Justin Blanton weighs in on the NetNewsWire iPhone application:
“Since installing the app, I find myself reading news a lot more in bed, before I get up in the morning. I roll over, grab my iPhone (which is sitting on the nightstand because I used a podcast to help me fall asleep) and start rocking and rolling with the days’ news. By the time I actually get out of bed, I’ve already made a sizable dent in my feeds. This works only because the app is not annoying; indeed, it’s quite a joy to use.”
It should be noted that Justin does not use NetNewsWire on his Macintosh. He and I share a love for Google Reader although we both have a lot of experience with NetNewsWire on the Mac.
Currently I don’t read any feeds on my iPhone. I have dabbled with Google Reader’s iPhone interface, but found it really hard to breeze through quickly for a number of reasons. However, his fairly thorough review of NetNewsWire for the iPhone makes me want to give it a try.
He is, as far as I can tell, omitting a huge caveat to using NetNewsWire for the iPhone and Google Reader on the Mac. Syncing. If I read something on NetNewsWire, on my iPhone, in bed – will I have to read that same post again when I pull up Google Reader at my desk? That’d suck.
Source: I ♥ NetNewsWire (on the iPhone).
8 Comments
Unless there is auto-syncing, AND the App is faster than using a web-based safari client… there really is no point, right?
I use desktop based clients for one purpose: so i can still read the news when I have no access to the internet.
With an iPhone, I suppose if you didn’t have 3G service for the majority of the area or time you use your phone, then a App would make sense, but otherwise…
Daniel: I don’t have a 3G iPhone period. I am stuck on 2G for, well, many years to come I’d wager. So perhaps an application is the way to go.
I’ll be sure to, at the very least, follow up on this post and speak my piece about NNW on the iPhone as it compares to Google Reader.
Daniel, there is auto-syncing (I wouldn’t use it if there wasn’t), and the NNW iPhone experience is much better than what you’ll find with any currently-available web app.
Justin Blanton: It doesn’t sync with Reader though, right? And, you have to create a NewsGator account.
Maybe I won’t be giving it a whirl.
Colin: Correct — I would be in heaven if it synced with Reader.
I’m a complete G user but after trying out NNW iPhone I’ve installed NNW on the desktop again.
Love the syncing of things and it is good to read stuff on the move but I’m still not convinced by NNW desktop; I prefer GReader’s web interface as I can log in at home, work, laptop or even a cafe.
In short NNW iPhone is good, so good that it makes NNW desktop bad. If only Newsgator made a better web interface I would be happy.
I’ve been a much heavier Reader user since I got my iPhone. In fact, Justin described my exact morning and right-before-bed activities. I really did love mobile Reader on the iPhone.
But… the problem I have is Safari on the iPhone. If I click to follow a link in Reader, it opens a new Safari page ’cause that’s how it have it setup. But often times when I’m done and return to reader, it refreshes Reader and because I’ve “read” that post, it disappears! Total P.I.T.A. if I now want to share that post.
So I took a look at NNW, found that I had to have a NewsGator acct. Signed up for NewsGator, exported my Reader OPML file, imported into NewsGator, grabbed the bookmarklet, and have been using NewsGator and NNW happily now for over a week.
Based on the comments above, I’m now going to go take another look at NNW for my desktops.
I’ve been a fan of FeedDemon, the PC equivalent of NetNewsWire, for a while now. Was even a paying customer prior to NewGator making it free for everyone. The iPhone app completes the circle for me. I don’t use NewsGator Online much, but it’s come in handy more than a few times when I was away from my computers/wifi and needed a feed fix. Google Reader is nice… but a dedicated desktop app is far nicer, IMHO.