Google ups the ante on news delivery!

Launches new algorithmic news services for users of Android phones across the world, and interestingly, on iOS for users in the US

Google has increased its stakes on the news business and announced the launch of a new news feature on Android phones (actually an all new service which will also be available on iOS for users in the US) that will pick news tailored for users interests culled from their interaction patterns with all Google properties apart from location-based trending stories and the world.

“Today we are announcing a new feed experience in the Google app, making it easier than ever to discover, explore and stay connected to what matters to you—even when you don’t have a query in mind,” Shashi Thakur, VP Engineering, Google Inc., said in a blog post today.

While we have known that Google is serious about the news business knowing very well that it is stories that drive online ad dollars, the launch of the new service pits the search giant directly against Facebook and Twitter which are today seen as the primary news delivery channels albeit through user generated content and links to stories.  

In stark contrast, however, Google will be aggregating content from publishers with whom it has already tied up in huge numbers. The company actually introduced the feeds last December and has since then improved them based on its deep learning algorithms to anticipate what the users want to read and predict their interests.    

Google has been investing heavily on news for the past many years. Very recently, it funded the UK’s Press Association and news start-up Urbs Media for a news initiative, Reporters And Data And Robots (RADAR), to generate a whopping 30,000 local stories per month.

It is no surprise then that the media it is a worried media industry, particularly in the US, where leading traditional publishers rallied together earlier this month to initiate an anti-trust campaign against Google, and Facebook concerned that the search, advertising and social media giants respectively are increasingly pushing them out of the contention for the advertising dollars. This move comes in the wake of the EU slapping a $2.7 billion anti-trust fine on Google.

However,  the juggernaut is on the roll and it will be difficult to stop it.