Though writer JRR Tolkien never worked with Disney, the company has taken a page out of the writer’s famous work as there is now one Disney app to rule them all, one app to find them, one app to bring them all and on the iPhone bind them.
The Disney Interactive Media Group has a new iPhone application, The Disney App, that will be a central platform for the rest of its mobile offerings and let users unlock exclusives and bonus content from its existing apps and Web sites.
Disney’s new iPhone app will gather content from other applications and either push them to the iPhone or promote the other apps. So far it does this only with previous Disney game apps and Web sites. The app will allow users to listen to live broadcasts of Radio Disney and purchase Disney music and videos through the iTunes Store. Videos so far include backstage pass-styled videos, and the company promises to bring original content to the app every week. Users can also interact with hundreds of Disney characters via picture frames and audio greetings.
Perhaps the most interesting features of the app is its “Click2Life” feature, which unlocks exclusive Disney content on the device after it captures an image from the Disney.com Web site.
The app, for example, asks for a photo of a Disney character and gives clues to its identity. Getting the right photo then unlocks bonus videos, images, wallpaper and other content on the device.
Click2Life will eventually incorporate real-world items, which most are focusing on as movie posters or public products, but the big driver will be in-store images.
Disney is said to be spending around $1 million to revamp its New York City store, taking a lot of plays out of Steve Jobs’ and Apple’s playbook by mirroring its store after Apple’s retail locations.
The biggest tie-in is that employees at Disney Store locations will get to use iPhones and possibly iPod Touches to check item inventory and control displays within the store. If these displays can be monitored by the iPhone when used by Disney’s staff, they will also very likely interact with users and the Click2Life feature.
Jason Davis, vice president of Disney.com, told Reuters that it already has a large audience of iPhone and iPod touch users for its content on its existing mobile application on Disney.com. Davis also said that the company plans to extend its offering of other branded iPhone apps, such as those for its films and TV series, which will also interact with this new app. Disney.com reaches roughly 31 million unique visitors per month and says it ranks No. 1 among mobile entertainment sites.