Times: Review and Giveaway
There are currently many RSS applications out for Mac, but none of them are quite like Times. Times reinvents the user interface of an RSS reader by making it look similar to a newspaper. With a simple interface, Times makes it easy for anyone to read and view RSS feeds. It also has many special effects to make it look even better.
I’ll start with adding new feeds. To add a new website you can either click File-New Feed, Command-N, or click the plus arrow in the feed panel. If you have something on your clipboard it will automatically fill in most of the information. Once you have added some of your favorite sites you need to add them to one of your pages. You can have different pages to sort your news. Each page includes 3 main sections: a vertical bar on the right side, a horizontal bar on top, and a main area in the middle. To add a feed simply drag and drop the feed from the feed panel to a section of the page. To remove a feed you click the x icon in the corner, which only shows up when the feed panel is open.
Ok, so now you have all your pages set up and feeds in them. To switch pages simply click the name of the page on the bar on top. Then the current page slides away and reveals the other one. Reading feeds is very easy, too. If you click on one of the articles, the page peels back (or slides down) to reveal the full article. You can then scroll through the article or click the Read link at the bottom to open it in Safari. New articles in Times are marked with a small blue dot next to each article, and a red “New” badge is added to the dock icon. Then the pages with new feeds will have their titles in a blue font.
If you ever want to read articles that interest you, after looking through all of your new articles, you can add them to the shelf. To open the shelf just click the small black icon in the top right, next to the pencil, and a wooden shelf pops up on the bottom. Then you can drag articles straight from the main view onto the shelf. The shelf has space for 4 stacks of articles, and stacks work just like the ones on the dock in Mac OSX Leopard. When you mouse over a stack all the articles spring out and you can select one to view. In the application’s preferences you can change when the shelf automatically clears.
Times does a great job of changing the RSS reader. It is a major change compared to a normal RSS reader, and makes it even easier to use. Times is available today for $30 CAD from Acrylic Apps. But wait, there’s more! Dustin MacDonald was kind enough to give us 3 licenses to give away. Just post what you like about Times and any suggestions in the comments for your chance to win. Winners will be randomly selected on May 9.
This is an amazing app!
Great application, really like it because it is so uniquely Mac in terms of design and interface. Two features I would love:
1. Publishes page to .Mac or other web server automatically every day so that your news can be accessed on the go or your pages viewed by others.
2. (When iTunes App Store opens) A iPhone app that syncs/downloads feeds to your iPhone, iTouch for offline viewing, a bit like AvantGo, but much prettier.
Keep up the awesome work!
If it’s quick, autoupdate every minute, and there is a way to print it to read all the morning feed in the bus. I will adopt it.
Look awesome!
This must be the best app ever for converting parents from traditional new to digital.
The interface on this is definitely one of the most innovative I have seen in a while! It looks stunning!
That sorta 3D looking newspaper interface is very neat – how the pages fold down and are visible. Not just your usually pagination thing.
Great Mac-App! A new way to read not-so-very-fun list of rss posts!
Hi, looks great. It will be perfect if it can import rss from Google Reader!
The interface is very solid and innovative, i like it very much.
Syncing with one popular online rss reader like google reader would be very cool.
I love the shelf idea!
And a feature I would like to see is the NetnewsWire import (if there’s not already present).
Thanks for this review!
How much will it cost?
Really fast download RSS. For me is most important feature in RSS Reader.
seems very promising… wonderful ui… Would like to get a license
I’m very curious about this application. I think it can be a wonderful way to read feeds, but I’m not totally sure about its usability.
I don’t know if Times already has some integration with del.icio.us, but that feature would be very welcome (via Pukka or directly to del.icio.us). The same for integration with a blog editor like MarsEdit. I use these features a lot when reading feeds via NetNewsWire.
I love the flip page thingy, makes me wanna lick it! Cant wait for the release.
This app really looks unique and I will definatly be test driving this.
What would be nice is to have a scheduled task option of printing the pages out at a specific time so you could treat it like a newspaper and wake up to a nice printout of you favourite RSS feeds. Maybe use the built in sumarize feature in OSX to shorten the rss feeds is needed. That would be cool.
Syncing feeds is also a big feature as I use feed demon at work and then have what i have read in the day synced to my mac at home so I dont have to have to mark the same feeds as read when I get home.
But it all looks very promising!
iPhone/iPod touch support would be great (either by a standalone app or a webapp).
Fullscreen!!
I love the styling of the scrollbars, they should be an option in Leopard!
Hallelujah! This is *glorious*!
Very cool. It would be great to have a way to import feeds from other newsreaders.
Splendid program.
This is what I call ->> thinking out of the box.
Not a clone but completly new and innovative.
I love the really slick interface.
An iPhone interface that syncs seamlessly over the air would be kickass.
Nice app. I’d like to see it…arrive on my doorstep every morning?
I never understood why you would pay for an RSS reader when Google Reader seemed to do everything (and more) for free. Now I know why. Times is absolutely gorgeous.
Can’t seem to download it yet, but one thing I would need to adopt the app is full keyboard controls, something in the way GReader works (j/k to move individual items in a feed, etc).
It looks promising. Fullscreen, iPhone integration and NetNewsWire navigation like capabilities would be nice.
wow, the user interface is great!
Oh yeah, this looks like something I always wanted to use.
Too bad the server is down and I am not able to test it. Ouch.
Looks amazing!
What about some newspaper-themes, so you could have different layouts…
Also som kind of feature for making a pdf-booklet, so you can bring news with you, on ur iphone/touch or via mail… sounds delicious.
Maybe a built in browser, for reading real newspapers online, but with the layout and interface of Times?
Would sure love a license!
Cheers from Norway..!
