Firstly some statistics:

Now for OS 4.0

• Developers can now access calendar, photo library, still and video camera data, quick look, SMS inside their apps.
  • This is great news as event modules can now add events into your actual calendar.
  • Articles can now be shared via SMS within the application without needing to leave the app
• Automated testing tool that Apple uses internally to decided whether an app will be accepted or rejected is now publicly available.
  • This means that the app approval process is much more open and it will speed up the overall approval process
• A few new features: Create playlists, 5x digital zoom in camera, Bluetooth keyboards, spell check, gift apps, Tap to focus video, Places in Photos, Home screen wallpaper, file & delete mail search results, web search from sugestions,Larger fonts for Mail, SMS & Alerts, Rotate photos, Sync IMAP notes, iPod out, Wake on wireless, Folders.
• Multitasking is here! Jobs likens it to cut, copy and paste. “Not the first, but the best.”
• Apps keep track of where you were and can start right back up again.
• iBookstore on iPhone as per our predictions in this blog post
• Better data protection. Encrypt all your e-mail, including attachments with PIN codes.
• Mobile device management. Letting IT managers to deploy iPhones and manage them remotely.
• Wireless app distribution. Companies can push out custom apps over the air instead of relying on an iTunes sync.
  • This is great for corporate apps as they no longer have to be distributed through iTunes

There is much more, but this is all they had time to highlight

iAds

iAd’s is Apple’s new advertising network. They will be managing all the inventory and from the sounds of it they will be taking 40%. All ad units are built in HTML5 and get served up in the application without having to go to an external site. Spreed is doing something very similar, but NO development skills are necessary.

• Jobs says Apple wants to help developers make money off their creations, but says that “most of this mobile advertising really sucks, and we thought we might be able to make some contributions.”

• Jobs says ads are easy on the desktop b/c of search. But people are spending all their time within apps. “This is where the opportunity to deliver advertising is,”

• Jobs: Average user is spending 30 minutes a day using apps. That’s 10 ads per device each day.
• We want to get 1 billion ad impressions per day by the end of the year.

• Jobs: deliver “interaction” and “emotion” – Something that’s in the middle of where Web ads are, and ads on your TV.

• Jobs said it was annoying for people to click on an in-app ad b/c it would take them out of whatever they were doing.
• Devs can add iAd in their apps for a 60% split of the revenues. All the sales and inventory are handled by Apple.
• Ads have access to much of the same APIs as apps, like location and some level of accelerometer access
• Jobs demoed a Toy Story and Nike ad
  • All the animations are interactive, and crazy smooth.
  • It’s not so much about the content of the app, but the interactivity
  • He’s flipping through the app: it’s offering up the history of nike ads, allowing you to flip through the years to see all the shoes throughout history
  • He pulls up the app with the Nike ad. It puls up an Air Jordan 2010 clip

So the run down on iAd’s is that it is great for developers in that it will be very easy to monetize apps. However, this is not a great solution for publishers and media companies. Apple will be taking 40% of all ad revenue and they are administering the inventory (you cannot retain your ad sales teams). In addition I am skeptical as to how deep their ability to target advertising will be. They have one piece of the puzzle and that is strong creative advertising, but they do not address targeting. Because they do not parse, control or index the content and because they do not understand user behavior, it will be hard to do deep targeting which is one of the main promises of mobile advertising.

Julie Ask of Forrester Research backs up my point about iAds not being for big publishers in her blog post on OS 4.0 with these two points

1. We didn’t hear a lot about targeting – making use of past purchase behavior, day-to-day use of applications, etc. We did hear about location. Knowing that I have downloaded and am using the latest Audi application or browsing automotive sites on my iPhone might indicated that I am in the market for a car – that would be valuable information to automotive OEM’s. Knowing that I buy alternative rock music or that I read mysteries adds other dimensions. Location – given the structure of how they sell ads – this will more likely be purchased by large, national companies with stores throughout the country. Location (from the consumer’s perspective) will be more interesting when it helps me find local mom and pop stores that better match my interests.
2. We didn’t hear much on analytics for the advertisers. This will be interesting to watch as the more effective Apple can be in demonstrating ROI – bought movie tickets, purchased a Nike shirt, bought the movie Toy Story – the more advertisers will spend. They’ll spend on branding now, but I think they’ll spend more if they can drive sales.

