 25% of iPad owners.
The results should prove useful for mobile app advertisers and developers as the availability of tablet devices rockets. A recent report predicts Apple will sell as many as 120m iPads globally by the end of 2012 while developers such as Samsung and LG are launching their own tablets in the coming months.
Source: strategyeye.com
HP challenges iPad with $800 Slate 500 tablet computer
Hewlett-Packard Co. jumped into the nascent tablet computing market Friday when it released its Slate 500, an $800 competitor to Apple Inc.'s 6-month-old iPad.
The Slate 500, which runs Microsoft's Windows 7 operating system and is aimed at workplace users rather than consumers, goes beyond the iPad in some places, and stays behind it in others.
The iPad has no camera, where the Slate has built-in front- and rear-facing cameras, including a three-megapixel higher resolution camera on the back. And unlike the iPad, the Slate has a USB port that allows it to work with a variety of plug-in digital accessories.
But HP's tablet, which is now available through its retail store and will ship in mid-November, is priced higher than Apple's entry-level $499 iPad, has half the advertised battery life (five hours instead of 10) and does not come with the option of a cellular wireless plan, like Apple's more expensive iPads. Instead, the Slate is limited to Wi-Fi Internet connectivity.
A press release advertising the device says it is "designed specifically for business, enterprise and vertical customers looking for the mobility of a tablet, the familiarity of Microsoft Windows 7 and the ability to run custom or corporate applications."
HP, which acquired Palm earlier this year, is also at work on a consumer device that will use the webOS operating system that runs on some of Palm's smartphones.
Source: latimes.com
Wednesday, October 20, 2010
Is the iPad Really the Savior of the Newspaper Industry?
Even before the iPad was revealed, analysts, pundits and the publishing industry were already heralding the tablet as the platform that would save the industry from declining readership and dropping revenue.
The iPad’s high-res display, large screen, digital delivery and interactive capabilities were lauded as the next generation of tools that print publishers could use to woo their readers back into the fold.
Now, six months after the iPad’s launch, we thought it would be interesting to take a look at which newspapers have taken advantage of the digital platform, and the state of the market today.
We recently tested the apps ourselves and spoke with content creators and industry experts to get an overview of where newspaper iPad apps are — and where they might be headed in the future.
Adopting a New Way to Consume News
In order for the general public to consume their daily news on a tablet device, they have to own one. Although great things are promised for the consumer tablet, recent data from ABI Research suggests that at the current rate of sales, such devices won’t reach what’s considered “mass-market penetration” until 2013.
However, there are enough devices out there to make app building worthwhile. Apple sold 3 million iPads within 80 days of the product’s release in the U.S., with the most recent sales figures (dating back from July)coming in at 3.27 million sold.
Wall Street analysts Bernstein Research suggest that the iPad is enjoying the fastest adoption rate of a consumer electronics gadget ever — even overtaking the DVD player and Apple stable-mate the iPhone .
Forecasters at the Harrison Group found that 13% of all American consumers showed “interest” in buying a tablet device between now and next September, with potential sales of up to 15 million units. In fact, some reports suggest that the iPad’s popularity could affect PC and laptop sales figures as consumers opt for the touchscreen tablet over a new netbook or upgrading an old PC.
As far as the wider market goes, Apple is far from the only player. RIM’s BlackBerry PlayBook, the Android -based Samsung Galaxy Tab, and HP’s PalmPad are just a few of the alternatives due soon on competing operating systems.
And the good news for content creators on the tablet platform is that consumers are hungry. The Harrison Group survey found that tablet users spend nearly 75% more time reading newspapers and newspaper articles, and 25% more time reading books.
Those surveyed were apparently so convinced by the digital delivery and form factor, that 81% of tablet owners believe that it is inevitable that all forms of publications will eventually be produced almost exclusively in a digital format.
Establishing Pricing and Attracting Readers
So what is the current state of the newspaper app market for the iPad? Six months after the iPad’s launch, more than 900 apps populate the “News ” category in the App Store in both the U.S. and the UK. News is a broad category, however, and it includes feed readers, other types of content aggregators, websites’ iPad apps, and even magazine apps.
The number of actual dedicated newspaper iPad apps is low — surprisingly low if you consider how the platform was heralded as the savior of the industry. In the U.S. the Wall Street Journal and USA Today are the main options, along with a recently released “complete” version of The New York Times’ app. As far as big names in the UK market goes, The Financial Times, The Times, The Daily Express and The Sun offer apps, while The Telegraph is currently dipping its toe into the water with an Audi-backed app.
Out of those options, only the USA Today, The New York Times and a trial version of The Telegraph apps are free. The others require payment to either download or access full content, making them a “personal choice luxury” rather than a must-have download, considering how many free options exist. (It should be noted that while The New York Times app is currently free, you will need an account to access all of the content once the paywall goes up in January 2011).
So why is this the case? Surely struggling publishing companies would do well to attract as many users to their apps as possible in order to increase brand loyalty and make money from mobile advertising.
Paul Gillin, a social marketing consultant and author of the Newspaper Death Watch blog suggests that, in time, apps could be a “significant revenue stream” as the platform grows. He says that newspaper companies are wary of falling into the same trap they did when free online versions of their papers debuted, making it hard for a pay structure to be introduced at a later date.
This assertion is backed up by data from the Association of Online Publishers “Content & Trends Census 2010.” The census revealed that apps are seen as “the most significant route for mobile Internet revenue opportunities,” according to the UK publishing companies (not limited to newspapers) that took part. In fact, 61% expect to see significant revenue from subscription services, compared to 55% via sponsorship and 46% via in-app advertising.
The same AOP research also reveals that while 16% of online publishers currently have paid-for iPad apps, another 60% are planning to introduce one in the next 12 months.
