New York Times Goes Online with New Mobile App Features

The New York Times (NYT) has launched two new subscription plans for their customers on March 26, which includes a more affordable app geared for those who access the newspaper website through their mobile phones.

This app is called the NYT Now and it is part of the American daily newspaper company's effort to increase their readers' share in the digital category. Since the apps come at a low price, this is also seen as a move to increase the newspaper's revenue. Another new app is the Times Premier, which is similar to the Times Insider. Times Premier will allow readers a peek of how the news stories are developed and how the journalists work to get a story published. Both of these new apps are now available for download.

Just like other newspaper organizations, NYT is finding ways to boost its revenue and at the same time engage the readers who are using their mobile phones to know the latest news. Since the New York Times has required a subscription for access to their website, the number of their digital readers rose to 760,000. However, the growth of this reader base seemed to be stunted for the last few years.

The launch of these apps, particularly NTY Now will target mobile readers and will give them access to news stories. The app will also present a rundown of articles from The Times and from other news websites. Aside from that, readers will also be given a summary of the reported news in the morning and evening. Editor of NYT Now, Clifford Levy explained in a New York Times article that this app was "a leap like we took when we went from print to the web". He also stated that the app's content would be edited by journalists and not by a computer algorithm.

The subscription price for NYT Now is $8 a month while existing subscribers of the app are not required to pay for the app.

New York Times is also scheduled to launch two more apps, one which focuses on food while the other will present opinion articles. Denise Warren, executive vice president for digital products and services, explained in an article published in New York Times itself that these new apps are likely to be launched on summer.