[HN Gopher] Show HN: We built an app for reading articles saved ...
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Show HN: We built an app for reading articles saved for later
Author : shkliarau
Score : 62 points
Date : 2021-12-27 16:13 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (alfreadapp.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (alfreadapp.com)
| dillondoyle wrote:
| Cool app. But that website really buggy for me (chrome macos).
|
| Looks like they are - kind of cool idea - placing 'overlay'
| screenshots on top of a phone, then css transforming them on
| scroll to 'swipe away.' But it doesn't really work for me.
|
| Maybe the apple idea of using a video and controlling the
| timeline on scroll might work better
| shkliarau wrote:
| Hm, that's weird. Should be fine on chrome macos, will check.
| Cool idea with the video!
| krat0sprakhar wrote:
| Really interesting idea! Would love to try it out when it's
| available for Android (or Web)
| monkeydust wrote:
| Second this. I have a lot of stuff I save for later and just
| don't get around to reading, been looking for a solution.
| shkliarau wrote:
| Have you found/tried any?
| shkliarau wrote:
| Hope to get there some day ;)
| shkliarau wrote:
| Hey HN,
|
| I'm Fedor, co-founder, and designer of Alfread, read-later app
| with a focus on the reading habit.
|
| Internet is full of talented writers, articles, and newsletters
| that are worth reading, not just saving. Our goal with Alfread is
| to create a place that feels exciting to come back to. For new
| knowledge from your saved articles, for fresh perspectives on old
| topics, and sometimes for fun!
|
| But a read-later app is not a to-do list. Not every article has
| to be read, it's not a chore.
|
| That's why Alfread helps manage your queue giving quick actions
| to archiving and snoozing with a familiar Tinder-like interface.
|
| We know, how hard it is to start and keep using new apps. To
| ensure a smooth start and get the most out of Alfread fast, you
| can connect your Instapaper/Pocket account to sync all your
| unread links.
|
| Here's how Dustin McCaffree described his experience with the
| app: "As soon as I signed up, I had content and value. It just
| uses Instapaper or Pocket like usual for me to collect articles.
| But then it reminds me to read, lets me set streaks, allows me to
| "read later" or "archive." Then, if I haven't read them after a
| month, it'll auto-archive them. Boom "
|
| Give it a try and let us know what you think!
| mikejulietbravo wrote:
| This is great. I always feel like I have to read stuff because
| I'll forget to do it later and I hate the "reading list" thing
| in apple
| shkliarau wrote:
| Ha, why do you hate the reading list in apple? A few people
| asked us to sync their reading lists to Alfread but Apple
| doesn't allow that, of course
| finiteseries wrote:
| They don't allow it in their TOS or App Store guidelines?
|
| Desktop Safari supports bookmark (& reading list) export
| via an HTML file on the off chance you're not aware, and it
| isn't banned.
| shkliarau wrote:
| We might be talking about different things: one off
| export is possible like you mentioned but no way to sync
| saved links to the reading list continuously as there're
| no API's for that from Apple
| AJRF wrote:
| On Desktop Safari the reading list is stored in a
| Bookmarks plist file you can grab and filter out Reading
| List items from, might be worth having some little
| desktop util for a 1 time sync to move people onto your
| platform? It's not ideal, but it's better than nothing.
|
| Here is an example with some code showing how someone did
| it so they could upload it to Pinboard:
| https://brettterpstra.com/2015/01/06/reading-list-
| catcher/
| shkliarau wrote:
| Ah, could be good actually. Definitely better than
| nothing, thanks for finding that link, appreciate it
| AJRF wrote:
| No problem - and congrats on the launch!
| shkliarau wrote:
| Thank you!
| bverks wrote:
| I can see Twitter support, but will it work for storing and
| organizing Twitter threads? Great design tho
| shkliarau wrote:
| It will! You can save Twitter threads to Alfread just like any
| link and it will make it into an easy to read article which you
| can also highlight.
| 1123581321 wrote:
| Neat! Congratulations. My one question was whether you sync to
| Readwise and it looks like you have that covered. Does that
| include highlights or annotations made in Alfread?
|
| I also have to be that guy and ask if the similarity to
| alfredapp.com ever came up. :) For a sec I thought they were
| adding a reading workflow feature, which would be awesome.
| shkliarau wrote:
| Thank you! Yep, highlights made in Alfread are synced to
| Readwise. We don't have annotations yet but stay tuned. Lol,
| yeah it has been mentioned: someone said that it's a poor
| choice of the name since it's so similar to Alfred. Naming is
| one hell of a challenge
| artiparty wrote:
| Cool website!
|
| If I understand correctly you help me to _actually_ read the
| articles I saved unlike Instapaper /Pocket that only allow me to
| dump them?
|
| What are the dynamics you developed to make me read them? (I use
| Pocket)
| shkliarau wrote:
| Great question! We're doing a few things here: managing
| articles, reminding to read them, and gamification.
|
| As reading later is not a chore, Alfread helps archive or
| postpone articles with a Tinder-like interface, so you can find
| a gem you want to read right now.
|
| Reminders work when or where you want them. For example, you
| can set a time reminder for your lunch break or breakfast. Or
| set you bus stop as a reminder, if you commute to work, for
| example.
|
| Any habit needs a nudge and a reward. Reminders work like
| nudges and rewards are small celebrations when you finish
| articles and achieve your weekly reading goal.
|
| Do you know any other ways that helped you get into any habit
| in the past?