“Publishers are establishing pricing from the start,” says Tim Cain, head of research and insight at the AOP.
“iPad apps are being seen differently [than] mobile apps. It’s thought that people value them differently and will be prepared to pay.”
Readers Respond to Subscriptions and Pay Up
So just how many people are prepared to pay, and how many are using the apps? Different companies have different policies on revealing their download figures and are generally even more secretive about subscription stats.
We can, however, note a few choice numbers. The WSJ for iPad has been downloaded more than 650,000 times since its launch and has “thousands” of paying subscribers. The FT’s iPad Edition option has seen 400,000 downloads and is credited for driving 10% of all FT digital subscriptions since its launch. Meanwhile, USA Today’s free app has had a slightly higher download figure of over a million.
If companies are guarded about download stats and subscription figures, they are even more guarded about how those relate to revenue. This is not the case for the Financial Times, however, as Ben Hughes, the paper’s deputy chief executive recently revealed to The Guardian that its iPad app’s 400,000 subscribers have helped the app reach £1 million (approximately $1.5 million) in advertising revenue since May.
And previous reports note that in-app iAds are fetching as much as five times the price of online advertising, with click-through rates reported to be significantly higher (15% versus 0.10% in a recent NYTM campaign from JPMorgan Chase & Co) on the tablet device than a website.
News Organizations Harness the iPad’s Possibilities
These stats show that consumers are obviously downloading and using these apps, but which consumers? Are the papers cannibalizing their own print and online audiences with shiny new apps? Or are the App Store offerings opening up a different market to the titles?
“The iPad definitely provides a valuable platform for newspapers to engage their readers in a new way and, in many cases, to appeal to a different set of readers,” says Dena Levitz, manager of digital strategies for the Newspaper Association of America. “Mobile is going to be a growth area going forward, and tablets are one exciting subset of that larger trend.”
The Dow Jones & Company’s senior director of corporate communications Ashley S.Huston says the Wall Street Journal’s plan is to offer content wherever readers are. “We know that readers consume news and information on multiple devices … The iPad app complements our existing print and digital offerings with an experience created specifically for the iPad.”
USA Today, meanwhile, notes the obvious portability the platform offers, making it a good choice for those away from home. Matt Jones, vice president of mobile strategy and operations for Gannett/USA Today tells us: “Our target is the early and middle stage tech adopter, frequent traveler and general news/sports/entertainment enthusiast.”
Despite the comprehensive content in the Financial Times iPad Edition, the publishers view the app as a “companion product,” and notes the value of easy global distribution in places where it’s more difficult to distribute a print copy, according to Steve Pinches, lead product development manager at FT.com.
So far we’ve only considered national titles. Regional newspapers, arguably the hardest-hit markets, could take advantage of the iPad’s potential too, like UK publishing company KOS Media did with its free Kent News for iPad, which was released in August.
The company is not releasing its download stats, so we have no way of knowing how popular the launch has been, or if, as KOS Media claimed at launch, it has offered “huge advantages” to iPad owners.
With national publications seeing an increase in click-through rates on its in-app advertisements, it would make sense then that location-based advertising might see similar success. And that success could be replicated by local papers. They should view the tablet platform as the potential savior it was initially billed as.
Newspapers Must Adapt Again to New Technology
After looking at a variety of newspaper iPad apps, our main complaint — and we’re generalizing across the entire market — is that they don’t take enough advantage of the iPad’s wowing capabilities.
This view is shared to a certain extent by Roger Fidler, the program director for digital publishing for the Reynolds Journalism Institute at the University of Missouri. He is organizing the RJI National iPad News Survey “to better understand how people are consuming news on the iPad and readers’ expectations for news apps.”
“I’ve long believed that utilitarian tablets like the iPad would evolve into the 21st century equivalent of the printing press; and, as such, would be vital to the digital transformation of newspapers and magazines,” says Fidler.
Fidler says that newspaper iPad apps need to offer a new visual format that blends the “relaxed reading modality of print with the dynamic interactive modality of online media.” It should be differentiated from print and online editions and offer tablet-specific content — all things he doesn’t think most apps are doing very well.
The solution could be found in a new “hybrid newspaper app” suggests Fidler, in which “automated sections with continuously updated news stories and more visually rich magazine-like sections created by editors and designers could coexist.” The Reynolds Journalism Institute is experimenting with exactly that kind of new publishing model.
The NAA also acknowledges the need for newspapers to “differentiate” content, and digital strategist Levitz says that consumers read longer-form content on the iPad, and they really enjoy the high quality of the visual images on the screen. She thinks newspapers can thrive in the tablet space if they take advantage of the device’s capabilities.
So is the future of print to be found in touch-screens? In the immediate future it certainly seems that publishing companies are going to be jumping on the app wagon, but how many of them will go the distance is questionable. You’ve got to think that targeted papers such as the WSJ, or the FT for business types, or geographically relevant titles have got the brightest future in the app market because they offer something that can’t be found via generic news feeds or readers.
“I would expect to see the iPad and the dozens of competing products planned for this year providing revenue for newspapers either through subscriptions or advertising sponsorships,” says Levitz. “Still, we expect tablet apps will be one part of a broad portfolio of products which will continue to include print products in some form, web-based products and other emerging products. Newspapers will continue to be the dominant local sales and content franchises reaching a range of audience segments through multiple media channels.”
The new sparkle of the iPad will keep the newspaper app market buoyant only for so long, and unless Fidler’s “hybrid newspaper app” advice is heeded, consumers will grow tired of the app-ified newspaper just as they have grown tired of previous formats before that. Newspaper Death Watch’s Paul Gillin has a grim take on the future.