Looks great! I hope it works as good as it looks
How come people are already telling what they like about Times and what features they would like if Times isn’t even available yet for download? I’m sure still greated with a “Coming in 1 day” message on the site?
Same here Hank, I am still getting the ‘coming in 1 day’ message…am I missing something?
It looks awesome, can’t wait to try it!
It’s true that conventional RSS readers have become boring… Hell, even NetNewsWire (which I purchased before it became free) is doing weird stuff all the time.
I need a fresh RSS reader like this in my dock ASAP!
I’m eagerly awaiting the release today. I don’t believe it has this feature, but integration with Google Reader would open up my wallet immediately. No one likes reading articles at work and then coming home and having to filter through all the “unread” articles. Integration with an online resource would be excellent.
Aw man! I was sent a licence for this today but I can’t download the app
A whole new way to look at RSS. The newspapper look will bring RSS to the guys that have not been acoustumed to it, the ones that still only read newspaper. Now everyone can enjoy a 3D newspaper on their macs….bring an iPhone version soon….
I’ve been longing for this app since I first heard of it. I hope I won’t get disappointed, the RSS reader should be a really simple clean thing that just will be there for you and I think Times will do it great.
This is the most beautiful RSS reader I’ve ever seen. I’ve been a die hard vienna user since I got a Mac, but this looks like it might find a place on my dock.
My only concern is how well it handles a ton of feeds. One of the things I like about vienna is the speed with which I can move through articles and open links in the internal browser, Im wondering how well Times will handle that.
Also, I hope there is a way to import opml files?
I’m definately going to try this. I hope the price is good, especially with the low dollar these days
What I like about Times is the column view. That’s how I want to read my news, and every time I think of switching from Google Reader, that’s the feature that does it.
The only thing keeping me with Google Reader is the shared items feature. If Times could work that in, I’d be willing to pay for the software.
Wow, looks awesome
.
I would like to have a kind of expose view for all sites where I have subscribed.
I can’t download it …
I really like the interface! Looking forward to trying it out!
Hey, just wanting to get into the contest.
My suggestion for making times better would be a separate view for webcomics that displayed them a la the paper newspaper.
Looks great, It would be great if it had some kind of web interface but it already looks cool.
Great looking RSS reader. Can’t wait trying it out.
I like the new look.
Wow, this is awesome! I have never heard about this app. I use GMAIL’s Reader and NetNewsWire and I am going to try this out!
Fantastic app, I think this will be the first RSS Reader that will make me switch from Google Reader.
I would also like synchronization to a reader. Otherwise, I’ve been watching the site to try it for a few days now. Looks intriguing!
Uh, an online reader..
(didn’t specify).
wonderful app!
This makes me want to actually use a RSS reader.
I’m readin MacApper in Bloglines, but this looks like it could be a worthty replacement.
I use NNW, but this one looks great to read the feeds I actually read all the times, while keeping NNW for less important feeds.
Waiting to download it!
I think the concept is novel and very creative, considering the pressure to “standardize” the look and structure of every Mac App.
What could be changed? A minor quibble, but I’d like to see something done with the window bar at the top. It clashes with the feel of the rest of the app. I’ve seen other apps skin that part. So instead of having the grey bar with 3 colored buttons, perhaps there’s a way to make it a white color that blends with the rest of the “paper.”
There was an online service that could set an RSS feed up to look like a newspaper, but I can’t seem to remember what it was. That’s all nice, but it was a formatting trick for the online version, and it looks like very good-looking, albeit un-useful, eye candy to me.
I agree with the prevailing sentiment so far: that the prettiness is gravy. The real feature that’s going to set Times apart is the online service integration.
I love the app’s design and simplicity when it comes to reading feeds. Will definitely check this out.
finally an app that looks and feels like reading a physical product but with the flexibility of digital. the everyman can now create a custom “newspaper”. now if only syncing between the desktop and the iPhone/iPod Touch version (assuming one is planned) is possible, then I will be one very happy reader.
Very nice interface..beautifully done. Now if it had an iphone interface as well to sync i would be in heaven.
hmmm…website still says not available…1 more day.
Wow, I really like the newspaper metaphor. I also like the shelf-like feature. The transitions are amazing.
This looks great. Now that they have made this to replace the morning paper, maybe they can get to work on my digital morning coffee.
wow, that looks great. I love the interface. i agree that it would be great for converting older people to digital media as well as helping convert my GF to Macs.
Times excites me because it shakes up the way I see news being delivered from here on. I’ve always loved Safari’s RSS but Times takes it to the next level, categorizing and presenting content the way a newspaper does, virtually replacing print media for me in one app. Amazing
I’m not a “newsie” (i don’t work in the news industry), but I do sometimes watch the New Designers. They often cover layout redesigns.
It would be interesting to offer several layouts in addition to the 3-section one it has.
Where has this cool app been all of my life? Wow!
One suggestion though: get on the .Mac support! Synching, restoring, sharing – all of it via .Mac makes life so much better!
Personally, I don’t care for doing “that” amount of reading on a computer screen. If I want to read the paper I would use the Kindle from amazon. With the kindle you can subscribe to any newspaper, magazine and purchase a massive amount of books from the device wirelessly, no computer needed. It uses a new type of e-ink which looks a lot like paper.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000FI73MA/ref=amb_link_6750302_2?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=gateway-center-column&pf_rd_r=04S79H3FFS1JETDNEGBJ&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=392460501&pf_rd_i=507846
Ooops forgot to add the most important item. The Kindle can also read or subscribe to the blogs, so….
The fact that it has a nice interface, that reminds me of a newspaper.
Website finally opened. Download frenzy!