What is good though is that it will super charge the agencies to begin selling ads as they can utilize their existing skills sets to build strong creatives. Jobs just did to the mobile ad industry what he did to the mobile industry in general 2 years ago.

Possibly, more interesting is the rise of online news sources on the iPhone. Flurry believes that with the release of the iPad we are going to see an even strong supply and demand for blogs and other online media sources. It is therefore essential that if your newspaper does not have an app now, to act fast. If you wait too long, the online media sources will own the real estate on users phones and other mobile devices.  More below and in the report.

Like gaming, the creation of compelling content in News is a specialized and costly operation. To source and report quality news, companies often have to span various media such as TV broadcast, radio and print, which further increases cost. It’s therefore no surprise that Traditional Media dominates the News category, controlling nearly two thirds. For traditional media (e.g., New York Times, ABC News, NPR, etc.), the iPhone represents a large channel through which to distribute their existing content. The small incremental cost of expanding the distribution of Traditional Media’s core content, and the attractiveness of reaching an educated, affluent and tech-savvy audience, makes iPhone the perfect platform through which to serve news. Looking forward, the iPad creates an even greater opportunity to increase reach because its larger screen size works better works for newspaper and magazine layouts, as well as TV broadcast.

“A new survey by the Pew Research Center released Monday found more than a quarter of all American adults read news on their mobile.” -Pew research

This headline from the March 3^rd edition of MobileMarketing Daily caught our attention.  The headline is taken from the recently release Understanding The Participatory Newspaper Consumer which is a deep analysis of the publishing ecosystem.  From our perspective as a mobile publishing company the most encouraging news for publishers is the degree to which younger readers – the readers newspaper publisher need to bring into their franchise – are using their mobile devices to access news and information where and when they want.   This table taken from the study confirms  that younger adults are much more likely to access news and information on their mobile than older adults – 43% adults under 50 expect to find  at least some of news and information that they need on their mobiles.

We are not surprised by the importance of mobile as a trusted source of news and information for younger adults.  The iPhone apps we have built for our publishing clients continue to drive double digit growth in new subscribers and page views.  As important, app publishers are experiencing month over month growth in average number of articles read.  This tells us that  iPhone app subscribers  have quickly adapted newspapers to fit their reading habits – they no longer need to be in front of the paper or online editions to access the news they want when they want it  We expect to continued growth in on demand newspaper as more and more adults move to app enabled phones.

We remind our publishing clients that Apple app editions deliver a young readership – almost half of whom are under the age of 34 according to AdMob research.– and  that these apps are the pipeline to their future franchise.

When most of us think of Apple app editions, we usually think of the iPhone as the most likely delivery device.    But as Flurry research shows, the iTouch now delivers 41% of all Apple app user  sessions

AdMob data above  clearly demonstrates that the iTouch user profile is very different from the iPhone user profile – three quarters of iTouch users are below the age of 18 vv 15% of iPhone users.  We believe that the iTouch cohort is of vital importance to publishers for two reasons.

1)      Because they can and do access the App Store just as easily as iPhone users, they are a captive audience for news and information relevant to them

2)      They are now locked in to satisfying their information and entertainment needs with proprietary Apple hardware and software.  As they mature, the migration to the iPhone and iPad will be a natural and seamless progression for them.

If you are a regular reader of the Spreed blog or know much about Spreed:Inc, you will know that we believe that newspapers in this day and age need a mobile application. However, too often we see people try and cram everything they can into their mobile news reader. This is a problem in the newspaper industry as news websites have such a large amount of varying types of content.

Here at Spreed we advise our customer to follow a long tail niche approach to application development. The first application that any company develops should be focused specifically around their news content. However, by no means should you ignore all the other content that is available on your website. Now that many newspapers have applications it is time to start thinking about the different niche apps that can be built to include your other content while leveraging the unique capabilities of these phones (i.e. multimedia, GPS, built in camera). By no means should you cram all of this other content and functionality into your existing app. Each source of content applies to a different app and can provide yet another revenue source to your paper.

A few scenarios that we often suggest our clients to consider are sports apps, traffic/weather apps, tourism apps, classified apps, finance apps and home listing apps. These applications can be sold at a premium and leverage the vast content pool that newspapers already have access to. If you try and cram all these features into your main headline app, you will sacrifice both your UX and your potential future revenue.

