Google News gets an overhaul with customized news feeds
Google has refreshed its Google News service and brought all of its news products under it, the company announced at its ongoing annual developer conference Google I/O 2018. The new Google News replaces Google Play Newsstand and the Google News & Weather app. The refreshed version has already live on Android, iOS, and web, and will be available in 127 countries by next week.
New Google News leverages AI to organize news
The refreshed Google News uses AI to understand news stories as they evolve. This helps it take in the constant flow of information and analyze all of it in real-time so as to offer the end-user organized storylines.
Stories that only you might be interested in
Google News gets a new "For You" section that features five top stories that Google's AI thinks you want to read. Since this depends on your Google News activity, the five stories could be anything: global headlines, local news, new developments on stories you've been following, or a mix of all. Other sections include Headlines, Local, Recent News, and Editors' Picks.
Google experimenting with new visual format called Newscasts
A new visual format called Newscasts offers users a collection of articles, videos, and quotes on a single topic using natural language understanding. It aims at educating users about the basics of a news story by browsing all kinds of different sources on it.
For the ones interested in in-depth news coverage
If you want to delve deeper into a story, Google News' "Full Coverage" feature aggregates published stories in real-time and allows users to see how they are being reported from different sources and in multiple formats. Google News presents you with the topic headline, a timeline of key moments and developments, and lastly, frequently asked questions, tweets, and fact-checks regarding the story.
With Newsstand gone, how will you browse and follow publishers?
Since Google Play Newsstand has formally gotten folded into Google News, its functionality has also found a new place in the latter's UI. Google News now has a dedicated tab that features over 1,000 publishers. A new service called Subscribe with Google aims at streamlining the process of subscribing to publishers. Through it, users can simply subscribe and access paid content on any device.
Google has been making efforts to combat fake news
Earlier, Google launched a project called the Google News Initiative (GNI) to tackle the issue of fake news and boost quality journalism. Google said it will invest $300 million towards GNI over the next three years.
