Words, Mac App Review

“News” is defined as newly received or noteworthy information, esp. about recent or important events. Since the dawn of man, there has been some form of news. The first newspapers made their appearance in the 17th century and since then, written forms of news have been prevalent throughout modern society. In 2010, it was reported that more than 41% of people surveyed by Pew Project for Excellence in Journalism received their news online. I remember a time when teacher’s would tell us not to use sources online because they could be written by anyone. While that was true, now it is also true that more information is stored online than most libraries. Because more people receive their news online than any other source, there are now hundreds of apps that syndicate news from RSS feeds.

I will admit that while I understood what it was, I never thought I would use RSS Feeds regularly. RSS feeds and feed services have certainly gained popularity in recent years and they make it very easy to follow the news – especially specific news that you have interest in. In doing some research for this app review, I discovered that RSS formats date back as early as 1995 when Ramanathan V. Guha and others at Apple Computers were developing Meta Content Framework. While the concept dates back as far as 1995, the first version was officially released in March of 1999. Today, RSS Feeds are a popular way for blogs and news sources to display and share information with its readers.

As I mentioned, there are hundreds of apps that are available for people who enjoy RSS Feeds. One such app is Words. Words is developed by NewNet Soft and is currently on version 2.2.0. It was most recently updated on July 25, 2013. Words is a very advanced, very well-designed desktop application for Mac. It syncs a user’s RSS and read-it-later articles into your inbox. Words works well with Instapaper, Readability and Pocket to pull all of a user’s articles into one place.

The designers of Words have taken the approach of ‘making RSS better’ for their customers. I can tell you that this app is very easy to use. Being somewhat new to RSS Feeds, I was happy that the app came with a couple pre-loaded. When adding new feeds, users must open the preferences panel to do so. As happy as I am with this app, this is one area I would like to see improved upon. Instead of having to open the preferences, I would like to see a plus symbol in the corner of the options panel for a quick add of RSS URL.

Once the RSS Feeds refresh, the unread articles are indicated by a white line beside the article. This is another area I believe there is room for improvement. The article list does not appear to have a way to sort the list in any way. I’d like to see an option for sorting by date and unread articles. The feeds do automatically update and are available for users even if the computer is not online.

One feature I really enjoy is the ability to go to full screen mode. It’s not an option I use often, but it is enjoyable with an app like Words.

I recommend this app to anyone who regularly uses RSS Feeds for news. I also recommend this app for those who are interested in starting to use RSS Feeds as the interface is very easy to understand.

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