“Will tablets save the mainstream publishing industries as we know them?” he asks. “No. There is still a lot of pain to come as publishers wind down their print operations over the next 10 to 15 years. However, tablets could present a source of some circulation revenue growth that helps ease the pain somewhat while that transition occurs.”
So, with more and more ways to consume free news content, is the traditional newspaper’s time up, regardless of platform? Or is the tablet the shot in the arm that the industry needs to really innovate and grab consumer’s interest once again? Have your say in the comments below.
Source: Mashable
The iPad’s high-res display, large screen, digital delivery and interactive capabilities were lauded as the next generation of tools that print publishers could use to woo their readers back into the fold.
Now, six months after the iPad’s launch, we thought it would be interesting to take a look at which newspapers have taken advantage of the digital platform, and the state of the market today.
We recently tested the apps ourselves and spoke with content creators and industry experts to get an overview of where newspaper iPad apps are — and where they might be headed in the future.
Adopting a New Way to Consume News
In order for the general public to consume their daily news on a tablet device, they have to own one. Although great things are promised for the consumer tablet, recent data from ABI Research suggests that at the current rate of sales, such devices won’t reach what’s considered “mass-market penetration” until 2013.
However, there are enough devices out there to make app building worthwhile. Apple sold 3 million iPads within 80 days of the product’s release in the U.S., with the most recent sales figures (dating back from July)coming in at 3.27 million sold.
Wall Street analysts Bernstein Research suggest that the iPad is enjoying the fastest adoption rate of a consumer electronics gadget ever — even overtaking the DVD player and Apple stable-mate the iPhone .
Forecasters at the Harrison Group found that 13% of all American consumers showed “interest” in buying a tablet device between now and next September, with potential sales of up to 15 million units. In fact, some reports suggest that the iPad’s popularity could affect PC and laptop sales figures as consumers opt for the touchscreen tablet over a new netbook or upgrading an old PC.
As far as the wider market goes, Apple is far from the only player. RIM’s BlackBerry PlayBook, the Android -based Samsung Galaxy Tab, and HP’s PalmPad are just a few of the alternatives due soon on competing operating systems.
And the good news for content creators on the tablet platform is that consumers are hungry. The Harrison Group survey found that tablet users spend nearly 75% more time reading newspapers and newspaper articles, and 25% more time reading books.
Those surveyed were apparently so convinced by the digital delivery and form factor, that 81% of tablet owners believe that it is inevitable that all forms of publications will eventually be produced almost exclusively in a digital format.
Establishing Pricing and Attracting Readers
So what is the current state of the newspaper app market for the iPad? Six months after the iPad’s launch, more than 900 apps populate the “News ” category in the App Store in both the U.S. and the UK. News is a broad category, however, and it includes feed readers, other types of content aggregators, websites’ iPad apps, and even magazine apps.
The number of actual dedicated newspaper iPad apps is low — surprisingly low if you consider how the platform was heralded as the savior of the industry. In the U.S. the Wall Street Journal and USA Today are the main options, along with a recently released “complete” version of The New York Times’ app. As far as big names in the UK market goes, The Financial Times, The Times, The Daily Express and The Sun offer apps, while The Telegraph is currently dipping its toe into the water with an Audi-backed app.
Out of those options, only the USA Today, The New York Times and a trial version of The Telegraph apps are free. The others require payment to either download or access full content, making them a “personal choice luxury” rather than a must-have download, considering how many free options exist. (It should be noted that while The New York Times app is currently free, you will need an account to access all of the content once the paywall goes up in January 2011).
So why is this the case? Surely struggling publishing companies would do well to attract as many users to their apps as possible in order to increase brand loyalty and make money from mobile advertising.
Paul Gillin, a social marketing consultant and author of the Newspaper Death Watch blog suggests that, in time, apps could be a “significant revenue stream” as the platform grows. He says that newspaper companies are wary of falling into the same trap they did when free online versions of their papers debuted, making it hard for a pay structure to be introduced at a later date.
This assertion is backed up by data from the Association of Online Publishers “Content & Trends Census 2010.” The census revealed that apps are seen as “the most significant route for mobile Internet revenue opportunities,” according to the UK publishing companies (not limited to newspapers) that took part. In fact, 61% expect to see significant revenue from subscription services, compared to 55% via sponsorship and 46% via in-app advertising.
The same AOP research also reveals that while 16% of online publishers currently have paid-for iPad apps, another 60% are planning to introduce one in the next 12 months.
“Publishers are establishing pricing from the start,” says Tim Cain, head of research and insight at the AOP.
“iPad apps are being seen differently [than] mobile apps. It’s thought that people value them differently and will be prepared to pay.”
Readers Respond to Subscriptions and Pay Up
So just how many people are prepared to pay, and how many are using the apps? Different companies have different policies on revealing their download figures and are generally even more secretive about subscription stats.
We can, however, note a few choice numbers. The WSJ for iPad has been downloaded more than 650,000 times since its launch and has “thousands” of paying subscribers. The FT’s iPad Edition option has seen 400,000 downloads and is credited for driving 10% of all FT digital subscriptions since its launch. Meanwhile, USA Today’s free app has had a slightly higher download figure of over a million.
If companies are guarded about download stats and subscription figures, they are even more guarded about how those relate to revenue. This is not the case for the Financial Times, however, as Ben Hughes, the paper’s deputy chief executive recently revealed to The Guardian that its iPad app’s 400,000 subscribers have helped the app reach £1 million (approximately $1.5 million) in advertising revenue since May.
And previous reports note that in-app iAds are fetching as much as five times the price of online advertising, with click-through rates reported to be significantly higher (15% versus 0.10% in a recent NYTM campaign from JPMorgan Chase & Co) on the tablet device than a website.