I’ve always wanted an app like that and didn’t know where to find it! It looks awesome!
I just hope the animations are fast enough, so they won’t bother you, after they stop wow-ing you!
Oh, and I hope these shelf-stacks have a way of opening, all together on a Safari window… That would be superb!
This looks like a great app! How about making it work on Tiger?
Ooh, another thing I want in an RSS reader – per feed granularity of what you want to see.
[ ] will simply viewing it cause it to be marked as read, or do I have to mark it as read manually
[ ] automatically allow items to fall off the end of the unread list either a) after so much time, or b) after so many items – i.e. automatically mark them as “read”
Well, it’s available now. Just got it. Interface is nice, animation is stunning, though I wonder if it will get annoying after some time. Maybe there should be an option to disable animation, instead of just choosing between page curl and sliding.
Overall Times seems to work like I expect it to. Except for one thing (which is my suggestion for improvement). I think it would be nice if you could create a new page by double clicking the white space next to the pages at the top, similar as to how you can open a new tab in Safari/Firefox/etc. by double clicking in the tab bar. In addition to this, it would be nice if you could drag pages out of there to delete them (make them go *poof!*.. you know..).
Other than that, impressive. I’ll start filling it with some useful feeds to try it for the next two weeks.
Love the interface, very creative. Attention to detail is very apparent.
This will go great with my my coffee sitting on my DVD-ROM coffee holder.
Like everyone else, I love the interface but to me, the problem is that it doesn’t add feeds to pages automatically and it refused to add my feeds from NetNewsWire with the groups intact, so I had to import the simple list of feeds and now I must place the feeds manually to see them, which is very time consuming
This looks great! I’d love to have it. Can the shelf be docked so that I can quickly call up pages, or must Times be running first?
Looks incredible!
It’s like they reinvented the paper.
I think mac programmers actually love their job, and do it as if it was art, not like others, who make dull and unimaginative software.
Amazing work guys!
Trying it out for a bit…while the interface is beautifully designed, it would not find any of the exported Google Reader feeds I had in an OPML format. Unless someone knows of a work-around, that’s a big minus in my book.
I love the newspaper look and feel. If I were to offer a suggestion, though, it’d be the incorporation of a traditional view (perhaps an “index” mode?). I have a LOT of feeds, and I think this would be cumbersome for a lot of them…
Wow, style with utility – a terrific app that takes advantage of the beauty of a mac. Very cool.
I like this very much. I’ve often felt that reading RSS feeds was getting a little bit too much like checking email, and this program provides a refreshing change from that.
I guess I have another suggestion (see my comment from 10:58 am). I just added two feeds to a section, and it adds those two feeds below each other. I think it would be *much* beter if it would mix those two (or more) feeds and display those as one chronological list. Working like this, I guess it’s pretty useless to me.
Also seems not very newspaper-ish, so I wasn’t expecting it to work like this.
My initial impressions is that this is a beautiful app. We don’t need another NNW/NewsFire/Vienna and I think Times succeeds in being something different. There are numerous nice graphical touches that make this feel good, from the application icon to the woodgrain shelf to the subtle shading and shadows. Really, really nice.
That said, it felt a bit beta to me. There were some glitches in the graphic transitions and it felt a bit sluggish here and there. And it was kinda buggy for me – the first time I added a story to the shelf it was positioned off to the left, not even on the shelf. I resized the app window and it jumped over to the correct position.
Another time when I clicked on the story the paper folded down and then disappeared, leaving me with no way to get back to the main interface. Maybe there was an option in the menu somewhere, but clearly this was a bug.
UI question – when looking at article within the app, the folded paper covers up the last line and I can’t read it. Is this a glitch? Seems very strange.
Anyway, this is meant to be constructive criticism as I really like the app so far. Just needs a few things ironed out I think.
My killer feature – Google Reader sync! No other app does this as far as I can tell, and I don’t expect NNW to add it since they have their own online app. But the bottom line is I’m not going to manage my feeds in two places, and I’m not giving up Google Reader. I’d love to use a nice desktop app when I’m on my machine, and I need Google Reader sync to do this.
What a gorgeous app. A beautiful blend of functionality, fun, and Apple style. Goodonya, Dustin!
Wow. I’m in awe. I’ve heard of others wanting to create an app like this, and it was even an idea from MyDreamApp.com. Glad to see that it’s not only realized now, but it’s well executed!
Beautiful App
I hope i win
Very nice app
Random, Please pick me
Another usability improvement (I’m guessing the developers are reading this, right?). Quick Look for images in feeds is genius, and I really love Quick Look and use it a lot, so I found myself tapping spacebar to close the Quick Look popup again, but it didn’t go away.. I *had* to click the little closing button.
I always read my RSS through Safari’s built in RSS Reader
but if i won this app, I’m going to start using an RSS Reader
sweeeeeet
For starters, this is the most innovative fusion of typography and modern RSS in one attractive package.
Times makes reading feeds fun again. Who doesn’t like a cup of coffee and a newspaper?
Nice GUI with nice effect, now I can read newspaper on my Mac
a great companion to zinio reader
Growl support would be nice
Wow. Oh, screw it… I’m BUYING that baby right now. It’s awesome.
This looks so good. I use Newsfire right now, and it certainly does its job with minimal fuss.
But – I love the aspect that Times can look like a newspaper and takes advantage of the features of Leopard. Very cool. In some ways, I wonder why online newspapers haven’t looked at developing an application like this that would revolutionize their distribution of news. Would be very cool.
96 comments in 5 hours. This has to be a record for MacApper.
Well first think I must say is that it looks different than ordinary app
The only flaw I was able to find is that when reading an article part of the text is covered by previous/list-of -feeds page and is thus unreadable. Hopefully author will fix this because the overall sence of an article can be easily destroyed as you can not see the whole text.
