Current is an interesting new RSS reader that doesn’t function like an email inbox. “There is no count because counting was the problem.”
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Seems to me that for some folks, the problem is that we don't have enough time to read/watch/listen to all the things we conceivably would find interesting and still have time for everything else, at least some of which is more important. A count lets me decide if I have time for "this," whatever it is.
Sometimes there are reasons why interfaces don’t change over the years. I’ve tried every new Newsreader that has come out over the past several years and keep going back to NetNewsReader. I really like the ability to quickly browse headlines organized in a way that I choose and mark them as read (in bulk) and removing the “unread” number. This keeps things organized and easier to consume in an efficient manner.
Current has an interesting take on this which will appeal to some folks, but after spending some time with it this morning I find myself again going back to NetNewsWire. Kudos to Brent Simmons for creating something that still sets the standard after all these years.
That's a lovely post, describing all the thinking through design that went into the app. Worth reading - I initially thought "but I like my traditional feed reader layouts!" but by the end I was reconsidering whether I'd been wrong all this time and didn't know it.
Same here. Not sure I will try this, because I don't use an RSS reader regularly, but it's good to see a fresh take on an old concept. Without taking anything way from Brent Simmons, which created the gold standard for 20+ years.
I've just spent an hour trying this and, so far, have concluded it's not for me. I feel completely lost in a way I don't with a "normal" feed reader where everything is in one place and is either read or unread. I guess it's trying to solve a problem I don't have - feeds with wildly different publishing schedules and an inability to keep up with everything.
But A WORD OF WARNING - I've now realised that having marked lots of feeds as being people in Current, it moved all of those into a new folder called "Authors". So, having decided to revert back to NetNewswire, I have to move nearly 100 feeds back into their original folders. I'm using Feedbin as a backend for subscriptions, and no idea if this happens with others.
Also, I've a feeling there are some posts that were previously unread, that I didn't read in Current, that are now marked as read, but I can't be 100% sure.
I wish Jason had told readers that the elegant first post was also a sales pitch. It's one thing to identify a problem and another to solve it. And trying something out shouldn't mess up your existing workflows, especially when you have to pay before committing to a new RSS reader.
I wish I could love this, because it's a genuinely interesting idea.
But, well, seriffed typeface and no obvious way to change it (I did look) in the reader view. Any reading-based app that thinks it has a right to impose things like that is an app I will not use. I'm not saying they're wrong to do that, but they are wrong for me.
They address this directly in the overview, and this resonates with me:
“ The body text is serif. The iOS system serif at 16 to 18 points, scaling with Dynamic Type. In a world of sans-serif apps, this is a deliberate choice. Serif type has been the standard for extended reading for five hundred years because it works. It guides the eye along the line. It whispers this is for reading before you've read a word. The reader view bumps up to 18-point serif for even deeper immersion, with a separate “poetic” typography tier for empty states and contemplative moments.”
Well, I wish I had read the overview more carefully before spending money.
Yes, seriffed (serifed? both seem to be used, it may be US/UK) typefaces have been used for hundreds of years, and yes there is good empirical evidence that they are more readable than sans faces ... for paper. I have read books set in a sans face: I'd like not to do so again. I have read text on screens in a seriffed face: I'd like not to do so again. Screens are not paper and are not like paper. Screens also give the opportunity for the reader to choose, which this app is withholding (as is its author's right, don't get me wrong).
This difference is hugely important and almost always misunderstood. I am a photographer, and my product is prints, made in a darkroom from paper, silver, boiled-down animals (sadly) and light. My photographs are not very good, but there are better photographers whose product is the same thing. And if you have not seen the physical object you have not seen their work. An extreme example is a Daguerreotype: you really haven't seen one unless you've seen the object (of course Daguerreotypes are not paper either). Screens are not paper: they are a different thing.
I was one of the beta testers after reading the article about the idea here, and I really like the design. I’ve been using RSS readers since google reader came along and it’s changed the way I read in a good way I think. I highly recommend giving it a try (and reading the articles about it).
river of news app, gotta try it!
The rebuilt version of Reeder that shipped a year ago also adopted a similar concept and I’ve really enjoyed using it. I plan to give this a shot as well. For those of you who don’t want some of the more opinionated design choices (serif, etc), Reeder might be a good option.
News is ephemeral and essentially infinite. RSS is news, curated. Perhaps that curation helps us feel we can get to the end of all the news, by exerting control. But the RSS news feels like it has more weight, because the curation has deemed those news items more important than the ephemeral ones. I miss thousands of non-RSS news items every day but they have no weight to me as I’m not tracking them, whereas numbers in my RSS reader show me how behind I am. The newspaper doesn’t do that. Yesterday’s newspaper has no weight.
I think I’ll try this app.
Even as someone who made a website that only shows today's newspaper, I'd disagree with you here.
First, "news" could be, arguably, ephemeral, but to different degrees. There is "live" news that could be out of date within minutes, reports of events that might be old hat the next day, but also news articles that are of interest and current, days or even weeks later.
Second, if the RSS feeds you read are "news, curated" then you're reading different feeds to me (unsurprisingly). A few of the feeds I follow could count as news but only the posts of a tiny number (less than five) feel stale after a couple of days. The rest - like Jason's - are still generally interesting days, weeks or even months later because they're not "news".
Third, I'd say that only some of "yesterday's newspaper has no weight". Even if we were to say that yesterday's "news" has no weight, newspapers contain more than news - features, reviews, opinion, etc - that have a much longer shelf-life than the reports of what happened the previous day.
None of which to say this app is wrong in its ideas. It's probably great for people like you whose feeds are apparently mostly the latest news, or those who subscribe to so many things they can never read everything so feel overwhelmed by the obligation.
But that is different to admitting that RSS is an entirely and universally ephemeral thing that should only be consumed in this manner.
I tried this model out with the Reeder redesign and found it to be a cheapening experience of using the web. By treating websites like subreddits that move forward at their own pace, you lose the ability to make sure you're catching all those diamonds in the rough.
There's no blog or news source out there where every single post is a banger. We'll always be filtering through. At least with the classic approach you're able to have your hand on the wheel a bit.
Hopefully people figure out ways to keep the old style feel great with solid design. Reeder used to do that, and I'm pretty upset that they abandoned it in favor of this evaporative feed approach. Current's time limit idea seems extremely fiddly in practice.
If you're interested in just catching up with the latest, in a pace appropriate to the source's posting frequency, why not save yourself some money - bookmark those sites and visit them when you want to know what they posted. Same experience for free.
Shades of Kinja! Plus a few fun new ideas.
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