Skip to main content
https://www.highperformancecpmgate.com/rgeesizw1?key=a9d7b2ab045c91688419e8e18a006621

Mammoth Media launches CatchUp, an app that summarizes the latest news and trending content

A new app called CatchUp might be useful for anyone who’s struggling to keep up with the latest headlines, podcasts and Netflix shows.

CatchUp is the latest offering from Mammoth Media, the startup behind chat fiction app Yarn and social polling app Wishbone. Founder and CEO Benoit Vatere told me that the product started out as a book summary app called Booknotes, but early users kept asking, “Why don’t you summarize more than books?”

So that’s exactly what CatchUp does, recapping the latest news and entertainment topics. The summaries should feel pretty familiar to anyone who’s watched videos on mobile social app — they’re vertically-oriented, broken up into slides, accompanied by text captions and last for just a few minutes.

Vatere told me that the topics are chosen based on what’s trending, either in Mammoth’s apps or more broadly in social media.

For example, when I opened CatchUp this morning, I watched a video laying out the basic info around the big topic one everyone’s mind: the coronavirus pandemic. Then I moved onto something lighter, a video breaking down the different streaming services available now.

It sounds like the CatchUp team is moving quickly. Vatere said they should be responsive to trends, creating new videos in just a day or two. At the same time, he said the app should offer a mix of news-y videos that will eventually disappear (“too much content kills retention in the app”) alongside more evergreen content.

CatchUp

Image Credits: Mammoth Media

He emphasized that this is very much an initial version of the app, and that the CatchUp team plans to iterate based on what users respond to. It’s English-only for now but could eventually add other languages. The company’s plans also include introducing monetization later on, starting with advertising and then eventually adding in-app purchases and subscriptions.

Vatere also suggested that while a CatchUp summary should stand on its own, it could also encourage deeper engagement.

“If you’re thinking, everybody is talking about ‘Love is Blind,’ what is this … you can listen for two minutes and understand the dynamic, understand what’s happening,” he said. “Then if it sounds really interesting to you, you can watch it. But if not, now you understand what’s being said.”

Mammoth Media introduces Choose Your Own Adventure-style storytelling to its chat fiction app Yarn

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Uber co-founder Garrett Camp steps back from board director role

Uber co-founder Garrett Camp is relinquishing his role as a board director and switching to board observer — where he says he’ll focus on product strategy for the ride hailing giant. Camp made the announcement in a short Medium post in which he writes of his decade at Uber: “I’ve learned a lot, and realized that I’m most helpful when focused on product strategy & design, and this is where I’d like to focus going forward.” “I will continue to work with Dara [Khosrowshahi, Uber CEO] and the product and technology leadership teams to brainstorm new ideas, iterate on plans and designs, and continue to innovate at scale,” he adds. “We have a strong and diverse team in place, and I’m confident everyone will navigate well during these turbulent times.” The Canadian billionaire entrepreneur signs off by saying he’s looking forward to helping Uber “brainstorm the next big idea”. Camp hasn’t been short of ideas over his career in tech. He’s the co-founder of the web 2.0 recommendatio...
Post a Comment
Read more

Leading VCs discuss how COVID-19 has impacted the world of digital health

In December 2019, Extra Crunch spoke to a group of investors leading the charge in health tech to discuss where they saw the most opportunity in the space leading into 2020 . At the time, respondents highlighted startups in digital therapeutics, telehealth and mental health that were improving medical practitioner efficiency or streamlining the distribution of care, amongst a variety of other digital health markets that were garnering the most attention. Where top VCs are investing in digital health In the months since, the COVID-19 crisis has debilitated national healthcare systems and the global economy. Weaknesses in healthcare systems have become clearer than ever, while startups and capital providers have struggled to operate while wide swaths of the market effectively shut down. Given significant volatility and the rapid changes seen in the worlds of healthcare, venture and startups broadly, we wanted to understand which inefficiencies might have been brought to light, w...
Post a Comment
Read more

News-reading app Flipboard expands local coverage, including coronavirus updates, to 12 more U.S. metros

Earlier this year, personalized news aggregation app Flipboard expanded into local news . The feature brought local news, sports, real estate, weather, transportation news and more to 23 cities across the U.S. Today, Flipboard is bringing local news to 12 more U.S. metros and is adding critical coronavirus local coverage to all of the 35 supported locales. The 12 new metros include the following:  Baltimore, Charlotte, Cleveland, Detroit, Indianapolis, Nashville, Pittsburgh, Orlando, Raleigh, Salt Lake City, St. Louis, and Tampa Bay. They join the 23 cities that were already supported:  Atlanta, Austin, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Denver, Houston, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Miami, Minneapolis-St. Paul, New Orleans, New York City, Philadelphia, Phoenix, Portland, Sacramento, San Diego, San Francisco Bay Area, Seattle, Toronto, Vancouver and Washington, D.C. To offer local news in its app, Flipboard works with area partners, big and small, like The Plain Dealer’s Cleveland.com , ...
Post a Comment
Read more