Also I would like Times to have “feed manager” where feeds can be easily managed because I find it a bit clumsy.
@Greg lol, I was just thinking that.
i like the app, viewing full pages outside of safari alone is great.
i purchased newsfirex back when it wasn’t free, $15 dollars seemed steep back then for something as simple as an RSS reader. Having said that I feel that Times even as innovative as it is, is pretty pricey at $30. That and I can’t seem to import the feeds from the OPML i exported from Newsfirex, i cant tell if its a limitation of the trial to not be able to import a certain amount, and i cant find documentation on the limitations of the trial. i tried reading a few articles and the whole page drop thing is kind of annoying, it blocks some of text and i can’t seem to figure out how to make it go away, the slide is much more functional. this program shows alot of promise, in my opinion i would not spend something $30 on this YET. there are still of interface things that i think should be tightened for a better experience, it feels like 1.0 program. however, having said all that im dying to see what happens to the program come 2.0, and what dustin comes up in the future.
I love the snazzy effects and the creativity and braveness to change the way we think of RSS.
Great idea, well executed! Have not tried out the app but the interface sure looks darn good. With NetNewsWire and Newsfire being offered free, I’m not sure how people will react to Times though..
Saw a preview of this at the begging of the week, been waiting for the release since.
Like most people, I think the interface has to be what I love the most, and the Apple style approach to RSS.
Just tried it out and it’s definitely going to replace newsfire. The interface clicked the moment I started using it, in two clicks I added my favorite feed and was on my way to browsing ease. The ability to save articles for later on the shelf adds that extra touch that sets it apart from any other reader on the market. A brilliant addition to anyones app collection.
Looks excellent. Finally something that redefines the paradigm. I’m fed up with NNWire.
Whoa, I really love the interface. The animated page changing. The shelf. All very cool ideas.
Just from the screenshots, I can see this may be the app that finally makes an avid RSS guy out of me.
It’s all about the experience — why use an RSS app that’s more difficult than simply web browsing?
Looks like Dustin MacDonald is working hard: there’s already an update on Times to fix the OPML import issue….
A lot of potential on this application, that’s for sure!
Great looking app, probably the best fun you can have reading RSS. As others have said, Fullscreen and iPod integration woud be great.
Being able to replicate the design and feel of your favorite newspaper or news magazine would be great. For example, those that are partial to the WSJ could have the standard black and white layout, and the “dot matrix” style images applied to the layout.
Very nostalgic, and the perfect old media/new media convergence.
What a splendid app !
Very nice looking, I like how it simulates print.
It would be nice, though, if:
1) it could sync with Google Reader; having two maintain two different RSS subscriptions is a pain, we’re not always at our Mac
2) it had Growl support
I like the use of cleaner typography and whitespace, as a designer it’s something I really appreciate. I would however like to see a nice easy way to browse with the IR remote.
I’d love this app!
I use RSS readers a lot but I’ve never really liked their plain and dull user interface. This app makes it interesting and nice to look at! Awesome!
Great UI (as noted by everybody)
But where’s the “smart folders?”
Transitions sluggish
I dunno what I did wrong, but I have blank pages?!?!? wtf
No marked as read
No tags
You can’t customize and create your own folder (that I’ve noticed), that means I can’t create a feed strictly for Apple. On Newsfire I can create smart folders for Leopard.
I understand its BETA, but these are some basic features.
this is great! I do a lot of rss reading through the mail app so having this would be great cause im already used to reading regular newspapers and having this type of rss would make everything that much smoother. nice
I like how you can move the feeds around, BUT once you move it, the other is gone. It would be nice if it just switched them, not completely delete it.
The dots to indicate if you’ve read the article are kinda pointless, since you have to click on the article in order to read it. Kinda defeats the purpose. It would be nice, if once the article is read, a pencil or pen type of “X” should appear on the article. As if somebody was reading an actual newspaper and just marked it.
Very nice and pleasing interface. I’m not sure if it’ll replace Vienna for RSS browsing, but it certainly is one of the slickest looking apps out there. I also agree that the price is a little too much. $19.99 would seem more reasonable.
Does it have a “keyword” search?
Not sure if somebody mentioned this, but a Quicklook option would be incredible, specially reading a full screen. And having the ability to switch between articles by using the arrows while in Quicklook fullscreen.
I love the “Services” implementation.
A feature called “Clippings” in which you can save certain articles would be nice.
Sorry for all the suggestions, but this app could be even more amazing than it is.
I’ve tried it out briefly this morning and it’s a very interesting idea though because of the page flip, you can not read to the bottom of the page. Maybe I’m doing something wrong. Also, I cannot see a way other than the shelf to save feeds. While the shelf seems great for collecting feeds you know you want to go back to in the current session, it would be nice to save the xml for future reference and keeping them in a stack is going to end up very difficult to go through once you have saved something like 50 or so. Other wise, very beautiful app and I really look forward to seeing how it develops.
I’d love a way to delete multiple feeds at once. Going through and removing the defaults is a pain.
From all the posts here, I’m sure Times will be a success. I like how easy it is to use and that there is no need for you to open the feeds in browser, all is built into Times.
The inteface is really nice its like you’re reading an actual newspaper. It has a very graphical look to it and the animations are really cool to look at also.
Fantastic implementation of rss app utilizing newspaper motif. You could sell 5 times as many licenses if you would cut the price in half. $30 is a bit high when you can obtain NetNewsWire and NewsFire for free. But I would still pay $15 for this because of the user experience and eye candy.
