Will you pay for the future of news? 10 top starter iPad news apps.

Just days after the international release of the iPad, comes the news that Apple has sold two million iPads in less than two months. Clearly, there will be many millions of iPads around before too long. And surprise, surprise, Google seems to be developing an iPad rival as we speak.

With these new digital developments as a backdrop, we have the much discussed failure of most traditional media companies to so far make adequate money from their online news content. Rupert Murdoch has famously pledged to start making readers pay for online news.

BBC News iPad app

On twitter recently, Malcolm Turnbull reminded me that Murdoch has stated that “The Internet will destroy more profitable businesses than it will create.” I wonder if Murdoch really meant News Corp businesses there. In any case, Google is claiming to have helped to generate about $54 billion of economic activity for American businesses in 2009 alone, but I digress. What is clear is that the media landscape is rapidly changing, and iPads are the latest manifestation of the changes.

Most online news content is currently free and widely accessible. In addition, it’s easily searchable through services such as Google News, and through real-time search engines such as OneRiot. The question is: do devices such as the iPad offer additional hope to news organisations, in terms of making decent money from news content? Will people be prepared to pay for news delivered via these new devices, and in sufficient numbers? If so, who will be the winners – the traditional news organisations or new (media) players?

I certainly don’t have any answers but I will assert that journalism is not dying, as some are currently crying. Journalism is just going online, and these devices will most certainly be a decent part of the picture in terms of news delivery. If you own an iPad or similar device, why would you now get your favourite newspaper delivered or go to a shop and buy it, when you can now (or soon) have it delivered in digital form before you even get out of bed? Sure, the reading experience needs to be a pleasurable one. I can tell you that it is on an iPad. It stands to reason that the future is upon us.

10 current chart toppers

It’s very early days but here are the top free and paid news apps currently in the iPad App Store charts (in Australia). It’ll be interesting to see how this lineup changes over the coming months. Some of the big news organisations have certainly been giving their new apps a push through their other media, and many of the popular blogs (such as The Huffington Post) don’t yet have iPad apps available. Things could change.

Will you pay for news delivered through an app if it’s good content? Do you think the prices are about right here?

iPad news apps

Top 5 Free iPad News Apps (In some the content is not free)

1. BBC News (3 star user rating)
“Get the latest, breaking news from the BBC and our global network of journalists.”

2. TIME Magazine (2 star user rating)
TIME Magazine on the iPad. This app allows you to purchase each week’s digital issue through iTunes, and to read and store all the issues within the app.

3. NYT Editiors’ Choice (3 star user rating)
Offers a selection of the latest news, opinion and features, automatically updated.

4. Reuters News Pro for iPad (almost a 4 star user rating)
“Professional-grade” news and market data from Thomson Reuters. On or offline access to the latest breaking news, images and video, together with financial data, corporate information and interactive financial charting.

5. Financial Times iPad Edition (3 star user rating)
Free access until the 31st July 2010. News, video, comment and analysis, optimised for iPad – the entire Financial Times edition.

Top 5 Paid iPad News Apps (In some the content is free)

1. The Australian (3 star rating)
From News Digital Media, this app is updated and edited with content throughout the day “Experience our world-class journalism in one convenient and seamless experience”. 1 31 Day subscription is ($4.99).

2.WIRED Magazine (Almost a full 5 star user rating.)
From Condé Nast, WIRED magazine, includes some exclusive iPad content ($5.99).

3. The Early Edition (4 star user rating)
“Your own personal daily newspaper. Takes the news sources that you enjoy and presents their content in a familiar newspaper format. You can import feeds from Google Reader or OPML file, discover feed URLs by entering links and categorise news feeds into sections, like a traditional newspaper ($5.99).

4. Pulse News Reader (3 star user rating)
Takes in up to 20 news sources that you follow, and creates a visual mosaic of your news. Tap on an article and you’re presented with a rendered view of the news story ($4.99).

4. NewsRack (4 star user rating)
Full featured RSS reader for iPhone and iPad (5.99).

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david

npr one is pretty awesom too, tho US oriented
http://www.jjprojects.com jjprojects

Yes, I have that one myself. It's quite high in the charts too.
http://twitter.com/grantyoung Grant Young

Now almost a week in to iPad ownership, I find a vast majority of the apps I use are reading related – be that RSS readers, magazines or news sites.

I was quite disappointed with the BBC app – feels much like a website bunged into an app, rather than doing anything interesting – though I suspect that will change over time (and, after all, that one is free – I suppose I expected more from the beeb given how good they've been in experimenting online). Wired and Popular Science's apps are more interesting, but haven't quite hit the mark.

Unless the content was exceptional, I won't be paying for stuff I can get online via RSS. After years as an avid NetNewsWire user, I'm trialling Early Edition + Pulse as new ways of accessing news (both using RSS) and they seem to work pretty well.

The Guardian/Canon “Eyewitness” app is also great too (albeit very simple), if you're visually inclined.

My feeling is that the reason to pay will be driven by features and/or exclusive/exceptional content. They'll have to make an attempt to understand and leverage the capabilities of this new platform, as Pulse is attempting to do.

So far, though, I've not seen much of that happening…
http://www.jjprojects.com jjprojects

Thanks for the very thoughtful comment Grant.

Yes, I'm finding myself doing quite a bit of reading on my iPad too, although I am using a few other apps as well. It'll be good when a few more native iPad social networking apps become available. The iPhone versions do work, but they aren't the best. Apart from apps related to reading, and those pre-installed, some of the apps I'm using are Evernote, Google, Skype (iphone version), foursquare (iPhone version) and Tweetdeck. I've also found that just using Safari instead of an app for quite a lot of content is fine. It's so much easier to read than on the iPhone, and not as cumbersome as a laptop.

Yes, I agree about some of the news apps seeming like they are websites bunged into an app. As you say, I'm sure that will change over time, as lessons are learned about what works and what doesn't.

I'm really interested to see what the The Huffington Post comes out with. They are by far the most popular news blog on the web and I understand they are going to be profitable in 2010 for the first time, with a readership of over 20 million unique visitors a month. If they come up with a good iPad offering that could really put them streets ahead in terms on online news.

One of the popular apps I didn't mention that I'm also using is Mashable's iPad app. It's good but I find myself still using feeds from Google Reader more often than not, so I can read other blogs too.
http://blog.yewenyi.net yewenyi

I think you need to compare it to current distribution systems. Newsparers and magazines already cost and some would be willing to pay, especially of it is cheaper. But then the tv is free.

I wonder why the advertising funded models for print and tv do not seem work in the online world.

Personally o do not read newspapers anyway. And I prefer the wikipedia approach of adding the latest events to the overall story. I find this much more useful than a news tit-bit with little or no context.
http://www.jjprojects.com jjprojects

Most off the paid news apps seem to be around the $4-5 mark. Set in relation to other media, it'll be interesting to see of people think this is good value, and if it changes over time.

I find when I look at newspapers I already know the news. It's yesterday's news, if you get you news primarily from the web, pretty much as it happens.
http://www.jjprojects.com jjprojects

Most off the paid news apps seem to be around the $4-5 mark. Set in relation to other media, it'll be interesting to see of people think this is good value, and if it changes over time.

I find when I look at newspapers I already know the news. It's yesterday's news, if you get you news primarily from the web, pretty much as it happens.

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