Facebook-type news aggregator in the fashion of Flipboard may be on its way sooner than you think!
Move over Flipboard
A report from the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) was has been released detailing Facebook’s plans to launch their own news aggreagtor in the style of the monumentally popular Flipboard. WSJ also made reference to Facebook’s plans to launch the new app in the forthcoming months, leaving Facebook fans eagerly waiting in anticipation only days after rumours of the social network giant launching a Facebook phone after Mark Zuckerberg visited Samsung HQ last week.
“The Reader”
Facebook are currently developing the news reader with an added emphasis on mobile devices, much like Flipboard which to date has only been available on a mobile platform. Facebook have dubbed the app “Reader,” Facebook have gone public with the announcement and told fans around the world that the Flipboard-like news aggregation app has been in development for over a year, but why are they announcing this now? And how will it perform against Flipboard?
Facebook’s Investors haven’t been happy that the social giant is trading below its IPO (Initial Public Offering) price, and a news app could drastically change their influence on the mobile platform. There are three ways which Facebook’s shiny new app could beat Flipboard in terms of popularity and user experience…
Mobile Ad Exclusive
Facebook can really use this mobile platform to capitalise on and push its mobile ads efforts further via the app. ‘Reader’ as a stand alone app could really entice brands to advertise on the platform as Facebook is yet to completely dominate the mobile platform as its previous efforts were a less than perfect strike as mobile advertising proved to be unimpressive.
Huge User-Base
Now there is one thing can Facebook can boast of, a larger user-base than any other social platform in the world. With this in mind, the support of over a billion Facebook users could really launch ‘Reader’ as either a stand alone app or a web-based one, or even as an added update to its NewsFeed. Regardless of its form, people would still use it!
Users with Time (…to waste)
There’s no denying that Facebook’s users, or at least a large proportion of them, have time to waste. They check their NewsFeed or update their status and spend the next several hours glancing over their friend’s status’s, liking, commenting on and sharing content and it is this user-base the will make ‘Reader’ the biggest news app to date. Without procrastination, Facebook may not enjoy as much popularity as it has and continues to do so.
Friends, relationship drama and quests for likes and shares aside, people are continuously growing more concerned with what’s happening in the real world. A news reader would encourage people spend more time on Facebook to consume news rather than looking to third party sites to get their news fix.
Are you a news consumer?
So if you consume your news in the form of an app such as Flipboard, does Facebook ‘Reader’ sound interesting to you? Are Facebook one step closer to providing every app that you could possibly even want to use?
We want to know what you think, so leave your comments in the box below!
