I’m a bit (understatement) of an old-school person regarding how I handle my newsfeeds and RSS reading. RSS is still the way forward out of the mess that siloed social media platforms have created and encouraged each with their own time-sink and attention-thirsty newsfeeds and timelines.
I started my usage (obsession?) with newsfeeds while a student at Wofford College in the late 90s, running the PointCast screensaver on the desktop in my dorm room cubicle (replacing the beloved flying toasters). It was buggy and intense on RAM usage, but I thought the concept was brilliant.
That led to me discovering early and inventive services such as Newsgator and FeedDemon (I loved that service) and the work of Dave Winer to script together the RSS protocol(s). I transitioned from FeedDemon on my Windows machines over to Bloglines sometime around 2004 as the web2.0 craze was spinning up. This felt like a magic time for the web as numerous sites were adding RSS icons, services like Writely were starting to bloom (which would go on to be acquired by Google and made into Google Docs), and people were blogging on LiveJournal or Movable Type as Geocities became abandonware. MySpace was around and beginning to infiltrate our lives, but we had things like Ze Frank’s The Show to keep us honest. I eventually found NetNewsWire (there’s a whole saga there for its history as well) as I transitioned to the Mac world after buying my first Apple Computer in 2005. Turns out, I still use NetNewsWire heavily 20 years later.
I started fiddling with a newer service called WordPress in 2003 and created my own blog (here!) that bounced between Six Apart and WordPress. Soon, the world would come to know Google Reader, and it felt like RSS was in for a whole new phase of growth and going mainstream. I’m still bitter that Google shut down Reader in 2013 and credit that with so many ills and curses that Google has seemingly had over the last 15 years of the “social web” as it would have made a great social platform (unlike Google+ and Circles and Buzz and Wave and that whole era of messes).
Then, Twitter, Facebook, and Tumblr all happened in 2006, and the writing was on the wall for the “open web” and RSS reading. People flocked to the silos. The hopes for open syndication via RSS readers in the mainstream died on the vine it seemed.
Until now, RSS reading, like dumbphones, is making a comeback with younger generations, and I’m glad to see it.
During all of those transitions, I kept using RSS readers (primarily Feedly, Feedbin, Reeder, and then back to NetNewsWire around Covid-time). I wrote a post twenty or so years ago here that RSS helped pay our mortgage each month. That’s still true. There’s magic in controlling your news and information consumption rather than relying on algorithmic data gathering services that “show you what you need to know.”
Now, I rely heavily on RSS reading for research and writing, as I work on my PhD dissertation and thoughts, along with feeds from friends’ blogs, news sites, services I use, and Substack newsletters, among others.
So, I’m a bit old-school in managing my hundreds of feeds, and NetNewsWire has been great for that as it syncs between my Mac, iPhone, and beloved iPad Mini via iCloud. My folders are neatly manicured and I try at least to get through all of my feeds at least once a day (I’m also an email and messages and inbox zero type curmudgeon… it still shocks to me to see people with thousands of emails in their inbox or hundreds of unread messages in their SMS app). As a result, I’m picky about my RSS reading and readers. I’ve tried services like the new Reeder, which brings in podcasts and YouTube videos and some social media alongside traditional blogs and RSS feeds, but I couldn’t commit and returned to NetNewsWire again and again.
I decided to give Tapestry a shot after reading about the latest update on Manton Reece’s blog (you should also check out his excellent micro.blog service if you’re looking for a great blogging platform).
Tapestry is made by Iconfactory, a company with serious street cred amongst us older web types (I loved their Twitter app Twitterific and used it heavily at the height of that now-defunct service along with their Transmit app for FTP). Tapestry is no different here in terms of thoughtful style and intentional minimalism with surprising complexity and delightful user interface.
Effectively, Tapestry combines RSS feed reading with services such as Blue Sky or Mastodon, and Reddit as well as YouTube subscriptions (I’m a heavy YouTube user, and that’s pretty well curated for me). I’m still trying to wrap my mind around seeing YouTube videos popping up in the middle of my RSS reading, but I see the value and point. I’m all about supporting the effort if we can get more people to turn back to private and person-controlled feed reading rather than algorithmic newsfeed scanning.
Is Tapestry enough to get me to switch from NetNewsWire? I’m not sure yet. But I’ll be using both the next few weeks to see where a habit or delight pops up and making note of that.
Regardless, I’m glad to see a company like Iconfactory hop into the effort!
Tapestry is available on Mac, iPad, and iPhone as a free app with a premium tier (not expensive, so the free version should be sufficient for most, especially considering current cost-cutting measures). Additionally, you can delete your Facebook and Instagram accounts for free today.
