Hands-On With The Daily (Sure Doesn't Feel Like The Future of The Newspaper)

Audrey Watters dissects The Daily, and doesn't like what she finds: "The launch event for Rupert Murdoch's new iPad-only newspaper The Daily was full of rhetoric about the future of journalism, heralding the app as a 'this changes everything' sort of moment. But having had a chance to download and read today's inaugural issue, it doesn't seem that the user experience matches the rhetoric. That may not be a surprise as plenty of people have long predicted The Daily would be a flop. But it still feels like a shame, considering the resources (some $30 million from Murdoch himself) that have been poured into the endeavor and considering the promise for a reinvented and reinvigorated journalism. That's just my opinion, of course, as are these first impressions of the new app ... "

The Daily vs. Flipboard - Which Wins?

Richard MacManus prefers Flipboard: "Last week Rupert Murdoch's iPad-only newspaper The Daily was launched. The Daily is a newspaper app available to U.S. users on the iPad for 99c per week (the first 2 weeks are free; non-U.S. people can download it for trial via this method). The Daily has been touted as the 'future of the newspaper' by News Corp. Audrey Watters wrote our initial review of The Daily and she was underwhelmed. In my own testing, I've found The Daily to be inferior to my current iPad 'newspaper' of choice: Flipboard. Here's how I came to that conclusion..."

Want to Read The Daily? No iPad, No Problem!

Yeah, but what lesson will the Times take away from this info? NYTimes: "Well, that didn’t take long. The Daily, Rupert Murdoch’s big push into iPad-based publishing, was introduced on Wednesday. And on Thursday morning, an unsanctioned Web site appeared with links to every article in The Daily, free on the Web. ... "

On eve of 'The Daily' launch, rival iPad apps offer previews

AppleInsider:

Ahead of News Corp's unveiling of The Daily digital newspaper on Wednesday, developers showed off competing iPad apps, including a social news app from The New York Times and a digital book platform from a former Apple designer. ...

News Corp's iPad publication could also be the first to implement an iTunes subscription feature that Apple has reportedly been working on. Publishers have pressed Apple for an iPad subscription agreement that would automatically send content to paying customers.

Competitors, however, haven't been idly watching The Daily's development process. The New York Times, in collaboration with Betaworks, is working on News.me, a social news app that will aggregate article links from Twitter streams and link sharing site bit.ly, TechCrunch reports. The approach is worlds apart from News Corp's, which focuses on producing custom content.

Also making headlines Tuesday was Push Pop Press, a startup from former Apple designer and Delicious Monster founder Michael Matas. The startup, which aims to create a "new breed" of interactive digital books, launched a teaser site Tuesday. ...

News Corp to Launch iPad Newspaper "The Daily" on February 2

Reuters: "News Corp will launch its long-awaited digital newspaper created for Apple Inc's iPad on February 2, two weeks after the two companies were widely expected to introduce the new product. ... "

Steve Jobs to Join Rupert Murdoch in Unveiling "The Daily" on Jan. 19

Interesting timing. This will be just one day after Apple reports earnings. AppleInsider: "Apple Chief Executive Steve Jobs will appear onstage alongside media mogul and News Corp. CEO Rupert Murdoch in San Francisco on Jan. 19 to unveil the new tablet-only newspaper The Daily for iPad."

News Corp's "Daily" iPad Newspaper Set For January Launch

Peter Kafka, MediaMemo, AllThingsD:

News Corp. plans to launch the publication the week of January 17, multiple sources tell me.

The caveat here is that launch plans have moved around a couple of times in the past few months; until recently, lots of folks expected to see this thing in December. But this latest date looks like a much safer bet. ...

Given that News Corp. has hired dozens of blabby journalists for the Daily, and interviewed many more, lots of other details about the app/service have leaked out already: It will come out daily, it will sell for 99 cents a week, it will use lots of video and it will have cool multimedia bells and whistles, including some kind of 3-D effect that lots of people are very excited about. And Apple CEO Steve Jobs may or may not participate in a launch event.

Most important for other media companies: The Daily is supposed to use a new “push” subscription feature from Apple, where iTunes automatically bills customers on a weekly or monthly basis, and a new edition shows up on customers’ iPads every morning.

If we do see that on the Daily next month, expect to see several other new iPad apps using the same feature shortly afterward.

That offering won’t resolve Apple’s dispute with conventional publishers, who want to be able to control their subscriptions–or at least get access to subscriber data–for iTunes app versions of their print products. But for new, digital-only products like the Daily, that data isn’t as crucial, and the ability to set up a recurring subscription would be a big step forward.

Conde Nast Digital Chief: Murdoch’s iPad Newspaper “Doesn’t Make any Sense”

VentureBeat: "News Corp mogul Rupert Murdoch is making a big bet on the iPad by hiring big-name (read: expensive) reporters for a new 'iPad newspaper' called The Daily. And other media organizations are skeptical. For example, publisher Conde Nast has made a big deal about iPad versions of its magazines like Wired and the New Yorker, but when Conde Nast Digital president Sarah Chubb was asked about The Daily today at the Ignition conference, she said, 'It doesn’t make any sense.' She noted that Conde Nast was able to revive Gourmet Magazine on the iPad, but that’s because Conde Nast only 'put a little bit of money into Gourmet Live, and we’ve gotten our money back.'" In other words, they did not have to finance original content, which Murdoch plans to do as part of The Daily business plan.