Fairfax: It’s a Sydney Morning Herald Smart Edition, not an iPad app
Sydney Morning Herald boss Lloyd Whish-Wilson has told Mumbrella that the paper’s electronic edition launched last week is not intended to be the newspaper’s main iPad app.
He told Mumbrella: “There’s no suggestion this is our app. This is an add-on.”
Last week Fairfax announced the SMH’s Smart Edition with a press release that began:
“The Sydney Morning Herald launches ‘Smart Edition’ App for the iPad
“Sydney, July 22, 2010: Fairfax Media today announced the launch of The Sydney Morning Herald smart edition app for the iPad, an innovation in publishing that will bring a new dimension to newspaper consumption for both readers and advertisers.
“The smart edition app, which includes a raft of reader-friendly features, allows readers to view The Sydney Morning Herald in full on the iPad, the world’s most talked-about digital device…”
However, Whish-Wilson today told Mumbrella that there had been no intention of presenting its Smart Edition as the SMH iPad app – merely as an electronic edition of the newspaper in PDF format. The iPad app will come in September, he said.
The Smart Edition was launched with a four page wraparound dominated by a front cover image of the SMH on an iPad. It is available in the Apple iPad app store where it is currently scoring an average review of one-and-a-half stars out of five.
Asked whether the marketing of the launch of the Smart edition would have been confusing for the market, Whish-Wilson conceded: “Being shown on an iPad was perhaps an error.”
Early this week, Mumbrella editor Tim Burrowes was highly critical of the strategy behind the Smart Edition.
But in an email to Mumbrella (reproduced with permission), Whish-Wilson today said:
“The Smart Edition is an electronic version of The Sydney Morning Herald newspaper,which is where we have placed it in the market and which was made clear in the initial press release. It was developed as a value add for those of our subscribers and readers who like the newspaper format and who also want the convenience of reading their newspaper in alternative, electronic formats. It means our subscribers can take their subscription with them to their desk-top; lap-top, or iPad. It also means that we can offer the full newspaper to some people in remote areas for whom delivery had become uneconomic, or very slow and difficult to achieve.
“The SMH has more than 80,000 subscribers Monday-Friday, and more than 120,000 at weekends. The great majority of these enjoy the newspaper “experience.” That is: turning the pages to scan the editorial offerings and making personal reading choices based on headline or subject matter; going to favourite sections; and scanning advertising. These people now have the opportunity to do it where they want to, as part of the cost of their subscription. We have offered them a free trial and will include it in their subscription packages, adding value and convenience. In NSW/ACT, the prices are at present part of our most popular subscription packages. We will very soon also be offering a digital-only subscription in NSW/ACT.
“The Smart Edition was already under development for PCs before the release of the iPad. It was made available on the iPad because it was clear some of our subscribers would very rapidly begin using the new technology. The Smart Edition was never planned, nor expected to be, the end-product in the development of the Sydney Morning Herald iPad app. This is now well in to development, and as MD Brian McCarthy said in his press release, will be released shortly. This will be a paid, inter-active native app, unlike anything yet produced by a newspaper publisher in Australia.”
He told Mumbrella that when the main iPad app is released in September, unlike the Smart Edition it will be available without a print subscription. He said that the price of the app was still be debated internally.
Meanwhile, Fairfax’s Australian Financial Review has this week taken a similar approach, running a house ad promoting afr.com as being “iPad ready”:
As an existing subscriber to the paper version, I had a quick look at the Smart Edition on the iPad last night. For what it’s worth, I think it works well as a tool that enables me to quickly scan the paper and tap through on the headlines that catch my attention.
Is it a great iPad app for distributing the news? Not really. However, as a free add-on for my existing subscription I find it works quite well based on about 15 minutes of perusal. I have struggled to find the time to read the SMH of late and if this helps me get more value out of my subscription, more power to it.
Of course, if this apparently in-the-works “native” iPad app provides a better experience at a similar or lower price, there’s a very good chance I’ll cancel my dead tree version that clutters up my house and fills up my recycling bin every fortnight.
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So, they tried to pass it off and see how many people would actually like it, realised everyone thinks it’s quite the meh, and then called it an electronic add-on or whatever? Nice.
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I think a better reference for it would have been the ‘Not-So-Smart’ Edition!
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If it looks like and app and operates like an app…
Damage is done now. Even if they launched a free app, it would tank given the bad press this cock-up has caused.
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seriously Fairfax… you really expect us to believe that?
I would like to see some of your cynical columnists buy that crap if it were any other company. That’s like Apple saying that the new iPhone is supposed to not work, but that’s not the real one – the real one comes out in September. Sorry if you purchased it!
Just because you put ‘smart edition’ in front of app, still makes it an app.
Admit it Fairfax, you tried the cheap way out, got it wrong, and now you’re back-peddling. Just be done with it, and give your readers something better.
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If you have to write an essay explaining your new product to your dumb customers, you are clearly doing it wrong
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I’ve never heard such rubbish in all my life. They launched this with full intention of positioning it as the SMH Ipad app……and when everyone decides they hate it they send Whish-Wilson out to back-pedal furiously.
Why would you launch a half arsed attempt when the ‘real ipad app’ is due in September? Absolute joke……The Australian here i come!
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App-alling
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So far I have found viewing the actual SMH website on the ipad a better experience, despite the tabloid look, because there are no videos. I don’t accidently trigger advertisements containing poisonous brats dancing in front of a TV. (I still dont know what the ad was for after numerous viewings).
However the website is still extremely messy, overcrowded and hideously ugly. I would expect the SMH to be a bit above the Daily Telegraph.
The SMH needs to look at the website for the New York Times. To see how it is done.
Let’s see what September brings.
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its in the app store – therefore its an app.
fairfax pick your ball back up
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the nzherald.co.nz ipad App is getting good reviews in NZ http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz-h.....f=masthead
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It’s not just the app they screwed.
http://www.presscouncil.org.au...../1472.html
As I’ve said before, The Age will be dead and gone by Feb. 1, 2011, victim of its editors’ incompetence and board’s stupidity.
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