Trove was a

social news Social organisms, including human(s), live collectively in interacting populations. This interaction is considered social whether they are aware of it or not, and whether the exchange is voluntary or not. Etymology The word "social" derives from ...

aggregation web and mobile application, with apps available on

iOS iOS (formerly iPhone OS) is a mobile operating system created and developed by Apple Inc. exclusively for its hardware. It is the operating system that powers many of the company's mobile devices, including the iPhone; the term also includes ...

, Android, and

Fire Phone The Fire Phone was a 3D-enabled smartphone developed by Amazon and manufactured by Foxconn. It was announced on June 18, 2014, and marked Amazon's first foray into the smartphone market, following the success of the Kindle Fire. It was available ...

. Trove is also the name of the company behind the application, which was owned by

Graham Holdings Graham Holdings Company (formerly The Washington Post Company) is a diversified American conglomerate holding company. Headquartered in Arlington County, Virginia, and incorporated in Delaware, it was formerly the owner of ''The Washington Pos ...

. Trove was shut down in December 2015.

Usage and features

Trove was a free

discovery and sharing platform where users connect with others through shared topical interests. Users can curate personalized newsfeeds based on their interests, called troves. Users then “pick” the best stories to share with their followers both on Trove and other

social media Social media are interactive media technologies that facilitate the creation and sharing of information, ideas, interests, and other forms of expression through virtual communities and networks. While challenges to the definition of ''social medi ...

sites. Users could follow a trove to see those picks on their

home page A home page (or homepage) is the main web page of a website. The term may also refer to the start page shown in a web browser when the application first opens. Usually, the home page is located at the root of the website's domain or subdomain ...

. Smartpick In January 2015, Trove added a “Smartpick” capability. When enabled, any relevant articles posted to a user's

Twitter Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...

account will be categorized and picked on Trove automatically. Conversations In October 2015, Trove launched “conversations”, which enables curators to engage their following in a discussion about a particular pick.

History

In 2009, Washington Post Labs (WaPo Labs) was created as the digital innovation and technology team of The Washington Post Company. In 2010, The Washington Post Company acquired iCurrent, a personalized news and information service that became the basis for the company's news application. In August 2013, after

Amazon Amazon most often refers to: * Amazons, a tribe of female warriors in Greek mythology * Amazon rainforest, a rainforest covering most of the Amazon basin * Amazon River, in South America * Amazon (company), an American multinational technology c ...

CEO

Jeff Bezos Jeffrey Preston Bezos ( ;; and Robinson (2010), p. 7. ''né'' Jorgensen; born January 12, 1964) is an American entrepreneur, media proprietor, investor, and commercial astronaut. He is the founder, executive chairman, and former preside ...

bought The Washington Post Company's newspaper division, WaPo Labs was formally renamed Trove. Trove remained part of the parent company, which was renamed

Graham Holdings Company Graham Holdings Company (formerly The Washington Post Company) is a diversified American conglomerate holding company. Headquartered in Arlington County, Virginia, and incorporated in Delaware, it was formerly the owner of ''The Washington Post ...

(GHC). Graham Holdings Chief Digital Officer Vijay Ravindran is Trove's CEO. Headquarters are in

Washington, D.C. ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...

with a second office in

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...

. In December 2015, Trove was shut down after being integrated with SocialCode.

Product evolution

Trove's First Launch
In April 2011, the first iteration of Trove was launched as a personalized news web application. Washington Post Social Reader
In September 2011, the WaPo Labs team optimized the web application for

Facebook Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin M ...

and launched Washington Post Social Reader, one of the first social news applications to leverage Facebook's

Open Graph The Facebook Platform is the set of services, tools, and products provided by the social networking service Facebook for third-party developers to create their own applications and services that access data in Facebook. The current Facebook ...

technology. Social Reader had 17 million monthly users at its peak. iCurrent powered the personalization technology behind Social Reader. Trove's Relaunch and Platform Releases
In January 2014, Trove relaunched as an

and web application. ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' called Trove, "a treasure for news junkies."

CNBC CNBC (formerly Consumer News and Business Channel) is an American basic cable business news channel. It provides business news programming on weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m., Eastern Time, while broadcasting talk sho ...

called Trove, "a

Pinterest Pinterest is an American image sharing and social media service designed to enable saving and discovery of information (specifically "ideas") on the internet using images, and on a smaller scale, animated GIFs and videos, in the form of pinboard ...

board for news." ''

USA Today ''USA Today'' (stylized in all uppercase) is an American daily middle-market newspaper and news broadcasting company. Founded by Al Neuharth on September 15, 1982, the newspaper operates from Gannett's corporate headquarters in Tysons, Virgini ...

'' and ''

The Today Show ''Today'' (also called ''The Today Show'' or informally, ''NBC News Today'') is an American news and talk morning television show that airs weekdays from 7:00 a.m. to 11:00 a.m. on NBC. The program debuted on January 14, 1952. It was ...

'' have also given positive reviews. Trove launched on the Android platform in July 2014. Fire Phone
In collaboration with

launch in July 2014, Trove began providing news search results through the Firefly plugin. When Fire Phone users scanned something with Firely, Trove would return relevant news articles and troves. Apple Watch
In April 2015, Trove announced the release of their

Apple Watch Apple Watch is a line of smartwatches produced by Apple Inc. It incorporates fitness tracking, health-oriented capabilities, and wireless telecommunication, and integrates with iOS and other Apple products and services. The Apple Watch was rel ...

integration. Users could scan headlines, pick stories, and leave comments directly from the watch. Amazon Echo
In September 2015, Trove became available on

Amazon Echo Amazon Echo, often shortened to Echo, is an American brand of smart speakers developed by Amazon. Echo devices connect to the voice-controlled intelligent personal assistant service ''Alexa'', which will respond when a user says "Alexa". Users m ...

as an Alexa skill. Users could instruct Alexa to ask Trove about the latest news, or request information on a specific topic.

References

{{Reflist English-language mass media IOS software Android (operating system) software IPod software Mobile social software News aggregator software