At Civil Beat, our top priority is providing you with local, independent, in-depth journalism. However, we realize that your days are already busy as can be, and we want to make reading our stories fit effortlessly into your schedule and lifestyle.

That’s why we decided to launch the latest option for reading Civil Beat — a brand new mobile app that displays the day’s stories in a digest format, making it quick and simple to keep up with the daily headlines on your smartphone.

More than half of all Civil Beat readers access our content on a mobile device, so we chose an interface that is sleek, easy to use and meets the needs of our most dedicated readers.

The user experience is optimized for news content – you won’t see flashing popups or ad tiles embedded in stories. The app’s card-based design allows users to peruse the day’s headlines by swiping from one story to the next.

You’ll also find a nifty feature that separates the super readers from the headline skimmers. Swipe to the final tile following all of the day’s stories to see how many stories you finished reading that day.

The launch caps a collaborative effort between Civil Beat and two local software developers, Jason Tagomori and Daniel Colton of Skyloft Inc. A few months ago, Daniel and Jason attended one of Civil Beat’s Coffee and Conversation events and wowed us with their concept of a sleek mobile news app that’s fast to load and easy to use. Several iterations later, we’re excited to finally unveil it to you.

The Civil Beat news app is available for download on iOS devices via the Apple Store. If you’re currently using our old mobile app, you’ll need to download this new one separately. A version for Android devices is currently in development and will roll out soon.

We hope you enjoy using it as much as we do. Try it out, share it with your friends and let us know what you think using this convenient Google form.

Thoughts on this or any other story? Write a Letter to the Editor. Send to news@civilbeat.org and put Letter in the subject line. 200 words max. You need to use your name and city and include a contact phone for verification purposes. And you can still comment on stories on our Facebook page.

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