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Newspaper giant Hearst Corporation unveiled its News Reader software, a product born of a partnership with Microsoft. News Reader software debuted in beta at the Seattle Post-Intelligencer as a downloadable application, allowing an on-screen view of Hearst newspapers.

The news comes in the wake of growing concern for the future of print media as online content becomes more prevalent and preferred.

George B. Irish, president of Hearst Newspapers, and Kenneth A. Bronfin, president of Hearst Interactive Media.

Seattle PI and Microsoft worked with software developer IdentityMine to create what they call a "digital reading experience" where the whole newspaper can be downloaded in about two minutes. With archiving, Hearst says the content is viewable online or off. The News
Reader is available for free in beta to registered users.

"It is clear that digital delivery and consumption are critical to the future success of the newspaper industry, said George Irish, president of Hearst Newspapers.

Irish said Hearst plans to expand the project to its other major newspaper markets in the near future.

Up to six days of content can also be archived and read, with customizable layouts. The application works on computers running
Windows Vista or Windows XP. Microsoft says it intends to broaden support for the application to additional platforms, including mobile devices and computers running Apple's Mac operating system, in the future.

"We want to continue to be at the forefront of the digital publishing world and one way we are doing that is by working with Microsoft," said Kenneth Bronfin, president of Hearst Interactive Media. "The quality of the reading experience remains paramount for us and we believe that readers will find this platform to be the best they've seen."

The program uses Windows Presentation Foundation, Microsoft's display technology in Windows Vista. Consumers using Windows XP will automatically receive the necessary upgrade to their system when downloading the P-I Reader.

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