The things you're going to ask anyway.
Why exactly five stories?
Because five is what you can hold in your head at once. David Allen's working-memory cap is the constraint we built around — three national stories, one local to your city, one for your state. Past five, you stop catching up and start scrolling. The five-card cap is the brand.
Why national plus local plus state?
Because the news that affects your day is rarely all national. The local slot covers your city. The state slot covers your statehouse. Three national stories cover what everyone else is talking about. That's the daily picture for most readers — broad enough to know what's going on, grounded enough to know what's going on near you.
What happens on a slow news day?
You still get five. If the news runs thin in one slot, we backfill with the next-strongest story that fits your feed rather than break the daily ritual.
Do you rate news sources for bias and ideology?
Yes — and we lead with ideology, not just left/right. Every source gets its real ideology (Establishment Liberal, Gaullist, Populist Conservative…), plus where it sits on the bias spectrum, with factuality, ownership, and funding-model disclosure. It's an nwsly+ feature; the free tier shows the brief and the source list. The methodology is public so you can argue with us. Labels get reviewed quarterly.
Is the brief written by AI?
Yes — an AI model analyzes each brief from three to five underlying source articles. Every brief is human-spot-checked before the 7am push. We will not ship an unchecked brief; that's a credibility floor, not a launch concession. Full workflow on the editorial standards page.
Will you make a web reader?
iOS and Android are both live. US first; UK, Canada, and Australia after we prove the daily ritual works. Web reader after. Five stories in five minutes is a ritual product — rituals work best on the phone.
Do you sell my data?
No ads inside the app, ever. We never sell what you read. nwsly+ subscriptions are the entire business. The recommendation model runs on your phone where it can; what we collect is what's needed to pick tomorrow's five, and that's the line.
How is nwsly different from other news apps?
Most news apps give you an endless feed or a wall of comparison tools; nwsly gives you five analyzed stories a day — synthesized from multiple sources, each source’s ideology shown — then it ends. Finite by design, not infinite.
How much does nwsly cost?
Right now nwsly is free with email registration during our launch period — sign up and you're reading the same morning five every day. The free tier is the product: five stories a day (three national, one local, one state), every day, no ads, no daily-limit paywall. When nwsly+ opens, it'll be $100/year and add source ideology + bias ratings, unlimited additional cards beyond the daily five, save-for-later, follow specific topics, and full sourcing sheets on every brief. Cancel anytime.
How is nwsly different from Apple News, The Skimm, or Axios?
Apple News is ad-driven and algorithmic-feed. The Skimm is a daily email newsletter. Axios is bullet-point briefings without locality slots. nwsly is a finite swipe ritual with AI-analyzed briefs and a deck split between national, local, and state news every day. We're a different shape of product, not a better version of the same one.