AP gives the iPhone special lovin

When you have the best demographics and an exploding user base you
always get special treatment. Is it fair, certainly not; but that is
the way life works.

A new offering by the Associated Press titled the 'Mobile News
Network', will offer a round-up of the company's own news coverage
with that of local newspapers formatted specifically to support the
Apple iPhone.

http://www.talkiphone.com/iphone-***...s-service-346/

At 15 Apr 2008 05:00:53 -0700 4phun wrote:
> When you have the best demographics and an exploding user base you
> always get special treatment. Is it fair, certainly not; but that is
> the way life works.


Actually this particular story works more like that old kid's game of gossip,
where kids sit in a circle and pass an oral story around and see how far it
gets twisted by the time it comes back around...


> A new offering by the Associated Press titled the 'Mobile News
> Network', will offer a round-up of the company's own news coverage
> with that of local newspapers formatted specifically to support the
> Apple iPhone.
>
> http://www.talkiphone.com/iphone-***...s-service-346/


Here's how the gossip game works:

AP's Press Release announces a "Mobile News Network" that "will provide a
national platform for smart phone users..." and "be optimized for the
richest multimedia experience the new*wireless devices will allow..."
(Note the word "iPhone" was not mentioned in the PR.)

The story passes to reporters, who have to add an iPhone angle, because you
can't possibly write a story about mobile phones without mentioning the
iPhone, like this Broadcasting and Cable article headline: "The
AP... ...announced the formation of the Mobile News Network, which will
deliver news to smart phones including Apple's iPhone."

Which passed on to iPhone bloggers becomes: "Associated Press announces
Mobile News Network for iPhone and other smartphones..." which continues to
make the rounds and eventually becomes "formatted specifically to support
the Apple iPhone."

A few more blogs and soon it'll be for the iPhone only!


But yes, the AP will be producing a local-newspaper co-branded, ad-supported,

mobile web service to complement the other thousand mobile news
pages/services out there now.

Slow iPhone "news" day, 4phun?

Todd Allcock wrote:

> AP's Press Release announces a "Mobile News Network" that "will provide a
> national platform for smart phone users..." and "be optimized for the
> richest multimedia experience the new wireless devices will allow..."
> (Note the word "iPhone" was not mentioned in the PR.)

Actually it was. Not in the blog story of the story, but by AP itself.

"WASHINGTON (AP) — The Associated Press announced Monday it will further
cut fees paid by struggling newspaper members and will develop an
advertising-supported service that will deliver stories and photos to
advanced cell phones, including the iPhone."

On Apr 15, 1:44 pm, Todd Allcock <eleccon...@AmericaOnLine.com> wrote:
> At 15 Apr 2008 05:00:53 -0700 4phun wrote:
>
> > When you have the best demographics and an exploding user base you
> > always get special treatment. Is it fair, certainly not; but that is
> > the way life works.
>
> Actually this particular story works more like that old kid's game of gossip,
> where kids sit in a circle and pass an oral story around and see how far it
> gets twisted by the time it comes back around...
>
> > A new offering by the Associated Press titled the 'Mobile News
> > Network', will offer a round-up of the company's own news coverage
> > with that of local newspapers formatted specifically to support the
> > Apple iPhone.
>
> >http://www.talkiphone.com/iphone-***...s-service-346/
>
> Here's how the gossip game works:
>
> AP's Press Release announces a "Mobile News Network" that "will provide a
> national platform for smart phone users..." and "be optimized for the
> richest multimedia experience the new wireless devices will allow..."
> (Note the word "iPhone" was not mentioned in the PR.)
>
> The story passes to reporters, who have to add an iPhone angle, because you
> can't possibly write a story about mobile phones without mentioning the
> iPhone, like this Broadcasting and Cable article headline: "The
> AP... ...announced the formation of the Mobile News Network, which will
> deliver news to smart phones including Apple's iPhone."
>
> Which passed on to iPhone bloggers becomes: "Associated Press announces
> Mobile News Network for iPhone and other smartphones..." which continues to
> make the rounds and eventually becomes "formatted specifically to support
> the Apple iPhone."
>
> A few more blogs and soon it'll be for the iPhone only!
>
> But yes, the AP will be producing a local-newspaper co-branded, ad-supported,
>
> mobile web service to complement the other thousand mobile news
> pages/services out there now.
>
> Slow iPhone "news" day, 4phun?