There are three examples of strong niche apps developed by newspapers that I would like to show here:

The first is the GoVolsXtra application developed by Spreed for the Knoxville News Sentinel. Knoxville had already created a separate portal for their university sports team, so this was an obvious extension of their brand. We simply pulled their live stats, news, pictures and videos and packaged them together in an app. If Knoxnews tried to cram all this info into their main headline app they would not have been able to provide as rich of an experience.

The second app that I would like to highlight is a tourism app developed by USA Today (Gannett). The Gannett team has been very strong in the mobile space and many will call the USA Today application one of the best news apps in the iTunes app store. Although there is a lot of functionality in the USA Today headline app, they have done a very good job at balancing it and not allowing for any more than three clicks to get to any particular piece of information. USA Today has a wealth of content and they have decided to release numerous apps, however the best one in my opinion is the USA Autopilot app which is a great tool for any frequent traveler.

The final application that I would like to highlight and the newest entry in the market is the NYTime home finder app. This app lets you find home listings in the NYTimes database and find homes for sales/open houses that are around your current location. This app it light, easy to use and takes advantage of location based features of the iPhone. It is a huge win for the NYTimes who have not really updated their mobile application since it first hit the app store.

The point that I am trying to make here is that the application ecosystem holds a lot of potential for newspapers, but be careful not to replicate what you did on the web. Do not try and cram everything into your existing application as it will not service any of your primary goals; building retention, generating revenue. There is so much content available within a newspaper website and each set of content can lend itself to a specific application. Each app presents a huge opportunity to become a major revenue generator for the newspaper. I am not saying here that you should not include some of your niche content in your headline app. For example you can still have a sports news  in your headline app and then different niche sports apps that present scores, statistics as well as news.

A good strategy moving forward is to watch your headline app statistics very carefully. The key here is to not include loads of functionality around your content in your headline app to the extent that it becomes bulky and impossible to navigate. If you see that people are reading your sports section, travel section, weather section or books sections  heavily, there is a good case to be made for building a niche app around that content in order to leverage the functionality of these device to build a richer user experience in a separate app. The devil is in the details and it is very important to keep your eyes on the stats to see where your mobile opportunities lay.

If you have any questions on how you can leverage your existing content to build an app please let us know.

• iPod touch owners download an average of 12 applications a month, 37 percent more than iPhone and Android users who download approximately nine new apps. webOS users downloaded an average of six applications per month.
• iPod touch users spent an average of 100 minutes per day using applications. webOS users spent an average of 87 minutes per day, followed by Android users at 80 minutes and iPhone users at 79 minutes per day.
• iPhone represented 47 percent of US smartphone usage in AdMob’s network in January 2010, followed by Android, RIM and webOS devices at 39, seven, and three percent, respectively.

The most interesting statistic as it relates to newspapers and potential paid application was  that:

• iPhone users continue to download more paid applications, with 50 percent of users purchasing at least one paid application a month compared to 21 percent of Android users.

What does this mean to publishers? Well it could mean that if you are looking to build apps for every platform it may make sense putting more emphasis on the iPhone. You can create a pretty basic Android app that simply reads the news, not invest a lot of money into it and give it away for free. However, on the iPhone if you invest more time and money on rich features you will see a greater return as users will be willing to pay for your application.

These finding make a lot of sense given the recent news from The Guardian. If the Guardian can charge $3.99 for their app and still get over 100,000 downloads in just 2 months, why can’t you? Running a trial with paid apps may make sense on the iPhone, at least for a short while to analyze acquisition rates.

This is great news and something newspaper publishers around the world should be paying attention to. Not only does it prove that consumers want to read their news through native mobile applications, but it also proves that they are willing to pay for this privilege.

A big round of applause go to the entire Guardian Digital Team for their pioneering work in the mobile media ecosystem. Congrats!

Download the app here

By not optimizing the page for mobile devices there was really no reason for users to download their application. In addition none of the advertising was optimized for the iPhone, so CTR’s were probably very close to 0. That’s all in the past now and as of last week they have announced plans to release a proper news application in April as well as a sports application that will also cover the upcoming World Cup of Soccer (along with live radio feeds of the games).

