Web on an App, available exclusively to Times subscribers with paid news subscriptions, provides access to The Gray Lady’s vision of audio journalism through the daily news podcast The Headlines and Reporter Reads short dispatches featuring reporters reading their work aloud.
Document Don’t Create
Gary Vaynerchuk, AKA GaryVee, is one of the quickest influencers to jump onto any new app or social platform and begin producing content quickly. A five-time New York Times bestseller and prolific YouTube creator, his video strategy lies within Document, Don’t Create; this method captures behind-the-scenes moments rather than creating all new work from scratch. For best results, create a Slack channel for collaboration and schedule weekly recording sessions to capture office life; use these videos later as sources for new pieces of content creation!
Crossword
The New York Times Crossword App is the official mobile version of their popular daily puzzle and can provide digital access to them, dating back to 1997. In addition, shorter puzzles that don’t appear in print may also be featured here – making this accessible for subscribers and non-subscribers alike!
The app’s current version may not be perfect, but it’s an excellent starting point. Its beautiful design and comprehensive features – a search bar, filtering capabilities by category and difficulty levels, an eye-friendly color scheme, and a “My Packs” section where puzzle collections are organized around specific themes – make for an engaging puzzle-play experience.
The addition of just a few elements could significantly improve an app. For instance, users could share completed puzzles with their friends via clicking or tapping a social media icon – this would increase user engagement and draw in more players into playing the game – an easy implementation feature!
Additionally, an app should include achievements for players to unlock. This will give them a sense of accomplishment while helping retain and loyalize existing customers and encouraging newcomers to try the NYT Crossword puzzles.
Crossword puzzles first debuted in The Times newspaper in 1942 and have since been regularly published by them. Margaret Petherbridge Farrar served as its inaugural puzzle editor, followed by Eugene Maleska, who directed them between 1977 and 1993; today, Will Shortz oversees their creation and editing.
The New York Times Crossword has become one of the top games on the App Store, drawing avid followers through its superior content and user-friendly app design. Its advantage could quickly deteriorate if it fails to expand its reach and functionality.
It is time for The New York Times to expand its platform and functionality; otherwise, competition could soon overtake it, sending readers searching for puzzle fixes elsewhere.
Badges
Badges used to be predominantly seen on Windows desktop computers and in the lower-right corner of BlackBerry phones; with touch-screen devices becoming ubiquitous, badges began appearing across a variety of social media apps and mobile operating systems such as Google Plus (where they were filled with inexplicably high numbers) as well as now appearing exclusively on Android smartphones.
Now, The New York Times is using badge swipes to track its own employees’ return from fieldwork, though their newsroom and tech unions have sent cease-and-desist letters to management over its plan to use badges as worker tracking mechanisms, sources tell Axios. Badges have become status symbols; for instance, in its local launch of The Wall Street Journal in New York, it awards citizens with Banker Badges if they visit the Financial District, Urban Adventurer Badges for visiting all five boroughs twice, or Lunch Box reviewer badges when dining at one of those reviewed restaurants reviewed by The Wall Street Journal newspaper.
