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iPad pub The Daily pops up on PCs

An enterprising programmer compiles a Web version of the much-hyped iPad-only "newspaper."

Edward Moyer Senior Editor
Edward Moyer is a senior editor at CNET and a many-year veteran of the writing and editing world. He enjoys taking sentences apart and putting them back together. He also likes making them from scratch. ¶ For nearly a quarter of a century, he's edited and written stories about various aspects of the technology world, from the US National Security Agency's controversial spying techniques to historic NASA space missions to 3D-printed works of fine art. Before that, he wrote about movies, musicians, artists and subcultures.
Credentials
  • Ed was a member of the CNET crew that won a National Magazine Award from the American Society of Magazine Editors for general excellence online. He's also edited pieces that've nabbed prizes from the Society of Professional Journalists and others.
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Edward Moyer
2 min read

Curious about Rupert Murdoch's heavily hyped iPad publication but not in possession of said tablet? Well, thanks to an LA-based computer programmer and journalist, you can check out The Daily in its entirety on your laptop, Netbook, or PC--though you'll miss out on the tablet-specific bells and whistles.

Launched with much fanfare yesterday, the specially designed, subscription-only, multimedia "newspaper" has media observers wondering if it will turn out to be a legitimate glimpse of publishing's future or nothing more than an interesting experiment.

After the postlaunch free trial of two weeks, the pub--which is viewable in its intended form only on Apple's iPad--will cost readers 99 cents a week or $39.99 a year. At its unveiling, however, Murdoch and Co. said that though there are no outright plans to make The Daily available for free online, the popularity of social networking means that paid subscribers will be able to share links to Web-page versions of Daily stories with friends--thus making the publication available for free in a stripped-down, piecemeal fashion.

Piecemeal, that is, unless you go to Andy Baio's site The Daily: Indexed. The New York Times reports that Baio became aware that the Web versions of Daily stories were available via search engines and decided to compile them into a facsimile of the pub, complete with archived editions.

It's not clear how long Baio's site will last, but so far it seems The Daily's publishers are happy to have the additional exposure, and happy for the chance to keep the hype machine rolling. In an e-mail to The Times about the matter, publisher Greg Clayman said, "It's not surprising that people want to share our content, but The Daily is designed for tablets, with a lot of rich media and a litany of interactive features and functionality. We are confident that as readers get to know our content, they will be driven to the full, authentic experience."

Well, maybe. You can check out Baio's site, take a peek at a Daily promo video, and make the call for yourself.

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