Google Reader Updated

Last year, was released by Google Labs, and it looked intriguing, so I imported my OPML and started adding feeds. 

Some of the things I originally liked about it were:

  • Ability to "Star" items.
  • Automatic "Mark as Read" by scrolling over a post.
  • Ability to tag feeds with multiple keywords.
  • Ability to make feed Tags public to share with others.
  • Ability to Import/Export OPML lists of my blogs.
  • Ability to use a Bookmarklet to add feeds on the fly.

Having used other blog-readers and blog-aggregation services, I was a bit disappointed by the UI and overall usability of this app, but it looked like such a perfect fit with other Google services that it seemed inevitable that it would improve.  Also, for now I just wanted a central place to store my blog-roll rather than having it in Thunderbird, or owned by some blog aggregation service.

Recently, they started adding a few new features, and today when I went to add another feed, I noticed there was a yet another new update - this time to the UI & navigation. I must say that it i's impressive.  The overall navigation feels much more like a standard rich-client blog-reader, the viewing-pane is made more usable by better content formatting, the ability to view more than 1 post on the screen at a time, etc.

In addition, here are some of the changes and features they have added over the past month or so:

  • A new Google Personalized Homepage widget.
  • Ability to add a "Clip" to my blog based upon a Tag. (see left sidebar for Telligenti Blogs clip)
  • Use Reader on your mobile phone.
  • Switch to "folder" metaphore for tagging.
  • Improved Tag & Feed admin features.
  • Additional Bookmarklets for navigating feeds.

The thing I think I like most is the development style of this app.   The app appears to be built much like Gmail and other Ajax-centric google apps and seems to be fully accessible via url-mangling navigation and rss feeds.   This product is definitely ripe for mashup opportunities.

Now if we can just get them to do the same level of improvement to Google Bookmarks.  :)

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