Wow, really unique way of reading RSS feeds that makes sense. I just got through trimming all the feeds I’m subscribed to, but I think this interface makes a lot of sense when you have tons of interesting subscriptions but don’t want to read every single article.
It would be nice if it could synchronize read/unread statuses via FTP or webdav, so when I will be reading at work, I won’t see articles I read at home, and vice versa.
Time crashed on my MBP while playing around with the Pages-feature. I am also afraid, I cannot live without NNW’s Clippings. Nice concept though.
More detail than ‘new’ on the in dock indicator
The ability to search articles
Cheaper price: I’m sure the devs have put a lot of work in, but there are so many free alternatives
Upgrades for life!!!!
Icon redesign, nice idea, but the newspaper is too square
I do love the app tho!!
Incredible looking app. Does this print out newspaper-like sheets, as well?
If there were a way to judge the importance of an article & put it as a “headline”, i.e., large bold font at the top of the page, that’d be pretty cool!
Quite impressive app. It took me a bit to figure out how to create new pages, but I’m glad one can have more than just the initial set of five. Now if only there was a way to adjust the page layout. Seeing the same three-pane layout on all of the pages could get old quick. Perhaps at some point this feature would be added.
Ok, this has become my full-time news reader! It’s excellent! But one snag I hit while importing my feeds is that I’ve run out of pages. So my suggestion is the ability to add more pages.
Haha, just figured out how to add a new page, wasn’t looking hard enough. Sooo my new suggestion is to colour new articles, making them stand out as unread.
I really like how Times forces you to select which feeds are most important to you, and its beautiful to boot!
Absolutely Stunning. So much fun to use too.
Looks really cool. I like how it puts all of your feeds in one place to easily read all of them. I’d much rather read a from a newspaper than from the file cabinet that is NewsFire (or NetNewsWire)
i need Times because as a designer i just get bored with Google Reader. i miss seeing the layouts of each site i check every day. but i have SO MANY i check each day that using an RSS reader is the only way to make it happen. and now Times will make the experience way more pretty.
Very interesting app. Definitely the best-looking one around for reading rss. I do not know if the price tag is adequate though (other apps might catch up pretty soon and remember that NetNewsWire is free now).
Another fabulous example of the lack of interface inhibition that characterizes Apple designers. Excellent program!
Wonderful application. fantastic graphics, amazingly simple operation. The *best* thing for trying to explain RSS to the older population, and a great tool to get them on the RSS bandwagon.
I really believe this application has a huge market among those who don’t have large RSS needs, or who are new to RSS.
Two suggestions though:
• The ability to scroll a page to see more feeds relating to that subject (or maybe flip it over –onto the backside–).
• The ability to sync two computers via .Mac (or some other web service… maybe the user’s FTP server also).
Other than those two (minor) things, a wonderful app (★★★★★)!
A great visual improvement over most of the other readers.
I’d like to see more than 10 items at a time. I’d like the New indicator to stay until I’ve read them all, rather than have it disappear after the next refresh. Or make it so that I can mark them as Read.
I can remove panes, but I’d like to option to add a fourth, fifth, etc. Some of the feeds I follow don’t post often, so I don’t want to waste a lot of real estate for something that doesn’t change often.
It really looks great, the newspaper look is a great idea, i think that would draw in a new crowd of people.
The interface is a paradigm breaking design and is the most interesting feature of the app. I’d like to see some sort of integration with Google Reader so that I things that I read in Reader are not shown in Times and vice versa.
Ben
Times is definitely what I have been looking for in a news reader. A feature I would like to include would be the ability to view all articles within the reader or is there already a way to do this? Once you click on some of the articles, they open in your browser.
It’s great! Runs very speedy, even on my underpowered Mac mini, and is far more stable than the copy that TAB reviewed. It would be great if I could drop feeds on the dock icon though.
Through using the trial a little bit longer, i’ve come up with another suggestion:
• It would be lovely when in the “feeds view” (editing, whatever you want to call it) have the feeds which are already on a page either slightly transparent or “tinted” another colour. Because at the moment it’s slightly difficult to see any difference between added and non-added feeds. Maybe include a little “check box” that one can tick to hide / reveal the feeds already on a page.
Awesome! I just love the interface. A couple of bugs, a few crashes, but I know these will be ironed out. Definitely going to keep my eye on this one.
Wow! Tried and I really hope I win yet I will probably get it anyways
Wow. I was skeptical when i heard about this app earlier but it looks AMAZING. I love the way it creates a look of continuity between all the feeds. WANT!
Sweet app, but runs sluggishly on my Macbook
I love the app. It is a clean interface and very creative in its appearance. I do however, have some suggestions to make it even better (in my humble opinion):
1. It would be great to be able to bookmark socially right from the reader. This is not a feature that many readers have incorporated but it saves us a step instead of opening in a browser and reading and bookmarking there. I would love to stay in the reader as long as possible without switching back and forth.
2. While the interface is nice to navigate around, it still is a little difficult to find pages at times or great feeds that may be out there that are easily seen quickly in other readers. It might be nice to have an “inspector” like box but just a popout menu for either a tag cloud, or table of contents or something that would allow us to jump to a feed quickly.
3. Along that same line it would be great to have multiple shelves, one for “revision later” one for saved forever, etc.
4. I think someone else had a great comment about being able to sync with some service on .Mac. I am not sure if that is possible but it doesn’t sound like it. However it might be possible to simply compile an online view of times that we could subscribe to and log in the way that NetNewswire and Gator work together.
5. I would also love to see the capability of editing and uploading our own blogs in this sweet interface.
These are suggestions but know that my hat is off to the developers for creating such an amazing application! Congratulations!
Wow! Awesome App. I wish I could rearrange feeds within an area on the page (rather than alphabetical order).
