Reeder‪.‬ 17+

Not sure what to do with the new Reeder just yet?

I’ve got a great deal of respect for Silvio Rizzi; He’s made what is probably the best RSS reader of all time: Reeder Classic. While I was excited for the new Reeder I’m struggling to find a proper use for it. I love the one place for all your feeds concept but in this early form I don’t think it’s there yet. I’ll start with the good: I like how video and audio is handled; (Though I’d like the ability to provide a like to YouTube videos). I understand the intended the flexibility and the expansion of the star concept to later/like/bookmark, I can see how that would be flexible, and of course the reading position across platforms is awesome (though it strangely doesn’t work for me). So while I’d love Reeder to become the one place for all my feeds I just can’t see it happen just right now. My key concerns are:
1. The lack of a read status is troublesome. I need to tell if I’ve actually previously seen something. I can simulate this with tags, but that’s clunky. I also need a clean slate, and a sense closure that the current app doesn’t seem to provide. All I see is several lists of endless “stuff”. (see the next point)
2. The categories and tags, while powerful, don’t convince me that Reeder won’t become a morass of “stuff” that takes time and effort to sift through. I don’t know how well search works, and while I could establish an elaborate tagging regime I want Reeder to simplify my life, not add to its complexity. The lack of item counts is good, but is Reeder a collection of things or a way of viewing what’s new? In reader Classic you had a very clear understanding of what’s new and what’s not; I lack that here. And I don’t think Reeder is currently well suited to be a kind of archive/log of all seen items.
3. The list of supported platforms needs to improve. I understand this is probably coming but for now I only find use for links, RSS feeds, podcasts and YouTube. This is true for me and the vast majority of people I know.

I have every faith that the app will develop over time and new features will be added. But while Reeder Classic feels like it’s protecting me from the firehose of online information, helping me spend _less_ time online, the new Reeder doesn’t have that quality as of yet.