NewsBots: A Chrome Extension that Uses the New-Tab Page as a Distribution Platform

I wanted to further explore what audience-building could look like outside of familiar distribution platforms like the homepage, social and news apps. So I started to think about where readers could encounter journalism between intentional visits.

I explored the browser's new-tab page as one of those moments: a high-frequency, passive space that could bring journalism into an existing habit rather than asking readers to form a new one.

The goal: create another publisher-driven pathway into the journalism.

Two browser new-tab pages, each showing one featured story and a cartoon Newsbot holding a banana

How It Works

Each new tab becomes a small moment of discovery. Opening or refreshing the page surfaces a new story from a curated list, paired with a new Newsbot and colorway to keep repeat visits fresh and delightful.

Readers can click through to the publisher to read the full story, or bookmark it for later.

Annotated new-tab page explaining story rotation, save for later, editorial curation and links back to the publisher

Not Another Homepage

The initial instinct was to make the publication’s homepage into the default new tab. But the two experiences serve different moments of attention. A homepage is a destination. A new tab is transitional.

So rather than squeezing a homepage into that moment, I designed around it: one featured story and that's it.

Homepage	New-tab extension
Destination	Touchpoint
Intentional visit	Incidental encounter
Many stories	One primary story
Comprehensive	Selective

Reference images: the Tabby Cat Chrome extension and a row of colorful street newspaper boxes

References

I took inspiration from Leslie Stetz's Tabby Cat extension, which has an ever-changing cast of cute little cats. For my own cast, I looked to street newspaper boxes (a nod to news distribution) and reimagined their colorful, boxy forms as Newsbots.

The cast of ten Newsbot characters, each modeled on a different newspaper box

A Modular System for Repeat Encounters

The experience may appear dozens of times a day, so repetition needed to feel fresh. I designed the characters as a modular system. Bodies, expressions, headwear, props, and shoes share standardized attachment points, allowing a small asset library to produce many combinations.

The editorial grid and typography stay fixed.

Construction grids for square, tall and wide Newsbot characters, showing anchor points for hats, faces, hands and feet

Thinking Beyond the New Tab

The larger opportunity is about finding more touchpoints outside the places readers already visit.

Instead of competing for another intentional homepage visit, notification, or position in a social feed, this concept attaches discovery to a behavior that already exists.

The next step would be testing whether this passive encounter translates into meaningful discovery, and later subscriptions: Do readers click stories they otherwise wouldn’t have found? And can resurfacing turn more saved stories into completed reads?