I liked netnewswire but it didn’t pick up posts from a couple blogs I follow. Kottke was the big one. I switched to feeder.co and love it. I’m just using the free version.
Tapestry is just going to be a river of information. I’m not sure it will be a substitute for RSS reader which let me saves article, highlight them for future reference.
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I tried Omnivore a few weeks ago and bounced off it. I found the sync between iPad/iPhone and Mac to be unreliable.
Also, while I have not tried Omnivore’s RSS service, I have tried Reader and my sense is that neither Reader nor Omnivore would scale beyond three or four feeds.
Also (and this is a peculiarity to me), the software is open source, and there’s a sync service that’s donationware. I found myself fussing over the question of whether I should donate or just free-ride. If I do donate, how much? I did not like that—I’d like the service to be available for free, or charge me for it. Don’t ask me to decide how much I want to pay.
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I am thinking of going back to Inoreader, despite the price increase, despite newsletter limitations, and despite the fact that I’ve already paid $36 for a year of Newsblur. That’s because I like Inoreader’s web interface so, so much. It’s kinda ugly but I can fly through it.
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Regarding Tapestry: I’m allergic to Kickstarters. I’ll gladly donate to open source projects (despite my kvetching a minute ago). I’ll gladly buy a product. If investing a small amount in a company was an option, I’d probably do that. But don’t ask me to set aside $$$ for a product that may or may not ship and that I may or may not still b interested in when it does ship
Tapestry looks great and I’ll strongly consider buying it when it’s available.
I make an exception for this one friend who funds his work through Kickstarter. But (a) he’s a friend (b) He’s reliable–he’s done Kickstarters many times and he always delivers and (c) he’s unusual in that he’s a friend and I’m also a fan of his work. I’m fortunate to have several friends in creative professions, but I’m not a fan of all of their work.
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Reeder can also Sync your feeds via iCloud, i.e. it doesn’t need a back end service.
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I backed it too, but it’s currently vapourware.
- It’s not available yet
- It may never be available (this is extremely unlikely with Icon Factory, but it’s always a possibility.)
There are many times your concern about Kickstarter is well placed. In this case I’m personally prepared to trust the IconFactory. They’ve been around for a while. However this is still a future hope and not something to use today.
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I never used Inoreader, but I love feeeed. It’s definitely its own style of RSS reader, but I love it for that.
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Thanks for your recommendations to feeeed. It’s an interesting take, almost like what Icon Factory’s upcoming Kickstarter project is going to be.
Wait, what? I’ve been paying $9.99 per month since joining almost a year ago. What prices did they increase, just yearly?
This thread is great though, I’m finding a lot of viable alternatives that I’ll be checking out to see about switching and saving some money.
edit: Also, just so I can add something of value to this thread, the best feed-generator service I’ve used is PolitePol by far for websites that don’t provide feed links.
I didn’t know anyone was paying a subscription for RSS readers, it does not seem like a thing I’d want a sub for - it should be a ‘download and go’ product (I guess I’m thinking of it in the same way I’d think of a book reading app. The ongoing cost should be for the content itself, not the app you need to read it.) (Yes, I realise app developers need feeding too. No, I don’t agree with subs.)
There are so many good pay-once or even free RSS readers out there. Does Inoreader really (REALLY?) have a feature that’s so good it’s worth $70 a year more than its competitors (let’s generously assume you’ll pay $20 for a different app). In two years you will have paid $140 versus $20.
I’m a Reeder user for what it’s worth, but I do think RSS is kind of a personal thing and we all have preferences, so we can recommend apps you might not have heard of but only you can find the one you like. I’ve used Reeder for probably over a decade and if I change it will be because of circumstances beyond my control. I have a huge amount of folders, with feeds appearing in many different sections (e.g. I have folders by topic, but I also have folders for stuff I skim, folders for stuff I know is probably going to need a closer read, a folder for priority feeds I always check first, a folder for Substack feeds that have not yet left Substack whilst I wait to see what their authors do… the possibilities are endless!).
[Since I mention this whenever we talk about RSS, please take the obligatory moment to scowl at Google and make a toast to the greatest app they abandoned, Google Reader.]
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Pouring one out for dear, departed Google Reader.
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There’s always a cost, whether that’s maintaining the app, or the service on the web which will have costs for compute, storage and possibly bandwidth used depending on how successful the service is.
How much someone should be willing to pay is, as always, up to the individual. Personally I think that £10 to £20 a year is fair for an RSS Feed reader app. I get at least that much value out of it.
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I’m still using old Reeder version 4 but I only read RSS on my Mac and don’t need to sync anything to another device.
I want to throw Feedbin into the ring.
I’ve been a happy customer for at least two years now probably longer. It’s simple and elegant and has just the right amount of features for me. You can use the Reeder app or a variety of other apps that support it too if you don’t like their app. I use the web app on desktop and Unread on mobile.
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Another option: RSSParrot (https://rss-parrot.net) turns your Mastodon timeline into an RSS feed reader.
Could be. I know Kottke also updated his quick links to only have one per post. But I gave up on NNW prior to that. I liked it a lot but too unpredictable on what I was missing.
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Can anyone recommend an RSS reader in which bulk import from Safari Reading List and export, but mainly import is possible in a read later format and which also allows for following RSS feeds… I currently use Reeder 5 but it doesn’t do any import or export from Safari Reading list or otherwise