News Organizations Harness the iPad’s Possibilities
These stats show that consumers are obviously downloading and using these apps, but which consumers? Are the papers cannibalizing their own print and online audiences with shiny new apps? Or are the App Store offerings opening up a different market to the titles?
“The iPad definitely provides a valuable platform for newspapers to engage their readers in a new way and, in many cases, to appeal to a different set of readers,” says Dena Levitz, manager of digital strategies for the Newspaper Association of America. “Mobile is going to be a growth area going forward, and tablets are one exciting subset of that larger trend.”
The Dow Jones & Company’s senior director of corporate communications Ashley S.Huston says the Wall Street Journal’s plan is to offer content wherever readers are. “We know that readers consume news and information on multiple devices … The iPad app complements our existing print and digital offerings with an experience created specifically for the iPad.”
USA Today, meanwhile, notes the obvious portability the platform offers, making it a good choice for those away from home. Matt Jones, vice president of mobile strategy and operations for Gannett/USA Today tells us: “Our target is the early and middle stage tech adopter, frequent traveler and general news/sports/entertainment enthusiast.”
Despite the comprehensive content in the Financial Times iPad Edition, the publishers view the app as a “companion product,” and notes the value of easy global distribution in places where it’s more difficult to distribute a print copy, according to Steve Pinches, lead product development manager at FT.com.
So far we’ve only considered national titles. Regional newspapers, arguably the hardest-hit markets, could take advantage of the iPad’s potential too, like UK publishing company KOS Media did with its free Kent News for iPad, which was released in August.
The company is not releasing its download stats, so we have no way of knowing how popular the launch has been, or if, as KOS Media claimed at launch, it has offered “huge advantages” to iPad owners.
With national publications seeing an increase in click-through rates on its in-app advertisements, it would make sense then that location-based advertising might see similar success. And that success could be replicated by local papers. They should view the tablet platform as the potential savior it was initially billed as.
Newspapers Must Adapt Again to New Technology
After looking at a variety of newspaper iPad apps, our main complaint — and we’re generalizing across the entire market — is that they don’t take enough advantage of the iPad’s wowing capabilities.
This view is shared to a certain extent by Roger Fidler, the program director for digital publishing for the Reynolds Journalism Institute at the University of Missouri. He is organizing the RJI National iPad News Survey “to better understand how people are consuming news on the iPad and readers’ expectations for news apps.”
“I’ve long believed that utilitarian tablets like the iPad would evolve into the 21st century equivalent of the printing press; and, as such, would be vital to the digital transformation of newspapers and magazines,” says Fidler.
Fidler says that newspaper iPad apps need to offer a new visual format that blends the “relaxed reading modality of print with the dynamic interactive modality of online media.” It should be differentiated from print and online editions and offer tablet-specific content — all things he doesn’t think most apps are doing very well.
The solution could be found in a new “hybrid newspaper app” suggests Fidler, in which “automated sections with continuously updated news stories and more visually rich magazine-like sections created by editors and designers could coexist.” The Reynolds Journalism Institute is experimenting with exactly that kind of new publishing model.
The NAA also acknowledges the need for newspapers to “differentiate” content, and digital strategist Levitz says that consumers read longer-form content on the iPad, and they really enjoy the high quality of the visual images on the screen. She thinks newspapers can thrive in the tablet space if they take advantage of the device’s capabilities.
So is the future of print to be found in touch-screens? In the immediate future it certainly seems that publishing companies are going to be jumping on the app wagon, but how many of them will go the distance is questionable. You’ve got to think that targeted papers such as the WSJ, or the FT for business types, or geographically relevant titles have got the brightest future in the app market because they offer something that can’t be found via generic news feeds or readers.
“I would expect to see the iPad and the dozens of competing products planned for this year providing revenue for newspapers either through subscriptions or advertising sponsorships,” says Levitz. “Still, we expect tablet apps will be one part of a broad portfolio of products which will continue to include print products in some form, web-based products and other emerging products. Newspapers will continue to be the dominant local sales and content franchises reaching a range of audience segments through multiple media channels.”
The new sparkle of the iPad will keep the newspaper app market buoyant only for so long, and unless Fidler’s “hybrid newspaper app” advice is heeded, consumers will grow tired of the app-ified newspaper just as they have grown tired of previous formats before that. Newspaper Death Watch’s Paul Gillin has a grim take on the future.
“Will tablets save the mainstream publishing industries as we know them?” he asks. “No. There is still a lot of pain to come as publishers wind down their print operations over the next 10 to 15 years. However, tablets could present a source of some circulation revenue growth that helps ease the pain somewhat while that transition occurs.”
So, with more and more ways to consume free news content, is the traditional newspaper’s time up, regardless of platform? Or is the tablet the shot in the arm that the industry needs to really innovate and grab consumer’s interest once again? Have your say in the comments below.
Source: Mashable
Monday, July 19, 2010
Gannett CEO Dubow: iPad App Will Remain Free, Ad Supported Through Q3
With advertiser interest in Gannett’s USA Today iPad app still running high, CEO Craig Dubow said that the app will remain free and ad supported at least through Q3. USAT has a set of free news and travel apps available across Apple’s portable devices, including the iPhone and iPod touch as well as on Google’s Android mobile system. In the year and a half since the first app was released, the various USAT apps have been downloaded 5 million times, Dubow told listeners on the company’s Q2 earnings call.
During the Q1 earnings, Dubow had said that the company planned to introduce a paid subscription plan for the iPad app by July 5th. But that was said three weeks after the iPad first went on sale and Gannett (NYSE: GCI) hadn’t anticipated that ad inventory on the app would be sold out so quickly and that demand would only rise. So, as we reported last month, plans for paid subscription format for the iPad app was put on hold, at least for the time being.
