One of the features I’m most looking forward to in iOS 5 is Newsstand, I can’t wait to have my news and magazines automagically download to my phone every morning. But what else is there to know about Newsstand?
For developers, Newsstand is opt-in, as in you choose whether or not to make your app a ‘Newsstand app’. If devs decide to make their apps a Newsstand app, it’ll be placed inside Newsstand only (it won’t be anywhere else in the iPhone) with a ‘dynamic’ icon that mimics a magazine cover or newspaper front page. That icon changes with every new issue.
Of course, the coolest feature of Newsstand is how new issues will be downloaded in the background so users don’t have to wait around to download new content. Apple limits these automatic downloads to once a day to preserver your battery. It’s very much like having the paper boy deliver the latest newspaper every morning.
We’ll have to wait until the event today to see which publishers are jumping into Newsstand to see how good Newsstand will be but I’m hopeful. [Poynter]