This seems like a pretty obvious move for a news organization these days, no? Well apparently not! The BBC is a government run organization and although it is quite progressive and recently has been run very much like a business, it is still held in check by the BBC Trust. In the past two months we have seen the launch and re-launch of a number of major national British newspaper apps – i.e. The Telegraph and The Guardian. These apps are both best of breed mobile news readers and have claimed the top spots in the UK iTunes News category. These publishers, as well as a number of other publishers from the Newspaper Publishers Association (NPA – a very powerful association made up of all the national newspapers in the UK) are yelling foul saying that the BBC’s new app strategy will distort the market.

This is a very interesting case of private and public news organizations fighting it out in a very new arena. We will clearly be following what happens as the NPA is currently in the process of  lobbying the BBC Trust and the British Department of Culture, Media and Sport to effectively have the applications banned. David Newell, the NPA’s director, summarized his organization’s argument in a terse and biting statement:

“Not for the first time, the BBC is preparing to muscle into a nascent market and trample over the aspirations of commercial news providers. At a time when the BBC is facing unprecedented levels of criticism over its expansion, and when the wider industry is investing in new models, it is extremely disappointing that the Corporation plans to launch services that would throw into serious doubt the commercial sector’s ability to make a return on its investment, and therefore its ability to support quality journalism.”

What is your take on this? Will the entrance of a real BBC app strategy hurt the current publishers? Will it distort the market or will it lead to greater competition and therefore increased innovation in the news app space? I know here in Canada the CBC (a Crown Corporation) has been aggressively working in the app space. They have built out an internal mobile team and are planning to push out a number of apps over 2010. Their CBC Radio application has held the #1 spot in the Canadian iTunes News category for some time now. If the CBC can do this, why can’t the BBC? We would love to hear from you. Should the BBC be allowed to release the application or not and if not, why? Let us know!

Update (2/26/2010):

An interesting piece popped up on the Times website today, however I am not sure whether this will have an effect on the future of the BBC’s iPhone apps. The piece talks about the end to an era of expansion for the BBC. The piece explains that the BBC will be cutting down most of its radio, TV and internet operations to allow for a level playing field with their corporate competitors. There are two quotes that really stand out to me here:

“Mark Thompson, the Director-General, will admit that the corporation, which is funded by the £3.6 billion annual licence fee, has become too large and must shrink to give its commercial rivals room to operate.”

and

“It will be seen as an attempt to show a potential Tory government that the BBC understands the effect the deep advertising recession has had on commercial rivals and that it does not need outside intervention to get its house in order.”

It appears that the BBC is going to be moving from their expansionary strategy and focus on quality over quantity. As I stated I am not sure whether this will have an effect on their app strategy, but it sounds like it may. The article can be found here and is definitely worth reading.

So the iPad was just officially announced by Steve Jobs and overall sentiment online has been mixed. I am going to reserve my judgement until I have actually placed my eyes and hands on the device myself. However, I do want to point out that this device or one similar to it is going to completely revolutionize the PC industry.

A few posts back I talked about the impending mobile OS wars and the future of the PC industry. The launch of the iPad proves that this movement is very real and that we are going to see more of these in the near future.

What does this all mean for newspapers and media companies? Well, we saw two media demo’s today. The first was from MLB who always do a spectacular job with their interactive technology innovations. If anyone is on the cusp of making ipTV attractive for the masses it is the MLB. more importantly though was the demo from the New York Times.

Here at Spreed we are very focused on the newspaper industry and as such the iPad is a very interesting platform  for us. The NYTimes demo showed off a great looking app that really took advantage of the entire form factor to replicate and enhance the traditional newspaper experience. I love how they have integrated videos and galleries seamlessly into articles and how users can get a snapshot of every article in todays newspaper through one view.

In addition this is a much smarter platform for newspapers and magazine publishers in comparison to the Kindle. For a good year now I have been saying that the Kindle is okay, but it doesn’t satisfy the needs of readers and advertisers. The Kindle is black and white and not interactive from a media stand point. The iPad completely satisfies these holes left by the Kindle. It can do everything a Kindle can, but displays everything in color and lets people really interact with the content (a must for online advertisers these days).

Mobile platforms are exciting and there is loads of potential for innovation. Spreed is definitely going to be playing around with the iPad and helping our clients embrace this new platform. However, we suggest everyone be cautious and make sure that they understand each platform before they move onto the next one. Make sure you can sell at least some of your existing mobile inventory on your iPhone, Blackberry and Android apps before you start sinking big money into an iTab edition of your paper.