Among the blue chip advertisers Gannett has lined up, Coca-Cola, Chrysler, Barnes & Noble have signed on as sponsors for the USAT iPad app.
Earlier this month, Gannett announced it would begin testing paywalls at a number of its papers as it seeks to find a model that can benefit all its properties. Gannett is now charging $9.95 per month for full online access to The Tallahassee Democrat, The Greenville News, and The Spectrum. Print subscribers will continue to get free online access.
During the Q&A part of the call, Gracia Martore, president and COO, said that Gannett should have a better sense of what works within three to six months. In terms of examples of ways of attracting paying online readers, Martore offered an example being prepared at The Tallahassee Democrat around sports coverage, which has generally been considered one of the few areas that consumers would pay to receive online news (finance is the other area generally considered unique and essential enough to charge for content).
Source: paidContent.org
During the Q1 earnings, Dubow had said that the company planned to introduce a paid subscription plan for the iPad app by July 5th. But that was said three weeks after the iPad first went on sale and Gannett (NYSE: GCI) hadn’t anticipated that ad inventory on the app would be sold out so quickly and that demand would only rise. So, as we reported last month, plans for paid subscription format for the iPad app was put on hold, at least for the time being.
Among the blue chip advertisers Gannett has lined up, Coca-Cola, Chrysler, Barnes & Noble have signed on as sponsors for the USAT iPad app.
Earlier this month, Gannett announced it would begin testing paywalls at a number of its papers as it seeks to find a model that can benefit all its properties. Gannett is now charging $9.95 per month for full online access to The Tallahassee Democrat, The Greenville News, and The Spectrum. Print subscribers will continue to get free online access.
During the Q&A part of the call, Gracia Martore, president and COO, said that Gannett should have a better sense of what works within three to six months. In terms of examples of ways of attracting paying online readers, Martore offered an example being prepared at The Tallahassee Democrat around sports coverage, which has generally been considered one of the few areas that consumers would pay to receive online news (finance is the other area generally considered unique and essential enough to charge for content).
Source: paidContent.org
Friday, July 9, 2010
Why Aren't More Print Publishers Cozying Up With The iPad?
The iPad was announced on January 27, 2010 and was quickly heralded by many in traditional print media as a potential rejuvenator for their troubled businesses. Having used the device daily for the last six weeks or so, I must admit it is the perfect media consumption device, among many other things, for all of my reading (books, magazines, newspapers, blogs, tweets, FB feed, emails, web sites). Given my propensity to multitask, I crave multi-purpose devices and find the Kindle far too limiting a product, especially for the price. The iPad is perfect for email, calendaring, surfing, reading books, digesting RSS feeds, browsing real-time web feeds from Twitter and Facebook, watching movies while traveling, listening to music, checking weather, tuning in to baseball games, and countless other things. It is a far better way to consume magazines and newspapers than any other electronic device I have seen.
Given this, more than five months after it has been announced and the developer tools made available, and more than sixty days after shipping, why is Wired one of the few print publishers to make the leap and offer a version? The WSJ has a decent app (but downloads take forever), the NY Times has an anemic reader which showcases only a handful of stories each day (many duplicated in each section), the NY Post released an app which just offers pictures, and Vanity Fair offers a meager PDF of the print magazine for a whopping $5 per issue. USA Today seemed to step up with a nicely designed app. But it’s telling that so few of the traditional print publishers have taken the last five months to rethink the way a magazine or newspaper ought to be delivered digitally and devote sufficient resources to getting something great out on time. Wired’s editor Chris Andersen made some noise about how his staff did this, but frankly their implementation is also mostly a glorified PDF with some videos thrown in. Amazingly, URLs are not hot-linked in Wired nor Vanity Fair, email addresses are not clickable, text is not selectable nor are articles tweetable.
I think the iPad is actually under-hyped as a device that will transform media consumption. I think, thanks to the forthcoming wave of tablet devices and better netbooks, the consumer PC is basically dead within the next three years (not so for PCs for the enterprise). But with this new opportunity comes the need for content companies to be aggressive in adapting to and adopting new platforms. We have seen countless examples of how native (i.e., purpose-built) applications prosper on new platforms whereas those migrated from a legacy platform never quite work. Doodlejump is the best selling game on iPhone, not Halo. Farmville is the biggest game on Facebook, not Mario Bros. Early adopters of new platforms tend to reap the rewards more quickly than the late entrants. Given the rapid pace of technology adoption (Steve Jobs says iPad is the best selling product Apple has ever released), consumers build loyalty to new brands more easily when they are the only ones available on a new platform. I advise our companies to be aggressive in adopting new platforms. Crunchyroll, a leader in the anime video space online, had a great iPad app available days after the device shipped. It is this level of aggressiveness that the traditional media companies must adopt in order to build consumer mindshare on these platforms.
It is easy to say, “Only 3MM iPads have been sold.” But given there are only 13,000 apps for iPad written so far, there is plenty of room for best-in-class apps to reach audiences much larger than their analog print equivalents. NPR, for example, has a great app that has been downloaded more than 350,000 times (as of mid-June).
Conde Nast had to go the embarrassing route of announcing their intention to deliver iPad versions of their magazines back in March but have only a few examples above to show for it, shortcomings and all. Where is The New Yorker? Cosmo? Glamour? Oprah? Better Homes and Gardens? Architectural Digest? People? The Economist? New York Magazine? National Geographic? Can you imagine what type of experience could be built for the iPad and other tablets with the content of these magazines? Yet none are available. Where are the hip magazines? Paper? Paste? Even Rolling Stone, heralding a rebirth of late, is absent.