There needs to be a button at the top to return to the bottom page, I don’t like having to move my mouse back down to the bottom just to bring up the page again.
This is the first app that got my mom interested in rss feeds.
Great work!
This is quite possibly the best RSS Reader I have ever seen. My primary right now is Vienna, and it does the job quite well. But this. This is simply incredible. I agree with the above that it would be nice to be able to organize in other than alphabetical order, but otherwise, it is a fantastic RSS reader. Keep up the good work.
A very different news reader indeed. Makes reading RSS feeds a lot more interesting.
However I find the current layout limits the number of feeds (up to 3) I can view on any page. As I subscribe to multiple feeds for each category of interest (e.g. technology), it would be nice to have the option to have the pages open up in “full” page view (2 times the current display) or better still, with a left and right page (this will be 4 times the current display) to simulate reading off a real newspaper. This would help to display more feeds for each category (or page) and allow me to cover more news in a shorter period of time.
I downloaded the trial and I love Times, I especially like the newspaper feel of the app, it makes reading RSS feeds a lot more enjoyable. But I would prefer if you could have more than 3 feeds per page.
great application, I love the new interface. How does it handle (display) large lists of feeds, though? anyhow, this new concept is a big step ahead.
It would be great to also have a version for Tiger. In this way I could use it on each of my macs – MBP(Tiger) and iMac (Leopard). Safari’s RSS feed is ok, but Times has a much better look.
Great app!!
I just wish it had syncing (w/ .Mac?) and better importing of feeds (didn’t work w/ NetNewsWire)
Sure its nice, different, cutting edge UI… But I cant see this replacing anyones newsreader at the moment. In terms of features it lacks, full of bugs for 30 bucks. Worth downloading though just for fun, not worth 30 bucks at the moment. NetNewsWire is way way better.
Interesting idea. Might just make me want to switch to Leopard.
I love the idea of making all feeds look like a newspaper.
Wish it didn’t have to open things in Safari though – that’s my feature request!
Times is super neat!
I love how the approach is totally different than the other RSS readers. The space needed this kind of innovation!
Very, Very, VERY nice interface. Not just another Feed Reader app… seems a whole new approach. Well done!!! Is there a trial?
When I see the programs like Times, I understand why switched to makintosh. One of the few applications, which demonstrates the full force of Leopard.
Multi touch implementation for those that have the new Macbook Pros,Air, Iphone and Ipod.
Using finger gestures to flip the page, scroll thru the articles would be great for them.
Wonderful! Just beautiful. This is what I would call ‘eye candy.’ My only concern at first glance is the immediate barrage of American news sources; thou it seems to be as customizable as the dashboard, so not a big deal. I could see myself using this but I might need a crosswords feature before I really give up my paper made of paper.
I’m trying this app out now. It seems pretty cool but I still need to test it out.
I would defiantly love to have an iPhone/iPod touch app that syncs.
I’m a sucker for eye candy. This app has it in spades.
Now that I’ve used it, I have to say I like the shortcuts and love the shelf. Would like to see it better implement importing feeds from an xml file (it refuses to work with my exported Google Reader feeds).
Some way to properly handle hundreds of feeds would be great.
It would be nice if the user could resize the columns and add/remove sections. Also, I don’t see a way of adding additional categories along the top, unlike what is shown in the screenshots.
One other thing is that Safari/Firefox don’t seem to recognize Times a newsreader by default. I had to browse for the application in order to associate a news feed with the application. It would be nice if this was automatically configured when the app is copied to the system.
Wow… What a refreshing look for RSS! I’ve always been very reluctant to use RSS readers because of the layout, presentation, and lack of “flash”, but I love how all the information is presented! This makes reading RSS much more enjoyable, and making the layout similar to an actual newspaper let’s me glance at each story much like I actually do with hardcopy
.
This app is absolutely amazing, I wouldn’t change a thing!!
Great layout/design. I have so been waiting for a newspaper design app for reading articles at my leisure.
The only added feature would be a google news reader synch.
I like the unconventional design of the reader. All the other readers look and are more or less the same.
Positives first, it is kind of nice to look at a newspaper layout of your RSS feeds… But the positives ends there. If you are having more then 30 feeds you will go absolutely crazy in a day or two trying to keep up with your RSS feeds. As an example, there is now way to see which are the latest feeds! If the app refreshes every 10 min, the previous “new” feeds gets unmarked. So leaving the app running for an hour going to lunch (having Times set to check for new feeds every 10 min) you come back and have no clue which are the unread feeds (obviously there is now way to tell how many unread feeds you have either). Organizing your feeds is nightmarish. Let say you import 100 feeds (I did 42). The feeds gets placed in a feed drawer, from there you drag and drop your feeds into “pages” you have created (pages being like Times equal to Folders with the difference that you have to put a feed on a page in order to read the feed). So you drag and drop your feeds onto the pages and very quickly you have no clue which feeds you already placed and which other you have not. So you scroll down, look at the other pages, take out pen and paper to keep notes on what you are doing… This is a joke! It will drive less patient people with loads of feeds up the walls in a matter of minutes. It costs 30 bucks and is beta software. Crashes and buggs, beware!!! This is just eye candy without function. The whole point of RSS is to digest information in an easy manner, Times makes it harder then any other RSS reader. This is form before function – bad design! Do not get seduced by the eye candy, take the candy away and you have buggy beta software that does not focus on the applications main objective – reading and organizing your RSS feeds!
What an awesome app!!
Would love to see painless syncing with NNW.
The shelf is a great feature.
Heck, the whole app is a “great feature”!! LOL
I am not usually an RSS reader, I tend to check websites when i remember, and i have a select few feeds in Safari and Mail. I Just tend to get annoyed with having a load of unread articles. Most readers do treat Feeds like e-mail and it becomes a case of ‘having’ to read all these messages. And people go into information overload.