Well Todd at first I am inclined to give you an A for effort in your
research.

But since you got it wrong I am now more inclined to issue a written
reprimand for incompetence.

Since this is USENET I have decided to write it off as you may be a
distant relative to Larry.

There has been 11,078 blog posts found related to AP Building An Ad-
Subsidized Mobile in the last 24 hours ...source -> onpost.com. Most
of them are not Apple centric ie. spinning the news.

Going back to the original disclosure it was an announcement that was
made by CEO Tom Curley at the AP's annual meeting Monday in
Washington, D.C.

"The formation of the Mobile News Network positions members to capture
opportunities on high-growth mobile platforms," Curley said in his
report.

The iPhone was selected as the first such 'high-growth' platform by
AP's Digital Cooperative, which was formed to identify digital
opportunities for AP content.

Now I agree Curley mentioned that they were working with other
manufacturers to tailor AP content and video but face it - the Apple
iiPhone had their hearts and imagination as they set up this new
venture for their news providing partners. Not to mention it is simple
to reformat pages like Fox and ABC did just for the iPhone browser.
The advantage to those with iPhones is this stuff looks even better on
the iPhone when browsing content then some of those poorly designed
web sites not meant for a four inch screen. Most of the many poorly
designed sites are so full of frames and crappy clutter they don't
really look all that good even on a PC with a 24 inch screen!

BTW the above mentioned sites have figured out how to pass video to
the iPhone so you can see what they are running currently on TV as
they rerun key snippets of breaking news. It is like turning to cable
news live while a story is breaking and seeing the video they just ran
a few minutes ago being run again because of its shock value. But you
can see it any where anytime on the iPhone.

Now Todd who was AP after? It was "to capture opportunities on high-
growth mobile platforms," Curley said".

They want to be among the first to capture iPhone owners!

When you have the best demographics and an exploding user base you
always get special treatment. Is it fair, certainly not; but that is
the way life works.

"SMS" <scharf.steven@geemail.com> wrote in message
news:4804f74e$0$36392$742ec2ed@news.sonic.net...
> Todd Allcock wrote:
>
>> AP's Press Release announces a "Mobile News Network" that "will provide a
>> national platform for smart phone users..." and "be optimized for the
>> richest multimedia experience the new wireless devices will allow..."
>> (Note the word "iPhone" was not mentioned in the PR.)
>
> Actually it was. Not in the blog story of the story, but by AP itself.
>
> "WASHINGTON (AP) — The Associated Press announced Monday it will further
> cut fees paid by struggling newspaper members and will develop an
> advertising-supported service that will deliver stories and photos to
> advanced cell phones, including the iPhone."

Yep, I'll use my spatula to yank the egg off my face now!

I read the PR on my phone using Google's "auto reformatting for mobile
phone" function and didn't realize it displayed the article mid-PR (it
displayed "page 2" which left off the 1st paragraph that mentioned the
iPhone.) Pulling it up on my PC I saw the all-important first iPhone-filled
paragraph.

My apologies to the iPhone! ;-) I'll point out the PR didn't mention
"specifically formatted for iPhone" pages, but I certainly wouldn't discount
the possibility that they'll create a bunch of variants for different
devices.

"4phun" <vic.healey@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:50b24c9a-2645-471c-9687-a264ec2859eb@d45g2000hsc.googlegroups.com...
>> Slow iPhone "news" day, 4phun?
>
> Well Todd at first I am inclined to give you an A for effort in your
> research.
>
> But since you got it wrong I am now more inclined to issue a written
> reprimand for incompetence.
>
> Since this is USENET I have decided to write it off as you may be a
> distant relative to Larry.

Now them's fightin' words... ;-)

> There has been 11,078 blog posts found related to AP Building An Ad-
> Subsidized Mobile in the last 24 hours ...source -> onpost.com. Most
> of them are not Apple centric ie. spinning the news.

Agreed... I just posted my apology and half-retraction- the original AP PR
did mention the iPhone (as an example- "iPhone and other smartphones...")