Here are the top magazines by circulation (as of end of 2009 by AdAge) and who has at least shipped an iPad app (√). Looks like a whopping six out the top 20:
- AARP The Magazine
- Better Homes & Gardens
- Reader’s Digest √
- Good Housekeeping
- National Geographic
- Woman’s Day √
- Ladies Home Journal
- Family Circle
- Game Informer Magazine
- People
- Time √
- Taste of Home
- Sports Illustrated √
- Cosmopolitan
- Prevention √
- Southern Living
- AAA Via
- Maxim √
- O, the Oprah Magazine
- AAA Living
This resistance to adopt early and experiment by incumbents is precisely what provides the opportunities for startups to create value quickly and disrupt markets.
Source: Business Insider
Thursday, July 8, 2010
Digital journalism: More work, more pressure but more opportunity
Longer hours, more pressure, decreasing quality and less enjoyable work. Old media is a dark, dark place for journalism - at least that's the mood of many of the journalists who were interviewed for the annual Oriella digital journalism study.
There are some reasons to be cheerful, which include journalists not being quite as pessimistic as the previous year. Are things really that bad?
The Ugly
There are some reasons to be cheerful, which include journalists not being quite as pessimistic as the previous year. Are things really that bad?
The Ugly
• Oriella PR interviewed 770 journalists in 15 countries including the US, Brazil and several in Europe. More than half the journalists working on traditional newspaper, TV and radio formats said they thought the channel would fold, and one in six say this has already happened. The trend is exaggerated in Sweden where a third of traditional channels have closed and one in six has completely transferred online.
• Forty-four percent said print media will shrink dramatically – pessimistic, but down from 60% in the 2009 survey. Around 43% said lack of profitability online will impact resources and therefore the quality of journalism.
• Advertising will fall a further 10% this year, journalists expect, though they anticipate a smaller drop than 2009.
• Around 46% of journalists said they were expected to produce more work, 30% said they are working longer hours and 28% have less time to research stories. Welcome to our world.
The Bad
• Journalists are producing less video, largely due to cuts in budget and increased time pressures. Last year, the number of news sites offering video reached 50%, but this fell to 39% this year. Blogs and discussion boards were also less used, according to the journalists surveyed this year.
• Journalists are less interested in receiving multimedia content from PRs; 75% want emailed releases and half want photographs. Does this mean less imaginative and experimental editorial?
The Good
• Journalists are slightly more positive about the future; only 14% think the total number of media outlets will shrink (by this, they mean established media rather than blog houses) and 40% think the web provides new opportunities. The most optimistic webbists were in the UK, US, Spain and Brazil.
• Twitter is even more widely used this year with 41% of publications running a feed. But that only increased 6% from the previous year – not much considering the rapid growth of Twitter. It was most popular in the UK, US and Brazil.
• Smartphones are increasingly important to publishers, particularly as they look to apps to provide a new income stream. One in five publications now has a mobile app, but apps are particularly popular in Germany, Italy and the US where one in three publishers offer them.
• One quarter of publishers are looking at paid-access models, with 30% exploring paid-for websites and 22% mulling charges for smartphone apps. Sunday Times executive editor Tristan Davies said there is a broader move to paid-for digital content in the industry: "The arrival of iPad and the explosion of mobile media means we will be able to give people the Sunday Times however they want it, wherever they are and whenever they want it. We think that's worth paying for. The Times and Sunday Times may be the first British newspaper to introduce subscriptions for their websites but it's clear from this survey that other media groups are actively working on ways of making their digital content pay."
• But despite the added workload and that extra pressure, 79% of journalists think the quality of their work has remained high and 84% still enjoy their jobs. The most optimistic journalists regard technology as an aid, rather than a threat. Quite right too.
Metro launches iPad app
National commuter favourite The Metro has launched an iPad app, offering readers bitesize news, sports and showbiz.
The newspaper already has an iPhone app available, launched earlier this year.
The Metro joins other national newspapers, including the Financial Times and Express Newspapers, who have launched iPad apps this year.
In a release, Metro says it was created “with a newspaper in mind, offering digital news in a paper-like experience”.
“It gives readers the chance to swipe between individual headlines and full stories with a single finger, whilst moving between the different sections, including News, Showbiz, Sport, Weird, Music, Film, TV and Tech, using a dual finger swipe,” they say.
The Metro worked with digital design agency Fjord and mobile agency Bluestar, to create the app.
Source:
Wednesday, July 7, 2010
iPad web browsing overtakes Android
Apple's iPad now accounts for more monthly web browser traffic than all Android-based mobile devices put together, according to data from Net Applications. Despite only being on the market for three months, the iPad comprised 0.17% of browser traffic tracked by Net Applications in June. In comparison Android devices represented 0.14% of web browser usage. The iPad is also outpacing the iPod Touch, which accounted for 0.12% of web browsing in June.
The iPad's share of the market has steadily risen since its launch in April. During the first two weeks after its release, the iPad accounted for the same amount of web browsing as all devices running the BlackBerry OS. After its first month on sale, the iPad hit an average 0.03% of browser traffic despite only being available in the US.
In May, when the device was launched in a further nine countries, that figure tripled to 0.09%, before almost doubling again in June. The highest single day for web use on the iPad was July 3, when it accounted for 0.35% of all browser usage.
Apple says it has already sold 3m iPads in the 10 countries where it is available. However, these figures are well below sales of the iPod Touch and combined sales of Android devices. The high web traffic is due to Apple designing the iPad for consumption of media such as books and video.
The firm has given the iPad a large screen that is suited to browsing the web and long battery life."Browser usage share on the iPad has already surpassed usage share on both the Android platform and the iPod Touch," says Net Applications. "Since Android and iPod Touch units sold vastly outnumber iPad units sold, this is an indication that the iPad is used much more frequently per user for browsing."
