Meredith Relaunches Mobile News Apps

StepLeader, a digital solutions provider that delivers information across mobile technology, OTT/Smart TV applications and more, is relaunching Meredith Corp.’s mobile news apps for its TV stations. The relaunch encompasses live streaming video support, app upgrades on the iOS and Android platforms, as well as enhanced interactive weather features.

“StepLeader has been a trusted digital solution provider since 2005, when they built our earliest mobile applications,” said Tom Cox, VP Digital Content, Meredith Corporation Local Media Group. “Our partnership enabled us to become the first large TV group to launch station news apps into Apple’s App Store, and they have helped us evolve our offering as our audience expectations and industry standards have shifted.”

“Over recent years their development team has helped us keep pace with optimized news apps across Apple’s App Store, the Android marketplace with Google Play and the Amazon Appstore for the Kindle Fire,” he added.

With the relaunch, StepLeader now provides live video streaming capabilities for each of Meredith’s television stations. Each partner has the ability to activate streaming capabilities to deliver breaking news and other selected coverage to their audience at any given time. StepLeader handles the device detection and encoding for the variety of formats required for mobile viewing.

To access the new app features on the iOS and Android platforms, Meredith users should upgrade to the latest version of their local mobile news app. All iOS universal apps feature a number of significant improvements, including: support for pro-roll video advertising; complete UDID transition (in compliance with Apple’s rules related to user IDs); faster content feeds; and iPad user interface improvements.

From the iPad, users can now access pop-up menus; swipe between stories, images, and animations; use the split-screen view in landscape; and utilize the new scrolling tab bar.

Android users will now see: a tab bar navigation feature; updated story navigation; and the ability to swipe between stories, images and animations. Meredith said additional updates and improvements include: rich media and HTML ad support; in-app Web browser; stream audio notification in the status bar; 77% faster startup and navigation; 66% less memory use; and better video streaming.

Overall, the Android functionality has been upgraded to be more inline and consistent with iOS app functionality. For more information on app upgrades, refer to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H5Qb4XJci3k&feature=youtu.be.

StepLeader has also partnered with Weather Central to bring enhanced interactive weather features to Meredith mobile news app users. Through the new iOS and Android app upgrades, users can access interactive maps for forecasts and Futurecast. They can additionally leverage the multi-city 7-day forecasts on their mobile devices.

In May, StepLeader launched Kindle Fire apps for 10 Meredith stations: WGCL Atlanta; KPHO Phoenix; KPTV Portland, Ore.; WFSB Hartford/New Haven, Conn.; WSMV Nashville; KCTV Kansas City, Mo.; WHNS Greenville, S.C.; KVVU Las Vegas; WNEM Flint-Saginaw, Mich.; and WSHM Springfield-Holyoke, Mass.).