I’ve decided to stop using Netvibes in favor of Google Reader for my feed reading purposes. Google Reader has improved quite a bit since it was first released (at that point I deemed it as unusable). I liked Netvibes’ customizability, in teams of colors, etc. But the “openness” of it is of no use to me (using 3rd party apps, etc.) I essentially just used it for reading my feeds.
I much prefer the way Google Reader formats my feeds (I used to use NetNewsWire back in the day when I used my mac, and liked it) - Google Reader sort of follows the method of NetNewsWire. Sort of…
The two features I have been waiting for Netvibes to introduce, and ultimately what made me finally choose to switch, are star and share. I often forget where I read something, and most of the time, can’t find it when I try looking for it. The star feature shouldhelp me in that area. Share is a nice-to-have - in case anyone out there is at least somewhat interested with what I would like to share. We’ll see.
So, sorry Netvibes. You guys were quite good at innovating in the “start page” arena and 3rd-party interoperability, but I’m looking for more Feed-friendly features. Google Reader satisfies my needs now.
Now, if only Google would let me change the color schemes of their apps - I prefer dark backgrounds, light text.
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November 21st, 2007 at 5:10 pm
I am a great fan of Google Reader. I use the share feature quite regularly. You can tag a feed and than share all the feed belonging to this tag. So I have a page on my blog where you can read these feeds. Best of all this also enables your readers to read contents that might be blocked in certain countries.
Another feature is the search through your feeds. That really helps finding articles you remeber but that you haven’t marked.
The only disadvantage is the delay. Sometimes it’s more than an hour until certain feeds are published in GoogleReader. Other Readers are faster in that aspect.
November 22nd, 2007 at 12:18 pm
We are on the same boat. I love Google Reader. It also has offline feature, but never really used.
November 22nd, 2007 at 1:03 pm
Yeah, I think the only use of the offline feature (any Google Gears apps for that matter) is if you have a laptop (duh) and you are going somewhere without a network connection, which these days, are getting few and far between. Maybe if you’re traveling, then it would be useful…