Introducing DiscoveryNews.com, the latest breakaway website from Discovery.com, which is destined to expand Discovery Communications’ science and technology news coverage. The new site features dedicated sections on tech, space, earth, archaeology, human, history and dinosaurs, as well as weekly in depth features on various topics. Discovery is also launching a dedicated iPhone and iPod Touch application for $0.99, which will feature multimedia content from the new site. “At a time when other news organizations are cutting back coverage in areas such as science and technology, the new Discovery News underscores the company’s longstanding commitment to science and fills a growing void with a trusted and captivating source of news,” said Kelly Day, executive VP of digital media and commerce, Discovery Communications.
New launches app, discovery, iPhone, launch, news, science, tech, website
Coming this month to an iPhone near you: the December issue of your GQ magazine. Conde Nast has developed the technology to view the December issue’s content on Apple’s iPhone through a $2.99 app. This is the first time a major consumer magazine has made an entire issue available on a custom-built reader on an Apple app, breaking away from Amazon’s Kindle app. In the reader, GQ can be read in vertical or horizontal modes, and users can tap through pages and ads. It will also include video, audio, and links to external websites. The app comes out mid-November. See the full FOLIO story here.
Industry buzz app, Conde Nast, GQ, iPhone, magazine, mobile
The release of the new, upgraded iPhone last week might mean the dawn of a new digital content distribution channel. The first publisher to get its feet wet with the upgraded phone? Men’s Health magazine, which is selling an app that offers workout regimens and exercises to try. But it’s not just a novelty app—where you download it, use it, then forget about it. The new iPhone’s apps allow for continuous upgrades and new features to be added (in the Men’s Health case, new workouts) for additional fees, allowing publishers an outlet for a constant stream of content and a constant stream of revenue. The Men’s Health app, reports AdAge, is selling for $1.99, and additional sets of workouts will go for 99 cents.
Industry buzz app, apps, content, iPhone, revenue
With advertising revenues down, publishers are increasingly investigating non-advertising ways to bring in additional revenue, such as raising subscription and newsstand pricing and cutting rate bases, like New York just did this week. Another small light at the end of the tunnel comes in the form of the iPhone, as iPhone applications created by – and touted by – magazine brands are gaining in popularity and bringing publishers just a smidgen more much-needed cash flow. By bringing the right amount of exclusive content to readers, and making it interactive and functional enough so that people will want to pay for it, magazine publishers might be on the right track with their iPhone apps. MediaWeek reported this week that Hachette Filipacchi Media, the parent of brands such as Elle and Car & Drive, are launching iPhone apps later this year that will focus on shopping and cars. Also, Meredith Corp., which has lifestyle titles like Better Homes & Gardens and Family Circle, plans to launch apps focused on food, parenting and fitness. Apps run the gamut of prices, from free to ad-supported, to $5 or $10 a pop, to bundle subscription-based “premium” features that are added onto free apps. We applaud publishers not stemming the flow of great content, but instead finding new outlets for it.
Industry buzz applications, apps, content, Hachette Filipacchi, iPhone, Meredith, revenue
Check this out. Artist Jorge Colombo drew this week’s New Yorker magazine cover on his iPhone, using a $5 application called Brushes. He simply stood outside Madame Tussaud’s in Times Square and cranked it out in an hour. Check out the video of the cover being created, step by step, here. People passing him in Times Square probably thought he was simply checking his email or phone messages. “I got a phone in the beginning of February, and I immediately got the program so I could entertain myself,” Colombo told the New Yorker website. A new drawing from Colombo will appear each week on the New Yorker’s website.
Industry buzz application, apps, art, Brushes, cover, iPhone, New Yorker
Apps aside, will the iPhone become the new digital medium for magazine content? Perhaps iTunes will become a virtual newsstand for magazines, bringing the newest issues straight through to your iPhone. In a recent article in AdAge, publishers say the idea isn’t so far-fetched. “iTunes is a great marketplace for entertainment, movies, music, TV, even books. Magazines are actually conspicuous in their absence,” Ryan McConville, publisher of Bauer Teen Magazines, told AdAge.
If you think it would be hard—virtually impossible—to translate a magazine spread onto such a small screen, don’t blink. Companies are already hard at work figuring out a way to do just that. One such company, called Bite Sized Candy, is working with Condé Nast and Hearst to provide magazine content to the iPhone via iTunes—and they’re looking at launching the solution this summer. Can’t wait to see it!
Industry buzz apps, Conde Nast, content, digital, Hearst, iPhone, iTunes, print
The launch of Apple’s iPhone App Store opened the door for media companies to explore an all-new, interactive way to distribute content and engage readers. Magazines were exploring the mobile world before then, but the iPhone App Store suddenly made everything amazingly accessible—and magazines went to task creating some can’t-live-without mobile applications. Take the Style.com app, which won Condé Nast Digital the top spot in the “Mobile Application” category at min’s 2009 Best of Web Awards last Wednesday. It lets users zip through runway shots of the newest fashion collections, read reviews and find out how to snag the looks. And there were other top magazine-based mobile applications that won, too. See the full list of min’s Best of Web Awards winners here.
Next week, Time Inc. is launching new applications for Golf.com and CNNMoney.com, adding to its already robust collection of mobile apps, including those from Time.com and People.com. Time Inc., which says mobile apps are a “natural extension” for its bran
ds, reports it has a million monthly unique visitors to its mobile sites.
Even local magazines are utilizing the iPhone App Store to create a more direct connection with readers. Here at TMG Custom Media, Washington Flyer partnered with GeoRadio and DC by Phone to create a Washington Flyer mobile app that gives customized guided tours of D.C.’s sights. Take a look. And tell us what magazine apps you love.
Industry buzz applications, content, iPhone, magazine, mobile
This year’s Magazine Publishers of America’s digital conference, called 24/7, was focused on a number of topics, including the importance of bringing print media online. ESPN magazine is experimenting with digital editions for email, and applications for the iPhone. Click here for more tips and information.
Industry buzz iPhone, magazines, media, MPA, online