I look forward to getting my iTab and sharing my first hand findings with  you all. Please feel free to call or email me with any questions about this new platform and what it means for your organization.

This months stats pointed out two very interesting items. Firstly, they noted that iPod touch numbers doubled after Christmas morning. This is to be expected (it also happened last year), but what are the implications? Publishers should understand that when building an application they must keep in mind the regularly offline iPod touch users. Spreed takes this into consideration when developing apps with our offline reading mode feature. All content is downloaded into the device when it has connectivity and reports usage back to the server when it reaches its next connection point. This means that iPod touch users (an increasingly growing market) can still use the app, download the content when in their Wi-fi network and read it on the go.

The second notable stat from this months report is that the iPhone accounted for 54% of all smartphone requests. Although it is important to take into consideration a multiple platform advertising strategy, it is clear that the iPhone is currently the best platform for displaying and seeing a return on your investment.

December 2009 Mobile Metrics Report

Today we released the December edition of our Mobile Metrics report, our monthly look at the data flowing through our network.  This month we look at several key metrics including manufacturer share, operating system share, top devices, and top smartphones for each region in our network.  At a glance, the data shows large regional differences in the devices that are accessing the mobile web.

Google Android is Google’s new mobile Operation System (OS). It’s an open source project that allows any cell phone manufacturer (no matter how big or small) to install a top of the line smart phone OS with a full ecosystem and community of developers supporting it. In many ways it is like Windows; just much more open. Just like Windows, Google Chrome can be installed on any mobile phone, making it a very attractive solution for hardware manufacturers. There is no doubt in my mind that like Windows did in the PC marketing, Android will do in the mobile market (that doesn’t mean it’s the best), but Apple will always have its loyal following. So how does this pose a threat to Microsoft’s main OS business?

I am going to make a bold prediction here that may or may not come true. I believe we are just beginning to see the first adoption wave of truly mobile computers. Apple is coming out with a Tablet or Slate as they call it at some point in 2010 (maybe on January 27th). In the mean time Google has proven already in 2009 that it can install its Android software on netbooks, tablets, and other portable PC’s etc. I believe that a good portion of the PC market is going to radically shift to a mobile platform as these devices go from being feature rich phones and lightweight PC’s to devices rivalling the power of your regular laptop and desktop PC. Then what is Microsoft going to do? Their mobile OS has poor adoption rates and the User Experience both on their core mobile OS and in the app store is far below subpar.

If the PC industry makes a radical shift over the next 5-10 years into a highly mobile platform and if Google does what it is currently doing and continues to make it easy for mobile hardware manufacturers to install its OS, we are going to see a very different OS landscape and Microsoft won’t be the leaders this time.

If any of you have used Admob before you will know that the majority of the ads that are served up on their network are pretty much replicas of traditional online banner ads and in most cases not well targeted and un-actionable. Mr. Jobs see’s this hole and knows the true powers of both mobile and more specifically the iPhone. Mobile advertising has the potential to be much more valuable than web based advertising both to end-users and brands. Instead of simply serving up two-dimensional banner ads that click to a mobile website, Jobs see’s the potential of utilizing the vast functionality of these smart phones to engage end-users.

Take this scenario for example. A user is checking their Yahoo Fantasy Sports app on the iPhone during Football Sunday. The phone knows which app is being used when and knows to serve up a Domino’s Pizza ad. The ad shows the latest deals from Domino’s and then lets the end-user make a call directly from the ad. The user is also then able to download a coupon from the ad directly into their phone’s photo gallery so that when the delivery boy arrives at the door they can redeem their discount. In cases like these the advertisement is adding loads of value to the end user and because they are so engaged the brand (Domino’s in this case) is happy.

Spreed believes in this methodology and is actively building these types of ads for our publishers’ advertising partners. In addition our ad platform has advanced targeting capabilities. Because we analyze every action that goes on within our apps we can begin profiling users and serving them the right ads at the right time.

These are very early days for the mobile advertising industry, however we believe, just like Steve Jobs, that this industry needs to go a lot further than simply pushing a random banner ad to an unknown end user.

Since our last post we quietly launched the Globe and Mail’s iPhone application. I call this a quiet launch as the app currently does not include all the features we plan on rolling out to the mass public. We used a strong early adopter community on Twitter to test out the base application. This was done to ensure our core focus on creating a strong, best of breed, content application was satisfied. Since the initial launch we have garnered lots of fantastic user feedback both through the hashtag #globeapp on twitter and through our uservoice page. This feedback has led to a second release that includes offline reading as well as haptic feedback and has also paved the way for many more future product developments.