The interface changes the way i see a feed totally. It becomes a joy to read rather than a chore. You can scan feeds easily, leaves less critical ones on the side and save some for later reading on the shelf. The only problem i have had so far is when reading a longish article. The flap down page tends to hide the last few lines. Not a critical fault for me usually, but it may be for some articles.
Anyway, i really like it. It’s a great thing and it proves what a difference the way information is presented makes.
WOW, feels like reading a newspaper, great design interface!!
Mixed feeling on this one… I love the UI but think this is a bit too pricey.
Also I am not sold on the stability of this application. When i first got the application i would not accept my OPML file. A few hours later an update occurred fixing that issue. Next I loaded up my feed and put Times to work and things appeared fine. I shutdown the application and tried to restart but no joy it crashes on startup. I emailed the support address and no response.
The Good
the UI
The bad
the price
the ugly
stability
wishlist
different pages layout
john
PS. sorry for being hard on stability, i am a software tester
I love the flip page effect, looks so real!
Good job!
Likes the interface very much. However I really need a possibility to have more then one feed in one box so their content is intermixed (something like smart folders)… Groups opml import would be also nice.
Okay, I didn’t buy it (yet) they have a trial download so if I could win a license, GREAT. So here goes… After spending a day with Times, here are my suggestions:
1 – growl notifications, I often keep the volume down on my computer so an audio signal that I have new feeds is not beneficial. However different audio sounds besides the standard ones, ala the widget, minutes would be cool.
2 – If you want to adjust a look of a page you can to do it manually by dragging the lines that separate each section on the GUI. If you want to have consistency with all the “pages”of your newspaper you have to do each one manually. If, say, a “MASTER SLIDE” something like in Keynote or powerpoint could be implemented so you could just make one adjustment and have it apply to all, that would be wonderful.
3 – Google Reader syncing would be terrific. right now you can import from NetNewsWire or a reader on your computer, how about an online reader?
4 – If it had buit-in browser capabilities ala NetNewsWire, instead of opening an article in my web browser, that would be great. After all, shouldn’t the point of having a desktop reader be that you DON’T have to use a web browser to read full articles? It’s what I love about NetNewsWire.
Suggestions aside, they gotta fix the bugs. the graphics glitch happened 4 times and it crashed once (sent the reports in). I really like it a great deal though and a free license would pretty much earn my love
Oops…I forgot one:
QUICK LOOK. I subscribe to a lot of photo feeds on Flickr so that would be nice.
Since I read a “lot” of feeds daily and am in that sense a power user, total keyboard control is an absolute must. I love google reader and NNW because I can do just about anything with a keyboard there and that really saves me a lot of time.
Having said that, Times does look like a new refreshing approach, and I am going to give it a try to see how it fares. The shelf idea seems nice.
Among other suggestions, I would love to see the ability to print / share /blog the shelf articles.
Got my email wrong on the previous post
The look of the app is what makes it shine.
Very buggy at the moment but that’s to be expected. Looking forward to seeing it evolve.
Well graphically done. But that’s all. I mean it’s great to have a lil’ bit different RSS reader and it’s even better to have one that actually looks like newspaper but I see a problem in value.
Basically the wonderful new design idea gives you no greater functionality that e.g. NetNewsWire’s “classic” interface.
And so we come to the point – shall we pay almost 30 US dollars for an app that gives you the same functionality as free NetNewsWire? Well, it depends how much do you really want your own digital ‘paper.
What really would make this application buy-worthy would be an iPhone/iPod Touch version. That would be really nice.
I think this might be a very nice addition a user’s RSS collection, rather than a replacement. Visually it is very clean, so I can see keeping it on my desktop in semi-transparent mode to be able to glance at headlines while doing other work, but keeping NNW on hand for regular deeper grazing of favorite sites. I think the beauty of Times is in its streamlined look so any future changes should avoid cluttering it with tabs and such.
its fancier lookin than any other on the market.
Intriguing feed reader. Not sure it’s quite enough to make me switch from NNW. That said, would love to see a way to manage a large collection of feeds in a quick and easy fashion.
Just some notes from the past day and a half….
The UI is obviously the draw here as everyone has said. It looks less cluttered because it is less cluttered. You can only get away with about 10-12 pages and 3-4 feeds a page. It does accentuate the feeds you give it though.
I think the way feeds are handled on the page can be improved.
For instance, you only have 3 sections to place feeds per page. You can place multiple feeds in one section. Say I place MacApper and MacDailyNews in the same section. Ideally that section should display articles in chronological order, regardless of site. Instead, it lists all MacApper articles, THEN all MacDailyNews articles below. this makes
The other feature I have a problem with is nothing gets marked as read and deleted from the page. If I click on an article, unless I move it to the shelf, it should disappear and make room for another article.
Overall, I can definitely see myself using this as my primary RSS reader if these issues are addressed one way or another. I would probably keep some feeds on google.
One last thing, I have no problem with this being a pay app. However, it has to offer a browser interface for when I am away from my computer. If free solutions offer such functionality, then a $30 must offer that as well.
I think that this app is a good start and will make up for its few flaws quickly.
Actually, I think most browsers have already included RSS function, and it seems that there are no values to develop a RSS application.
Anyway, Times is a good try. I would like to start by commenting on the UI. I believe it is a good idea, Acrylic has created a new way for us to read news. It is interesting.
However, I honestly think that $30 for a RSS reader is quite expensive, as there are a lot of replacement. It is suggested to provide some discounts.
Work hard, Acrylic
Easy on the eyes….
