Guardian prepares paid-for Apple iPhone app

The Guardian newspaper has revealed its intention to produce an app for the iPhone.

It isn’t the first paper to do so, although it’s looking likely that it will be the first to charge for the privilege.

The Guardian’s Digital Director, Emily Bell, confirmed this in a statement to the Paid Content blog, in which she said: “It’s still in development, but we are working on an app which I can’t give you too much more detail on at the moment, although we are likely to charge.”

Bell addressed accusations of inconsistency in a comment on the blog’s news story, defending the decision from those who were surprised The Guardian would charge for an app, when it was against charging for its online content.

“There’s no inconsistency there, we’ve always been keen to charge for content especially when we add functionality or utility,” Bell wrote.

“As I’ve said before, pay walls, for the Guardian websites, don’t make much sense, editorially or economically. But that’s not the same as paid for content – we have a fine tradition of charging for newspapers…”