Until now, newspapers’ attitudes towards the web have fluttered between utter disdain and begrudging acceptance. Certainly they have rarely identified (and indeed tapped into) the revenue potential of their online content. However, the Guardian has bucked the trend and gone all-out to develop its online content (even launching a content API last year). Today the ‘paper announced its incredible iPhone app has reached 70,000 downloads in just one month, which means they’ve already made over £167k in revenues (£2m per year if the app continues to be downloaded at the same rate). The mobile web, it seems, provides opportunities as well as risks to the humble newspaper publisher. Time will tell if the app continues to make the Guardian money (the buck doesn’t stop with subscriptions – there are opportunities to make money through affiliate links, eCoupons, premium subscriptions and interactive advertising) but the most interesting thing about the success of the Guardian’s app is that is quite simply an incredible user experience.

When I was sitting on the beach (sorry, did I mention I’ve been on holiday?) reading about Manchester City signing Patrick Viera, it didn’t feel at all like I was reading a website on a small screen (as some apps do) – the entire experience is much better than using a computer. The iPhone, it seems, goes some way to providing the tactile satisfaction of turning the pages of a newspaper, while offering the childlike glee that living in the future brings. Because this, my friends, is the future. A brave new world where you read a newspaper on a mobile phone and it’s not a shoddy, ‘lite’ version with content missing and deranged formatting. A strange and fantastical future where Patrick Viera signs for Manchester City. A future where newspapers might conceivably make some money.

The Guardian clearly has some in-house nouse when it comes to digital content delivery and the app is a joy to use. Load times are quick (even using 3G) and the capability to download the content for offline reading is invaluable. The ‘favourites’ function allows you to save the sections you can’t live without for quick and easy access, and the Guardian’s media rich content – from podcasts to moving pictures – is integrated with the daily news content in a more effective manner than the website has ever managed.

The real breakthrough, however, is the focus on trending articles. The Guardian’s website pioneered foregrounding the ‘most read’ articles for users, but again the iPhone app gives trending topics even more gravitas – the most popular articles seem as prevalent and prominent as the ‘latest news’. One of the tacit pleasures of using the internet is that you are not surfing alone, you are in fact participating in an enormous content ecosystem – every article you read, video you watch or blog you link to is affected by your actions in some way. In reading the Guardian app, you can tap into the vein of UK zeitgeist from wherever you are in the world, and it’s made plain to you that you are reading this because the rest of the world is. By reading the news, you are making the news. It’s lovely, and it’s something newspapers can’t do. Digg’s success is fueled by this feeling of news as a mass participation event – and I can’t wait for their imminent new app launch – but the Guardian’s is a broader, more elegant experience.

Anyway – if you have an iPhone and don’t mind 70% of news content being about climate change and human rights (which I don’t) – then this will be the best £2.39 you ever spent. Equally, if you’re a brand looking for a creative way to bring your services to a smartphone audience, this is a best in class example to follow.

If you’re Rupert Murdoch declaring that paid-for content is the only way for newspapers to make money online, then look away now, the future is blowing you a raspberry.

But it is a great ad for The Sun (via Gym Class Magazine)