News Corp To Launch Digital Paper For iPad

Technology giant Apple and media conglomerate News Corp are rumoured to be teaming up to launch a digital newspaper produced specially for the Apple’s iPad tablet.

The paper is said to have neither print nor web edition. Instead, news stories will be pushed directly to iPad users who subscribe for the service at a cost of 62p a week, or about £2.65 a month.

According to reports in the US media, the ‘iNewspaper’ will be unveiled early next year, featuring US-focused news and editorial.

The Secret Daily Project

The project is said to have been hatched in New York three months ago, as part of a secret collaboration between News Corp owner Rupert Murdoch and Apple CEO Steve Jobs.

The Murdoch-Jobs Daily venture came after a survey showed customers tend to spend more time on their iPads than they do on the traditional web, reports reveal.

A hundred journalists, including the Sun’s online editor Pete Picton, have been hired to produce news content for the world’s first digital newspaper ever created for tablets.

Apple was contacted by eWEEK Europe for comment but said the company did not comment on rumour or speculation.

According to the US fashion journal Women’s Wear Daily, Jesse Angel, the managing editor of the New York Post – who is also a school friend of Murdoch’s son, Lachlan – will be leading the newsroom on the 26^th floor of the News Corp building.

With projections that tens of millions of iPads will be sold in 2011, The Daily is seen as another attempt from the News Corp owner to charge online readers for reading news behind a pay-wall.