Apple News App – The Personalized News Curator!
Apple announced a brand new application known as “News,” that will aggregate lists of personalized news for iOS users. By curating information from popular sites and newspapers, the Apple News App delivers news articles and blogs in a systematic but custom layout with clear typography. Apple News App will be launched in US, UK and Australia, allowing users to pick up and choose their favorite publications, and topics so that Apple keeps sending in interesting stories to their smartphones and mobile gadgets.
Tie-ups with news publishers
According to company representatives, about 20 publishers have already enrolled in 50 titles with Apple including Condé Nast, ESPN, Hearst, Time Inc., Bloomberg and many others.
Users read and browse News which is tailored to each individual’s likes and dislikes based on a new digital publishing format that lets users to choose unique looks for displaying stories. One can include all levels of audio, video, photos, and more. This curated news service will be packaging them in a magazine-style interface that is akin to other apps that we find on the App Store like the Flipboard.
But for publishers and news organizations, it will surely make waves among other news app.
Reactions on ‘Apple News App’ from the media industry
Those in the media industry are aware that users will access websites from different places including social media channels like Facebook and Twitter. Links are usually posted and shared so that users are redirected to the original site’s section to read the full story.
But the Apple News App works differently since it lets the users read a digest of stories within its app which would mean that New York Times or CNN article in Apple News App, you’ll read the article within Apple News App rather than being re-directed to The New York Times or CNN’s website.
Facebook had implemented such a news app that created worries for publishers in May through Facebook Instant in the iOS feed. With Facebook Instant and Apple News applying the same strategies for news aggregation, users would prefer getting their content in one place but that may sound detrimental to the interests of these news publishers.
Many news publishers might feel a potential loss of control who have been controlling their ad sales completely, along with distribution of the articles and the printing up till now. The whole process which was first owned only by these agencies and companies will feel threatened if the control is passed, albeit partially to a big-shot company like Apple.
Is the Approach Feasible?
Whether the approach will work for publishers and news organizations is a question. But with the popularity of Apple and strong social fabric of Facebook, it is natural for many companies opting to be part of their plan, because of the massive reach of each company.
With Google, Apple and Facebook having a brilliant reach with the audience, it is evident that the news companies are hesitant if the move is made to wrest control from them. In general, social networks embed and publish content directly from other web sources. Snapchat now allows news organizations and magazines to record videos directly with the feature called Discover rather than only sharing videos through the platform.
Platforms in 2015 now spend a lot of time gathering power and now wielding it on other platforms who do not exert as much reach or power over the audience. Most agencies and organizations often feel that they will be victims because of the move
Rajiv Patil is the founder & Managing Director of Nimblechapps, an innovative iPhone app development company. He takes a keen interest in topics related to mobile app development and mobile game development and often like to share his knowledge through informative posts on leading blogging sites.