The smartphone has become the latest hope for news outlets struggling to fight falling print revenue.

The Star, Malaysia’s most read English daily, recently introduced the iSnap, a feature that brings the “newspaper to life” using augmented reality technology and two major Australian publishers, Fairfax and News Limited have both launched new smartphone enhancements in the past month.

Over at The Star, iSnap sprang from an internal challenge thrown to the New Media Department and to the paper’s technology partner, Knorex Pte Ltd of Singapore. Summoned by the owners to find new ways to enhance the flagship publication, both teams started an intense brainstorming session that eventually triggered the iSnap concept.