Thanks to our core group of early adopters, it is safe to say that the soft-launch of the Globe and Mail application was a huge success. The usage numbers are through the roof and we have already been featured on one of Canada’s most prominent technology blogs, Techvibes. Warren Frey, who contributes to Techvibes on the topic of game changing business models states that:

As an ardent news junkie, one thing I immediately noticed about the app is that it’s rock solid. Unlike the New York Times iphone app, Spreed’s app is robust and never freezes up and crashes …

It’s  not what’s under the hood that’s interesting about Spreed, though they’ve certainly done a good job of crafting a solid mobile news app. It’s their adaptation of print media to a new form in a smart way that’s most impressive.

We appreciate Warren’s understanding and excitement for our new business model and are very proud that he believes that our goal of creating a reliable and user friendly way of diseminating the news on mobile phones has been achieved.

I would like to thank Warren and all the members of our fantastic early adopter community. Without all of you this application would not have been such a great success and we look forward to working with everyone in the near future to help build a best of breed mobile newspaper platform.

Just a little personal background: I am a young guy and have been a techie my entire life; pretty much ever since I can remember, so going to the “tech mecca” was big for me. San Fran didn’t let me down. It was everything I thought it would be and more. 

During the Summit we had the chance to attend seminars ranging in topics life environmental sustainability, econonmic responsibility, emerging technologies and most importantly, to us, the mobile revolution.

People have been talking about mobile for a long time and we have always known it was going to be big. It’s been touted as THE platform. A way for advertisers to connect with users in a far more intelligent way. The problem was that the technology and interest of the people just wasn’t there.

The Web 2.0 Summit presenters and attendees, however, seemed to suggest that the technology (i.e. 3G, the iPhone, the Bold) is now where it needs to be and that the market is ready to adopt it. 3G networks are rolling out all over North America and the iPhone and Bold is becoming a common staple of ever day society. We realized it was time to commit to the mobile revolution.

I had the opportunity to chat with mobile expert, Raven Zachary, who made me realize the opportunity in providing mobile services to businesses.

As a team we decided it was time to truly define our business model and It is no surprise, given the excitement at the conference, that we chose to focus our model on mobile – and the iPhone in particular. 

We left San Fran more inspired than ever.

As of today Spreed will be focusing on providing fully branded mobile applications for content providers. We will use our expertise in mobile reading technology to provide publishers with the best of breed mobile solutions.

But we wont just stop at reading technologies. We want to replicate the newspaper experience on a mobile device. We want to eliminate the need for paper based news. More importantly, we want to find ways for newspapers and other content providers to engage their readers and build revenue they never thought possible. 

That being said we will unfortunately have less time to focus on projects like Spreed:News. We appreciate all the feedback we’ve received so far and will continue to fund our R&D lab and develop new reading technologies. We apologize in advance if we do not respond to your feedback as fast as we have in the past.But at this current time, our prime focus will be on pushing content to mobile devices with a clear eye to helping the publishers monetize that content. Such is the reality of 2009 – and from a technology point of view, the timing couldn’t be better. improve the system. 

This is a very exciting time for Spreed and we appreciate all the support we’ve received and continue to receive. I look forward to connecting with everyone in the near future. Please do not hesitate to reach out to me if you have any questions about Spreed’s model or Spreed:News. I am always available via twitter @ http://www.twitter.com/spreed or less frequently via our facebook fan page @ http://www.facebook.com/pages/Spreed/51827975076

I look forward to hearing from you all

Best regards

Dave Coleman (@DaveColeman)

I must have drank some seriously potent iPhone Kool-aid while I was in San Fran for the Web 2.0 Summit. Ever since I have been back all I can even think, dream or talk about is the huge potential behind the iPhone. The problem is that some people, in some cases even Apple, do not seem to be fully appreciating the scope of what is possible here. 

