
In the “web vs. apps” debate for online publishers, apps are on a run - dnetesn
http://www.niemanlab.org/2015/02/in-the-web-vs-apps-debate-for-online-publishers-apps-are-on-a-run/?utm_source=Daily+Lab+email+list&utm_campaign=68832a6498-dailylabemail3&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_d68264fd5e-68832a6498-395827456
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pmontra
From the post: "Smartphone owners “use an average of 24 apps per month but
spend more than 80 percent of their [in app] time on just five apps.”"

So you want to be one of those 5 apps, maybe being into the other 19 is
acceptable. There isn't space for everybody.

I'd like to know how many web sites smartphone owners look at every day. My
unsupported by data gut feeling is that there is more space there: bookmarks
are not more manageable than apps but web sites can be discovered and accessed
from other sites and even linked from within apps (think FB). I won't
recommend going app only. Example: Techcrunch has both and I don't think they
would ditch the site. Anybody from TC here?

I dare to say that apps are for frequent readers, probably not all of them.

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adventured
The notion the entire Internet will narrow down to 10 or 20 non-gaming apps,
is obviously absurd. There's clearly vastly more room on the Web. It's going
to stay that way.

Take a simple example. Quora, Answers.com, Yahoo Answers, eHow, Wikipedia,
Stack Exchange, WikiHow, How To Geek, WebMD, Instructables - and about 87
other sites people turn to via Google for information or answers.

There's zero chance a person is going to use all of those in the form of apps.
However over the course of time, I've used every single one of them via Google
search results (some a lot more than others). On the Web, those services have
a lot of real value; were they just apps, probably at least half of them would
not exist.

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snowwrestler
Gawker and Buzzfeed are building some new apps--so what? We have no idea if
they will succeed. That hardly counts as "on a run."

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monsterix
I don't use a single native app for news. Not even aggregators like Flipboard
who wrap it up with fancy animations. For me and my friends it's web all the
way.

Not sure about others though, I could be an outlier but I'd rather assume not.

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return0
I get the "apps for utilities" , but "apps for content"? I just cannot see
people bothering to download an app for every website they visit and
personally i never have . Data for this?

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prof_hobart
If it's content that I access regularly (BBC News/Guardian/Twitter/Facebook),
then I'll have the app. For other content consumption, I'll use the web.

What I don't understand is why, for organisations whose primary purpose in
life is content, it's even much of a dilemma. Putting together a simple web
page or a simple app to serve up identical content different ways should
really not be a huge amount of work.

If you want your app or site to really stand out from a usability perspective
- like Flipboard - then I can understand it. But Flipboard's product is
primarily its UI, not its content. For the Beeb and The Guardian, all I want
is a reasonably functional app, and I wouldn't be surprised if you could find
a free framework for 90% of what you need on Github for that.

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mslot
My 20 most-used apps:

7 by Google - Chrome, Gmail, Hangouts, Maps, Calendar, Translate

4 by Facebook - WhatsApp, Facebook, Messenger, Instagram

4 by start-ups - Netflix, Dropbox, Skyscanner, Meetup

3 utilities - Camera, Jota text editor, Avia

3 Netherlands essentials - 9292, nu.nl, NPO

In case of Facebook, nu.nl (News site) and Translate, I actually prefer the
mobile site, because their apps are too restrictive and suck at text. I think
that's typical for text content apps.

Interestingly, it appears most apps that I use regularly started out as
websites that became an app when they were successful, stable products.

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spacemanmatt
Netflix and Dropbox are startups? I know less about Skyscanner and Meetup, but
I have a hard time calling Netflix a startup anymore.

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z3t4
Haven't the script already won over the app? Instead of downloading and
installing each app, you import / require the modules needed.

There's one huge advantage with apps though, that they are easier to make
money from.

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Aoyagi
My hate for the overuse of "app", isn't a good number of them just web
wrappers?

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philippnagel
Well, they are downloadable from their respective app stores. Therefor they
are apps.

