Reading The Daily has become my morning habit. I am a fan. I look forward to reading it every morning. The Daily is a daily newspaper that looks like a magazine and is designed specifically for the iPad. Why do I love The Daily so much? It's a joy to read (watch, listen, experience - one verb doesn't do it justice). It's priced right. It tells me all I need to know about the news of the day.
Reading The Daily is an experience. It's what newspapers and magazines should be, what they all eventually will be. The Daily is designed specifically for the iPad. Each page can be viewed either in portrait or landscape mode. Indeed, the design changes depending on how you're holding the device. Embedded within each page is so much more than text with a picture. Often there's video or audio too.
There's an interactive aspect to The Daily that's difficult to comprehend until you've experienced it. One does not just read The Daily. When I'm holding today's issue in my hands, I'm touching, swiping, exploring, taking quizzes, participating in surveys, and writing and sharing my own opinions.
The Daily is priced right too. New subscribers receive the first two weeks for free - without the need to "cancel at any time." After the initial two-week trial period, you as the new subscriber, will have a choice: either $0.99 per week or $40 for the year. This, in my opinion, is an incredible bargain. I don't know how they do it. Even at the more expensive weekly option I'm paying less than 15 cents an issue. Take a dime and a nickel to your local newstand and see how far it won't get you!
I love The Daily because it tells me all the news I need to know. The Daily is not as comprehensive as either The New York Times ($5 every week) or The Wall Street Journal ($2.69 every week), but then it doesn't carry the heavy subscription cost either. Plus neither the NYT or the WSJ is designed specifically for the iPad.
As a pastor I love reading The Daily because it keeps me up on news I otherwise wouldn't have looked up on my own. I never know where I'm going to find opportunities for sermon illustrations. The Daily gives me a well rounded daily news consumption. For example, I'm not a follower of the gossip columns, fashions, or sports; news, politics, tech and business make up most of my daily reading. However, a few swipes through the Gossip, Arts & Life, and Sports sections, and I'm up to speed.
Are there improvements I'd like to see in The Daily? Sure, it's not perfect. Because the daily download is so large, one really needs a fast internet connection to receive the whole issue. On a slow connection - like at my mother-in-law's house, waiting for The Daily to download can take a long time. (I decided to write this column while waiting for the Saturday edition in Celina this morning. The download did finish before I wrote this - but just barely.) If you're sitting at a slow public WiFi hotspot like Bob Evans and want to download today's issue of The Daily? Forget it. Breakfast will be over while I wait for the spinning download wheel to stop spinning.
One improvement I'd love to see would be for The Daily and the iPad to figure out a way for each issue to be automatically sent to me overnight. That way it would already be on my device when I wake up in the morning. Amazon and The Kindle have figured out how to do this and it's great.
The advantages of The Daily far outweigh the negatives. The beautiful layouts, the interactivity, the right price, along with news that I can use all make The Daily is a winner. Frankly, had I known about The Daily before I owned an iPad, I would purchased the iPad much sooner - just so I could receive The Daily. It's that good!