The most recent example of a company failing to see the full potential behind this new platform is Penguin Publishing. I received an email from a colleague at the start of the week letting me know about a new application that Penguin released. It’s part of a broad sweeping initiative by the publisher to embrace the new social web, so kudos to them for finally jumping on the band wagon. However their iPhone application simply does the following, and I quote, “It makes the features of the Web site—the blog, book previews, podcasts, news and Penguin-specific book-finding tools—available on the iPhone.” Wow, awesome, but am I missing something here? What about the potential of literally selling people books to read on the iPhone through the application? They now have a direct channel to a medium that users can easily read their books on, why not skip over all the book re-sellers and simply sell the digital format of these books through their app? I dont get it! I am not saying that they should stop using book stores to sell their products, but the iPhone is a highly effective tool for reading books, why not go straight to the source? 

I recently downloaded Stanza (an e-book reader application for the iPhone) and blasted through Animal Farm in 3 days flat. The reading experience on the iPhone is an absolute pleasure. I actually enjoyed reading using my phone over and above reading a traditional paper back (I may just be a seriously early adopter though). The best part about it is that I never have to lug around another book with me. All I have to do is go to Stanza’s book store, download a new book and its with me everywhere I go. If the iPhone really is to become a new medium for content, why would Penguin develop an application that does not include an ebook reader so you can simply download their new releases and old classics directly into your phone while your on the go?

The other element of this whole debacle that eludes me is why Apple has not made an e-book reader part of their own native application bundle. They have an internet browser, a music and video player, a camera, but no book reader. If this is really going to become the new media device of the future, they certainly should include the most trusted form of content … text! And whats more is they have the perfect distribution channel to be selling e-books through; iTunes! They already sell audio books, why not sell ebooks also to be read directly through an application on their phone just like MP3′s. Hell they can even include DRM for all I care, to get the publishers on the board. 

There is a lot of potential here in the field of text based content on the iPhone that a lot of people seem to be looking over in favour of more flashy features. I love all the potential behind some of these new innovative features but In my opinion (please keep in mind the line I stated off with, that I definitely drank some potent iPhone kool-aid) the iPhone has the potential to destroy Amazon’s Kindle business and in turn the future of Amazon’s e-book sales. Who wants to lug around an extra device or another book when you already have everything you need in your pocket? Not me, thats for sure.

I am one of those 395,000 people and can say that I love their application. The form factor on the phone does make it hard to read the books at times, however if they were to integrate Spreeds technology into their platform, they could have a seriously killer application. I am very excited to see how this and the host of other e-book reader (that I am sure are currently waiting to be accepted by Apple) progress in the market. Maybe Amazon is wrong. Maybe people don’t want yet another device to carry around. Maybe people are happy enough reading their books on their phone while on the go and reserving the physical copies for when they get back to their home libraries. Only time will tell.

Spreed:News was officially accepted into the web app site two days ago. It has been labelled as a staff pick and is currently the featured news application. Even if you have a first generation iPhone or an iTouch you can check out Spreed:News here.

Update: After 3 days Spreed:News is now on Apple’s most popular Web Applications list. Thank you to everyone who has provided us with feedback. Keep your eyes on Spreed as we continue to roll out more news feeds and increased functionality over the next few weeks.

On two other seperate notes; our iPhone application will be going live in the iTunes store later this week and we will be demoing Spreed:News tonight at DemoCamp18.

Here is a round up of some of the blog posts on Spreed:News from yesterday:

• Spreed:News Brings 3G Speeds to your Eyeballs
• Spreed for Speed
• Spreed Launches iPhone News Reader Called Spreed:News
• The Need for Spreed Comes to the iPhone
• Speed Reading Software for the iPhone Launches
• Spreed:News Tries to Redefine Reading
• Read News on the Go with New Mobile App from Canadian Developer
• Congratulations to Spreed:News on their iPhone Launch Today
• Spreed Launches Mobile News Reader for iPhone
• Spreed Inc. Releases iPhone Application that Lets People Rapidly Read News on the Go
• Spreed:News Mobile Demo

Thanks again to everyone that made the Spreed:News launch happen. For more articles click here

Using Spreed:News users can customize their news\blog feeds and read articles through the Spreed proprietary reader. Our proprietary reader organizes words in logical groupings that are easy for the brain to digest. By flashing these groupings, we are able to increase users reading speed and because there is no interaction necessary after the user chooses the article it is simple and easy to read the news on the go.

We are very excited to be releasing the the first of many products that Spreed has to offer. Please contact me (Dave Coleman) at dave@spreedinc.com , if you have any questions, comments or feedback.

For a copy of the press release documenting our launch click here and watch the demo of Spreed:News found below