The BBC announced today that it will soon offer iPhone apps for its news and sport content. The apps will then be followed by version for the BlackBerry and those running the Android operating system.
The BBC said that the apps were developed because more people use "sophisticated handheld devices" to view content.
CCS Insight analysts think the apps would "increase tension between publishers of paid-for content and those reliant on other revenue." Some think the news industry is struggling to find the means to get rolling within the digital world.
"Whilst the BBC's impulse to enter an already crowded news and sport apps market place is understandable, the move belies the fundamentally competitive nature of the Corporation's approach to new services," said Emily Bell, director of digital content at the Guardian. "Applications are a long way away from being 'broadcast' media, and, unlike the web, they form a market which the BBC is seeking to disrupt." Bell continued saying the "considerable cost" of developing apps for all platforms meant the BBC was in "territory most publishers could not afford to inhabit."
On the contrary, Erik Huggers, BBC director of future media and technology, said the BBC audience "want to access the digital services that they have paid for at a time and place that suits them. Today's announcement means that we are catching up with our audiences," he explained at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.
As for the actual app, which is due in April, will provide content from the BBC News website, including features such as written stories, correspondent blogs as well as audio and video. Users will be able to send comments and pictures directly to the newsroom. The sports app will be released just in time for the World Cup, which begins in June.
Image courtesy of Zahipedia.com
