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October 28, 2011

Readings – Super Sleek RSS

Readings is an RSS reader that gets straight to the point. The social reader works similarly to Twitter or Facebook, in that users can subscribe to certain feeds to decide which news articles show up when they log into their accounts. It also works similarly to Google Reader, but without the complicated interface that turns many people off.

If you’re sick of the RSS reader you’re using now – or if you’ve been hesitant to use RSS because the whole thing seems too difficult to understand – then it’s time to give Readings a try. Browse through Readings’ extensive list of publishers and authors, and subscribe to any that look interesting. It’s easy to unsubscribe later, so there’s no harm in subscribing to anything and everything that looks good right now. You can also subscribe to the feeds of publishers that aren’t listed on the Readings site by typing in the website address or feed URL. Once you’ve added all the feeds, you’ll need to formally sign up by entering your email address and creating a password or signing in through Facebook or Google. Return to the Readings site and click onto your News Feed, to see a perfectly curated list of all the articles that are of importance in your life.

Browsing the news on Readings couldn’t be easier. Not only can you see a list of the most recently updated articles written by your favorite authors or published by your favorite news sites, but you can also see a list of the top stories for the past day, week, and month. Click the headline of a story to read it within the Readings site, or click “Read Later” to save it for another time. For news junkies who hate the clunkiness of competing RSS readers, Readings might be the solution.

Practical Uses:

  • Follow your favorite authors and writers online
  • Subscribe to all your favorite publications to get access to the articles in one spot
  • Read the most important articles from the last day, week, and month
  • Save articles that look interesting to read later

Insider Tips:

  • Users can manually add any feeds that aren’t listed on the Readings site
  • People who follow certain authors can also see when they post on Twitter
  • Browse publications by topic
  • Users can click on a publication to see the top stories before deciding whether to subscribe

What we liked:

  • Readings is a good solution for people who are afraid of complicated RSS readers
  • People have the option to follow their favorite authors, which is a unique feature
  • A list of all the publications and authors a person follows is viewable on the left side of every page
  • Users can import their current feeds from Google Reader into Readings

What we didn’t like:

  • Because Readings is new, it hasn’t been integrated into other news publications the way Google Reader and other competing RSSapplications have

Alternatives:

Company Info:

  • Launched: 2011
  • Privately Held
  • Headquarters: Silver Spring, Maryland
  • Founded by: Adeel Raza
  • Web site: http://www.readingshq.com

Costs:

  • Free

Comments

  1. Benjamin Collins

    I tried to import my most-read blog, and it shows up in the list of publishers, but it doesn’t show any stories, and more importantly, there doesn’t appear to be a way to show stories that have already been read.

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