Recent figures from Net Applications also reveal that the iPhone OS continues to see strong growth in the mobile browsing market, accounting for 32.8% of all web usage. Symbian comprises 14% while Android's share rose to 6.24%. Java remains the leader with 40% of the market, although it is rapidly losing out to both the iPhone and Android platforms.
Source: StrategyEye
Friday, June 25, 2010
Developers love iPhone and iPad but are excited about Android's upside
Among mobile developers, the iPhone is still the most favored platform, ahead of Android smart phones. But the future may tilt in the favor of Android, according to a new developer survey by Appcelerator.
Developers see the iPhone and increasingly the iPad as the hot opportunity right now, with their shared iOS operating system coming out on top in seven of ten categories including best app store, biggest market for consumer apps, best devices and best near-term outlook.
But the Android operating system, which placed second in all seven of those categories, came out on top for most capabilities of an OS, most "open" platform and best long-term outlook.
Programmers seem to say that Android has potentially a bigger upside, with its operating system more open and possibly able to span not just phones and tablets but a host of other devices like TVs, set-top boxes and even cars.
The survey not only notes the potential for Android, it also highlights the increasing interest in tablet computers. Developers said they were most interested in developing for the iPhone 90 percent, followed by the iPad (84 percent), Android phones (81 percent) and Android tablets (64 percent).
Interest in the iPhone was up just 3 percentage points from a similar survey in March and the interest in Android phones remains the same from the previous report. But interest in the iPad jumped from 53 percent in March to 84 percent in June while Android tablets, which were not included in previous surveys, did incredibly well despite the fact there are no Android tablets on the market yet.
Taking a step back, it's clear that these four device platforms form the top tier of developer interest, illustrating how Apple and Google are running away with the mobile developer market.
Developer interest falls off markedly after the iPhone and Android devices, with BlackBerry (34 percent) Windows Phone 7 (27 percent) and Sybmian (15 percent) the next most popular platforms. Even with its acquisition by HP, Palm's webOS garnered only 13 percent interest from developers though that number could shoot up if HP lays out ambitious plans to embed webOS in a bunch of devices.
Appcelerator, which offers a platform for making applications, conducted the survey of 2,733 developers from June 15-17.
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
iPad Ad Requests Soared In May
The iPad remains hot with advertisers two months after its release, with ad requests across the Apple device up 160 percent in May from April, according to the latest monthly Mobile Mix report from mobile ad net Millennial Media. And yet, Apple, the leading device maker on Millennial’s network since September ‘09, decreased nearly 10 percent month-over-month with approximately 25 percent share of impressions in April. In the meantime, Android is doing well, as ad requests for the Google mobile OS grew 15 percent month-over-month, with a 338 percent more ad requests since January. As Apple prepares to fully launch its iAd system on July 1, it’ll be interesting to see how that impacts Millennial Media’s tallies.
Other highlights from the ad net’s report included:
—In May, 90 percent of developers were creating apps for a single platform—56 percent of that was focused on Apple, and 29 percent on Android.
—While the media have been more focused on the growth of smartphones, consumers are still looking to feature phones and connected devices, which actually make up more than half of Millennial’s US Device OS Mix (see the chart on the left). So it’s important for advertisers to keep this in mind when they’re creating mobile ad strategies – Smartphones alone do not hit the mass of consumers using the mobile web.
Source: paidContent.org
Other highlights from the ad net’s report included:
—In May, 90 percent of developers were creating apps for a single platform—56 percent of that was focused on Apple, and 29 percent on Android.
—While the media have been more focused on the growth of smartphones, consumers are still looking to feature phones and connected devices, which actually make up more than half of Millennial’s US Device OS Mix (see the chart on the left). So it’s important for advertisers to keep this in mind when they’re creating mobile ad strategies – Smartphones alone do not hit the mass of consumers using the mobile web.
Source: paidContent.org
Apple’s iPad Makes Japan Debut
Apple Inc. on May 28 released its new iPad product in Japan, following up on roaring sales of more than 1 million iPads in under one month from their U.S. release date in April.
Some Japanese newspaper publishers, including the Mainichi Shimbun, the Sankei Shimbun, and the Nikkan Sports, are distributing their content via the iPad tablet computer. Many broadcasting companies are also preparing to target the iPad for delivery of their programs and related content, including news reports.
On May 29, the Mainichi Shimbun launched a digital magazine titled “photoJ.” exclusively for iPad users. PhotoJ is a monthly e-publication that costs 350 yen per issue. It delivers a combination of photographs and original feature articles. Subscribers get access to movies, as well as photo slideshows. The Mainichi also plans to sell ads to appear in the digital magazine. To issue the digital magazine, the Mainichi introduced a cross-media publishing system controlled by WoodWing Software of the Netherlands. The U.S. magazine TIME uses the same software to format and deliver its electronic edition for the iPad.
The Sankei has started issuing an electronic edition of its daily paper for iPad users at a price of 1,500 yen per month. By the end of June, the service will not start charging. By making optimal use of the iPad's vivid color display, the resolution of the page images can be raised much higher than that of the company’s existing service for iPhone users. The Sankei says it plans to continue delivering its free electronic edition for the iPhone as well. The Nikkan Sports has started delivering articles and photographs for the iPad, free of charge. Users can also search the sports daily’s news through articles and photographs viewed on the iPad
Some major broadcasting stations are also following the iPad fad. TV Tokyo, a Tokyo-based major TV network, on May 28 began offering an iPad application that displays a summary of its weekly documentary program “Jounetsu-no-Keifu” (The Genealogy of Passion), which traces the background of contemporary celebrities from various walks of life. The Tokyo Broadcasting System (TBS) has developed an iPad application for browsing news while listening to Internet radio channel OTTAVA, which specializes in classical music. That iPad application is due to be released by mid-June. Osaka-based Mainichi Broadcasting System will start delivering its new TV drama “MM9 ? Monster Magnitude,” for the iPad in July. Users will be able to watch the program on the iPad free of charge, at the same time as the program airs on TV.
