Apps for Media

Trapit A quick glance at Trapit’s website might give you the impression that it’s yet another personal curation app, such as Flipboard, Zite or Pulse (though, of course, Flipboard now has some innovative “magazine” features, discussed below). However, Trapit does more than curate users’ preferred feeds. Trapit also now works with publishers (traditional or otherwise, such as brands) who want to use their own content as the core of a magazine-like, branded native app that can also include content drawn automatically from many other online sources. The external sources aren’t just mainstream, well-known publishers, but also a wide range of smaller sites. Trapit says its curation system is based on artificial-intelligence technology built for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. Publisher Here Media, owners of The Advocate magazine, has already used Trapit to build a unique app, The Advocate Discovery, that includes news not only from The Advocate, but also from “the hundreds of queer news sources worldwide plus hundreds of thousands of mainstream sources already among Trapit’s hand-picked sources.” Trapit looks like an intriguing way a magazine publisher can expand its offerings without producing more content itself. Trapit: iPad, free.