> Going back to the original disclosure it was an announcement that was
> made by CEO Tom Curley at the AP's annual meeting Monday in
> Washington, D.C.
>
> "The formation of the Mobile News Network positions members to capture
> opportunities on high-growth mobile platforms," Curley said in his
> report.
>
> The iPhone was selected as the first such 'high-growth' platform by
> AP's Digital Cooperative, which was formed to identify digital
> opportunities for AP content.
>
> Now I agree Curley mentioned that they were working with other
> manufacturers to tailor AP content and video but face it - the Apple
> iiPhone had their hearts and imagination as they set up this new
> venture for their news providing partners.

Yes, but it's still a leap to present this as an iPhone exclusive.

> Not to mention it is simple
> to reformat pages like Fox and ABC did just for the iPhone browser.
> The advantage to those with iPhones is this stuff looks even better on
> the iPhone when browsing content then some of those poorly designed
> web sites not meant for a four inch screen.

I agree completely. Still, it's ironic, that pages need to be refomatted
for a "real browser." I've said many times however, that mobile formatted
web pages are just as much for the small screen real estate than for any
deficiencies in a mobile browser. The basic WAP/XHTM-style single column
web-page with inline graphics works much better on a small screen than a
page designed for a large screen, regardless if the mobile device can render
it or not.

> Most of the many poorly
> designed sites are so full of frames and crappy clutter they don't
> really look all that good even on a PC with a 24 inch screen!

No argument there either. As I've often said, I have a lot of mobile/PDA
formatted sites bookmarked on my PC- when I want a five-day Accuweather
forcast, the mobile site pops rights up vs. the cluttered "full site"
replete with video commercials for dog food!

> BTW the above mentioned sites have figured out how to pass video to
> the iPhone so you can see what they are running currently on TV as
> they rerun key snippets of breaking news. It is like turning to cable
> news live while a story is breaking and seeing the video they just ran
> a few minutes ago being run again because of its shock value. But you
> can see it any where anytime on the iPhone.

As well as a myriad of other phones.

> Now Todd who was AP after? It was "to capture opportunities on high-
> growth mobile platforms," Curley said".
>
> They want to be among the first to capture iPhone owners!

Agreed, but as popular as the iPhone is, it's still only a slice of the
"smartphone" market. I'm equally sure they want to catch the eyeballs of
RIM, Symbian, WinMo and (future) "Googleoids" as well. Smartphones are
permeating non-business users as well in record numbers, buoyed, I'm sure,
at least in part, by the "tide raises all boats" effect of the iPhone's
success.

> When you have the best demographics and an exploding user base you
> always get special treatment. Is it fair, certainly not; but that is
> the way life works.

I've yet to see any "special treatment" that wasn't "sponsored" by Apple or
AT&T (i.e. YouTube's willingness to re-encode their entire library from .flv
to QT to support the iPhone's mobile YouTube app.) Virtually every iPhone
specific webservice you've every enlightened all of us about was to overcome
an iPhone deficiency and allow it to access the same content or
functionality other smartphones could already access or perform. (I.e. the
streaming music Fly-whatever service, NYPL's digital content on iTunes,
Talkety's "almost-kinda-sorta-VoIP," etc.) While these services are
certainly important to iPhone owners, they are pretty yawn-inducing to
people whose phones have already had access to such features for a very long
time.

The coming iPhone 2.0 upgrade, along with the iTunes software store should
really be the turning point to see if the iPhone actually becomes a true
"smartphone" rather than what it is now- the absolute best media
player/webtablet phone on the market.

"Todd Allcock" <elecconnec@AmericaOnLine.com> wrote in news:xh7Nj.45$wL5.25
@fe101.usenetserver.com:

> My apologies to the iPhone!

What's this all about?? We had special news websites for mobile phones for
years!

Is there a news item I missed in there some where?

Of course, we COULD buy a device that didn't have such a little screen
resolution and supported common enhancements like Javascript, Flash, etc.

That that wouldn't be an iPhone....(c;

4phun wrote:
> Since this is USENET I have decided to write it off as you may be a
> distant relative to Larry.

Since this is USENET I have decided to write it off as you may be a
CLOSE relative to OXFORD.

"DTC" <me@nothingtoseehere.zzx> wrote in message
newsL7Nj.2585$%V7.2466@newssvr14.news.prodigy.ne t...
> 4phun wrote:
>> Since this is USENET I have decided to write it off as you may be a
>> distant relative to Larry.
>
> Since this is USENET I have decided to write it off as you may be a
> CLOSE relative to OXFORD.


There both the same person. Along with a few more AKA's as well.