A Feed Reader That I Actually Like
Posted on April 20, 2007 by
Adie 
Tools 
14 Comments
After all these years I’ve finally given in and started using a feed reader. I know, I know. I’m slow. The main reason it has taken me so long to switch to using a feed reader rather than just bookmarking my favorite blogs is because I honestly have not been impressed with any of the feed readers available. It seems that everytime I opened up my reader I was bombarded with updates, and me being the obsessive person that I am couldn’t allow any story to go unread. I lost a lot of time.
After doing a bit of searching, however, I’ve found a feed reader that I actually like: Netvibes. Netvibes is more than just a feed reader, it’s a dynamic homepage. The main thing I’m using it for, however, is to organize and read my feeds. Now I have all of my nerdy blog updates, music news, and football news in one location.
Another great reason why I’m using Netvibes over other readers is the small aesthetic touches. I know it’s probably a minor point to most people but the little tab icons and the window color-coding pretty much sold the site for me. The way I have my page setup now is with my most-read feeds up top in red with my less-read feeds underneath in blue or gray.
I may finally have been sold on the delicious use of feeds, at least in the way that they’re used on a site like Netvibes. Having all of my reading in one location as well as email updates, my twitter feed, a to-do list, and a sexy calendar is what web 2.0 is all about. There are many other services similar to Netvibes out there, but this is by far my favorite personal homepage.
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You know what? You’re not the only one. As of yesterday I actually started to use Google Reader. I tried NetVibes and it is too cluttered for me. I enjoy the ease and simplicity of Google Reader. I used to go to each site, such as yours, Bryan Le’s, John Chows, etc and refresh/check for new content. Now with the feed reader I can do all of that from one standard location. I may give NetVibes another try sometime but I really like Google Reader. You should try it if you haven’t already.
I like Netvibes a lot, too. I cut my teeth on Google’s setup, but then moved to Pageflakes…which gave me a few problems. I finally settled on NetVibes. But then I got the word that there had been some updates on Pageflakes…so I went back, and sure enough, for now, it’s the best I’ve seen. It’s fun to watch all these guys scrambling to improve, though. With less than 10 of all net users taking advantage of readers/aggregators/personalized pages…there’s a LOT of room for increasing the base.
I use MS Outlook for RSS feeds and I love it. The text is so much easier to read than actually visiting a blog.
Andy,
Are you serious? Outlook is hideous. I guess if you like Calibri in font size like 8 then you’re okay. I couldn’t stand reading it in Calibri. Add to the fact that you can’t even pick your own font, that’s just plain down right nasty.
I use firefox live bookmarks. It’s fantastic!
I might give this a shot… although I do want to take a close look at Google’s reader… the Google home page is killing me!
Netvibes is fantastic, not only for the rss feeds, but also for the large choice of modules. It’s not the rss reader that sold it to me, to be honest, but the ability to have google/image search, my ip, and a lorem ipsum generator (etc.) all in one page. Not to mention the fact that you can build modules for it.
I’ve been using Netvibes heavily for some time now - more than one year, and since i’m known to switch very easily to different versions, programmes and companies just out of curiosity, that should tell you something about how good Netvibes is, since i’m sticking to it for so long now. Couldn’t imagine using anything else, and believe me i tried.
[...] A Feed Reader That I Actually Like [...]
[...] I have tried several feed readers in the past few months. Googles feed reader was ok buti didnt take to it. I came across an article by Matt Coddington on NetBusinessBlog called ‘A Feed Reader That I Actually Like ‘. [...]
I never used to use Feed Readers. I didnt think that they were good and the fact that i wont be needing to use Google Homepage anymore because of netvibes, thanks very much for sharing.
Matt,
Cheers for this post. I’ve only recently dragged myself into the world of feed readers, well, just the world of Google so far. But on what I’ve read, I’ll give NetVibes a bash.
They do hold tremendous benefit for myself, in cleaning up my brain in segments, what to read, what to comment on, resources … etc etc.
And as my first comment, Awesome site (content + looks), have been subscribed for a while, but only recently got everything together to start commenting.
Well it’s great you like it, now you can finally signup to my feed
[...] Reader. I cant even search feeds for christ sake which drives me nuts sometimes. Matt Coddington started persuading me on April 20th then NetVibes announced there new customisations so I have to give it a [...]