A smart new application launched by the Hollister Free Lance
will allow readers fast and easy access to breaking news, features
and video, and enable the community to submit its own content
instantaneously.
A smart new application launched by the Hollister Free Lance will allow readers fast and easy access to breaking news, features and video, and enable the community to submit its own content instantaneously.
“I think it’s dynamic but the innovation is simple,” said Free Lance Publisher Steve Staloch. “It’s not user complicated. It has a logic to it that makes it very simple to navigate and yet very comprehensive. It’s one of the finest I’ve seen.”
Created by Whiz Technologies, a San Jose company founded in 2009 that specializes in building high quality custom apps, the Free Lance’s app delivers news, photos and video directly to its readers, while providing a community forum for exchanging information.
“It gives you the ability to not just deliver content to the community, but really have them interact with you on an ongoing, daily basis,” said KP Naidu, vice president and general manager of Whiz Technologies. “Now it’s not just somebody throwing the morning newspaper on your doorstep kind of routine. You’re with them 24/7.”
Stories published online or in print will be available to readers through the Free Lance app, which is free for a limited time and available for iPhone users through the Apple iTunes App Store and Android users through the Android Market. In addition to news, readers can access sports, business and lifestyles features, opinion pieces and Free Lance sports and news polls. Photos and videos “are of just beautiful quality,” said Nikhil Modi, chief executive officer of Whiz, as he flipped through a photo gallery of the Gilroy Garlic Festival. Readers may also share any of the app’s content using Twitter, Facebook or e-mail.
An advertisement is tucked into each photo gallery every few photos and a 15-second video advertisement plays before each news video, allowing advertisers a new platform to reach their customers, Staloch pointed out. Clicking on an advertisement allows readers to view the ad without leaving the Free Lance app. In working with Whiz, the Free Lance aimed to provide an easy-to-navigate, intuitive and feature-rich app, he said.
“Today we have an application that I believe is an industry model, creatively leveraging our unique local content with a powerful, yet non-intrusive advertising component,” Staloch said.
Users can customize their experience by moving their favorite news items to the home page. But what impressed Staloch the most was the app’s portability and ability to invite the community to participate firsthand in the news, he said. With the app’s u2us feature, video is now more than just a buzz word, he said.
“Whiz’s u2us feature allows easy video or photo submission of events captured on anyone’s iPhone or Android,” Staloch said. “Add a byline, brief description, and you’re a published video journalist. Interactive polling and discussion boards are now literally in the palm of the users’ hands.”
If a community member captures a great photo of their son’s perfect pitch, a few seconds of footage of an accident on U.S. 101 or a shot just too good to keep to themselves, “send it in,” Staloch said.
Similar apps are available for the Free Lance’s sister papers, the Morgan Hill Times and the Gilroy Dispatch.
“Offering our readers a variety of access platforms such as Whiz’s newspaper application convinces me that without question, the power of the press is alive and well – and prosperous,” Staloch said.