Not to miss the boat, the Mainichi, the Sports Nippon and the Nishinippon Shimbun have begun providing daily news content for the “Viewn” newspaper and magazine content service. That service for the iPad is operated by a subsidiary of the cellular phone company Softbank Corp, which operates iPhone services in Japan.
Source: .pressnet.or.jp
Some Japanese newspaper publishers, including the Mainichi Shimbun, the Sankei Shimbun, and the Nikkan Sports, are distributing their content via the iPad tablet computer. Many broadcasting companies are also preparing to target the iPad for delivery of their programs and related content, including news reports.
On May 29, the Mainichi Shimbun launched a digital magazine titled “photoJ.” exclusively for iPad users. PhotoJ is a monthly e-publication that costs 350 yen per issue. It delivers a combination of photographs and original feature articles. Subscribers get access to movies, as well as photo slideshows. The Mainichi also plans to sell ads to appear in the digital magazine. To issue the digital magazine, the Mainichi introduced a cross-media publishing system controlled by WoodWing Software of the Netherlands. The U.S. magazine TIME uses the same software to format and deliver its electronic edition for the iPad.
The Sankei has started issuing an electronic edition of its daily paper for iPad users at a price of 1,500 yen per month. By the end of June, the service will not start charging. By making optimal use of the iPad's vivid color display, the resolution of the page images can be raised much higher than that of the company’s existing service for iPhone users. The Sankei says it plans to continue delivering its free electronic edition for the iPhone as well. The Nikkan Sports has started delivering articles and photographs for the iPad, free of charge. Users can also search the sports daily’s news through articles and photographs viewed on the iPad
Some major broadcasting stations are also following the iPad fad. TV Tokyo, a Tokyo-based major TV network, on May 28 began offering an iPad application that displays a summary of its weekly documentary program “Jounetsu-no-Keifu” (The Genealogy of Passion), which traces the background of contemporary celebrities from various walks of life. The Tokyo Broadcasting System (TBS) has developed an iPad application for browsing news while listening to Internet radio channel OTTAVA, which specializes in classical music. That iPad application is due to be released by mid-June. Osaka-based Mainichi Broadcasting System will start delivering its new TV drama “MM9 ? Monster Magnitude,” for the iPad in July. Users will be able to watch the program on the iPad free of charge, at the same time as the program airs on TV.
Not to miss the boat, the Mainichi, the Sports Nippon and the Nishinippon Shimbun have begun providing daily news content for the “Viewn” newspaper and magazine content service. That service for the iPad is operated by a subsidiary of the cellular phone company Softbank Corp, which operates iPhone services in Japan.
Source: .pressnet.or.jp
Wednesday, June 2, 2010
Big names reach out to grab iPad opportunities
Stephen Fry, BMW, The FT and Ministry of Sound are among the first major publishers and brands to roll out UK iPad apps ahead of the device’s much-anticipated European launch tomorrow.
Stephen Fry, BMW, The FT and Ministry of Sound are among the first major publishers and brands to roll out UK iPad apps ahead of the device’s much-anticipated European launch tomorrow.
Apple, which shifted 1m iPads in its first month on sale in the US, has garnered support from key publishers looking at the tablet media player as the next evolution in online content distribution.
Publishers are preparing to experiment with a number of business models including launching ad-funded, sponsored and premium iPad apps. But they also say app developers have upped their prices as they become inundated with short-deadline work as brands rush to create content for the platform.
Broadcaster and technophile Stephen Fry has launched a series of iPad apps, including one for his blog, a tie-up with Harper Collins and Framestore CFC for animated readings of Oscar Wilde short stories, and another featuring quotations from Fry himself.
SamFry, the company that manages Stephen Fry’s website, is working with The Digital Tribe to sell ad spots around his content.
Andrew Sampson, joint-MD of SamFry, said, “The iPad presents a great opportunity. With these apps we’re looking to push the boundaries with the Apple API and show where you can go with it.”
The Financial Times hopes to win younger readers by making its premium content free for two months via its iPad app after signing a sponsorship deal with luxury Swiss watch-maker Hublot.
Steve Pinches, FT’s lead product development manager, said, “We’ve been live for a few days now and have seen a fair number of downloads from the US [where the app has also launched]. The sponsorship model slots quite nicely into our paid content strategy.”
The Telegraph is also looking to launch on the iPad but is wary of simply migrating its iPhone app to the device. Head of mobile Maani Safa said, “The business model should take into account that people are more likely to spend more time on the iPad than iPhones, and advertisers are willing to pay for that.
“The sponsorship model on the iPad is definitely something we’re looking at, but I don’t know whether or not we’ll go for it,” he added. “I think a lot of publishers have simply tried to replicate the newspaper experience on the iPad. This gives you less content in a less intuitive manner, so we’re trying to provide a completely new experience that has nothing to do with the web.”
Magazine publishers are also looking to launch on the iPad. Dennis Publishing has appointed digital agency PixelMags to launch an iPad app for its Apple-specialist title Mac User. Paul Lomax, chief technology officer at Dennis, said, “We’re looking at doing something for most of our titles. With some we’ll go into more depth, so there might be more than one app for some brands.”
He added, however, that because publishers have been rushing to launch apps, “Finding people to work on iPad apps at a reasonable rate has been a bit of a challenge.”
This Friday’s nma Live will focus on new content and ad opportunities for brands brought about by the iPad. See nmalive.co.uk for details.
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