Easy to learn….
Easy to want a copy!
I use Postino, but am looking for a more newspaper-like UI.
I like this….
great app – innovative interface and well thought out keyboard shortcuts..
suggestion – give the user the ability to customize the font face and size.
bug – the ‘page setup’ function also seems to have a bug, as i don’t get the OK or cancel buttons thus there’s no way to close the page setup screen! had to force quit…
cheers
Times looks amazing!
I would love to see some more spaces for RSS feeds e.g. newspaper style columns across the entire screen.
I wonder how well those visual effects might work on some older macs though. (can they be turned off?)
I like that it looks like a newspaper, but its my online feeds. Its retro but new.
Wow, 200 comments! This is obviously a pretty popular topic.
I like the fresh approach, but I’m not sure how well this would work in the long run, especially if you have dozens and dozens of feeds.
I love how images are detected and used for the newpsaper view… even for unknown feeds.
I like it as an RSS reader for people not into RSS yet. Hopefully future versions will improve it to allow for a proper comics page.
it’s great and innovative app. i like it!
Finally an app that seems to demonstrate the real power of 10.5! This will change the way i read my information everyday! Well done!
What I like about this app is that it’s a fresh new way of looking at news on your computer that’s based off the time-tested way of reading news off your computer but with a beautiful twist. I wish you could change the column widths around a bit, but other than that I really hope I win it
Great software, didn’t know something like this existed… This is a prog i’ll be looking at closely in the future, might give it a try!!
Thanks for the share
So far I love the fact that Times uses a different paradigm for feed reading than other readers do. Some feeds I know I want to read every single post, but others are more news-type feeds that I just want to browse. Times is a wonderful solution for reading those “just browsing” feeds.
I wish there was more flexibility in terms of creating pages (it seems to have a 5 page limit), and I wish I could import an OPML file and have it optionally automatically populate a new page.
Times really is a fantastic application, it feels really mac-like and is a new, original way to view your RSS feeds. It would be nice to be able to flick between this and the typical RSS reader view, then you can have the best of both worlds!!
I’m using Google Reader because my continuous travels and my iMac doesn’t come with me. So I needed to change from a rss app for mac to online. So my feature request is someway to sync Times with GReader..I now newsgator do it, but I prefer GReader.
I love the concept of Times, totally breaks the mould for previous RSS feeds and is much more enticing than Vienna, NetNewsWire et al
However although the newspaper style is great i’d still ove to be able to have a stanard “list” option for freqeuntly updated feeds which the newspaper style may miss for example facebook status updates
Leopard’s RSS readers in Mail and Safari are flat and minimalist; it’s easy to get sick of clicking through the bluish-boxes. Times is both eye candy and brain candy, up to the high graphic standards Mac users expect. This is a beautiful program–what Apple should have done from the first. e
I like the fact that it is like no other RSS reader, perhaps it is on the verge of starting a new trend (I hope).
Very cool concept, and excellent execution. I would need some sort of mobile version, or sync with an RSS reader which has a mobile version (Bloglines maybe?), before I started using this as my only RSS reader. It’s definitely makes the Times and Journal a much more visually pleasing and better organized read.
Great looking app.
Certainly a way to ensure I keep up to date with my RSS feeds more often.
A mobile version to take along with my regular newspaper in the morning would be great.
Great concept with useful interface.
I think that the application that seems to be very Mac.
I would love to see different designs for the pages.
Fantastic! Although I can appreciate the intricacy of Terminal or coding, a good UI does wonders. I work as a librarian, and the general ease of use and intuitive feel would be perfect for many of our elderly patrons. I love information overloads so much. =)
This looks fantastic.
I checked out the screencasts and this is an impressive app.
The interface of Times is very novel.And, it is very good-looking.There is no reason why this is not used.
It is after a long time to have met the application that uses andbecomes happy. I became very glad.
Whenever application best 10 with a beautiful interface is selected, Times will be chosen.
I’ve been looking for a way to make RSS feeds more accessible to my parents. Times is it.
I like how clean Times layout is. Its presentation is tidy and uncluttered, and it has that Mac aesthetic sensibility I love.
The interface of this application is very unique.
And, I love this interface.
Hard to imagine people once said commercial RSS readers were dead. Times has changed the playing field!
It was a novel RSS reader that had never seen.
Very cool interface, indeed. The app is a little buggy, but it’s a quite impressive work for a 1.0 release. I’d like the ability to save single articles or print to pdf
Amazing!
That’s what you should call Think Different!
There are about 20 RSS reader apps or mac (that I know off) and non of those fits for me the way Times does!
This guy is brilliant.
Times has changed the way I browse the web, and it Is a truly revolutionary product in my eyes.
I love how i can make my own private newspaper about the stuff I care about. It is so convenient to just keep track of all the different pages I reed by just flikking throug a few pages. It feels so natural and right.
Times is still a bit buggy but that will surely be solved in the future. But what I would like is to have different page layouts to chose from, and maybe a weather forecast built in.
I just love it. Great work.
A very nice app. I really wanted to have my own selected few “elite” feeds printed like a newspaper to be read every morning.
i just downloaded, i tried it and i love it!!!
it’s gorgeous! that’s how i want my rss-reader to look. great work, dustin!
my only feature request is that more content could be embedded instead of opening up in safari. i’d prefer not to jump between the two apps if possible.
It is an epoch-making RSS reader.
I have been deeply moved by this application.
Wow, really like the look and feel of this great rss reader!!
What a great looking app! It’s so purdy!
I love it!
I believe it will do better if the price was lower, though. $30 for a RSS reader is a bit expensive when there are alternatives for a lot less (free even).
The future for RSS is… looking goooood!
Keep up the good work!