| ronyfadel wrote:
| Kudos guys, love the clean design
| mtrovo wrote:
| I think this could be very useful, any plans for Android or web
| app?
|
| Also maybe a nice to have feature would be to group similar
| articles by theme so that when I sit down to read one article I
| can read all articles around the same theme while I'm still
| focused.
| shkliarau wrote:
| One day :) We're a 2-person team with 1 dev, so resources are
| quite limited, but hope to get there.
|
| Great suggestion! We have auto-tags for that right now, but of
| course it's not perfect yet. But could be nice to suggest
| similar ones at the end of the one I just read, like you
| suggested
| vbo wrote:
| Alfread looks great, congrats. I'm going to give it a spin,
| but I would desperately need a web app to go with the iOS
| one.
|
| I usually just open a myriad tabs on my computers and my
| phone and _hope_ I recall there was something I meant to read
| later. Doesn 't work too well. Google Keep comes close, but
| the UX doesn't really do it for me.
|
| What I'd love it a simple (think HN) interface where I can
| scroll through article titles. And being able to save
| articles seamlessly from anywhere (app, bookmarklet, maybe
| even email to a custom address).
|
| Any other apps I've tried were sadly bloated.
| shkliarau wrote:
| Thank you! We do have a list of articles to scroll through
| on the Search tab :) Seamless saving is on our mind but
| have to rely on Instapaper/Pocket for saving on the desktop
| mywacaday wrote:
| As a android user I see a lot of IOS only apps on Show HN but
| can't recall an Android only one. Is there a business reason
| for this given that android has over 70% of the market.
| awill wrote:
| for paid apps, it's because iOS users are more willing to
| pay real money when compared to Android users. As for free
| apps, I suppose it's more complicated. For a small team of
| 1 dev, if that dev has iOS, then that's what they'll build
| first.
|
| I don't build mobile apps, but I hear generally people
| prefer building for iOS. Plus, they can use the latest APIs
| and not worry about supporting a 6 year old OS.
|
| Imagine testing your iOS app. You get a small number of
| iPhones and you're done. Now compare to Android.
|
| I'm an Android user who constantly wonders whether he
| shouldn't give up and switch to iOS.
| smoldesu wrote:
| The people who use HN frequently are startup fiends, and
| Apple is an expert at extracting value from their users.
| The rest of the story writes itself.
| [deleted]
| als0 wrote:
| For anyone else looking for the privacy policy
| https://alfread.notion.site/Alfread-Privacy-Policy-5e67f4f92...
| shkliarau wrote:
| Thanks for sharing! Did anything stand out to you? To be
| honest, we did it last second but basically we don't have
| accounts, don't store any personal information, and everything
| stays on your device
| als0 wrote:
| I didn't see it on your website, but I eventually found it
| using the App Store instead. Other than that, very clear.
| gnicholas wrote:
| I'm excited to try out a new reader app, especially one that
| integrates with Pocket and Instapaper. Those apps haven't added
| many new features in years, so there's room for innovators in the
| space, and using their APIs gives people an easy offramp. Smart!
|
| One bit of feedback on the onboarding process: you hit people
| with the subscription prompt before they've started using the
| app, and you show them the features they can only have if they
| pay. At this point in the process, they have no idea what other
| features are in the app, and whether they want to keep using it
| at all.
|
| I would never subscribe to an app -- or even start a free trial
| that will automatically rollover into a paid subscription --
| before exploring the app a bit. Perhaps you could put a
| comparison checklist at this stage, so people can see what
| features are included in the free version? I probably still
| wouldn't subscribe at that point, but at least it would feel like
| the app has shown me the relevant info before asking me to sign
| up.
|
| I do realize this is for a free trial, not the paid subscription,
| but I don't want to put another to-do on my calendar for "cancel
| app subscription for $appIJustDownloaded".
|
| Looking forward to trying out the app and seeing what's under the
| hood. Good luck!
| shkliarau wrote:
| Thanks for such an insightful comment! Saving is a big part of
| read later apps, so we didn't want users to do too much to
| start. I agree with you on the onboarding flow as a user, but
| data shows that it's the best place to put it actually. You
| miss 100% of shots you don't take kind of situation. But we're
| trying to not be too pushy about it. Let us know how it goes!
| gnicholas wrote:
| Liking it so far. You do a good job of explaining how to
| activate the share extension, which is not an easy task!
|
| One low-hanging fruit is to have an option for the page
| background color to match the system theme dynamically,
| instead of having to set it into day/night mode manually each
| time.
|
| I also sent you guys a separate email regarding a
| collaboration possibility with my company's reading
| enhancement tech. I hope my emails is buried under a pile of
| front-page-of-HN-inbound-messages! Congrats on your launch.
| kiyanovsky wrote:
| Hi Fedor, it looks good, and I'm going to evaluate it soon! Could
| you please tell why it's free and if it's going to be a paid app
| soon? If yes, what would be the pricing model? If not, what is
| the monetization strategy for the app if you don't sell customer
| data? Thanks.
| shkliarau wrote:
| It's free-mium with a Premium plan that includes some pro
| features if the generous free plan is not enough :)
| bumpkinjunkie wrote:
| Is this tongue-and-cheek? Seems like you are creating value
| for people and should be compensated. Or is there some
| monetization of user data?
| marban wrote:
| I created a read-later service pre-Instapaper ca. ~2005 and only
| recently ditched all of them after having ~10k articles in the
| queue. Today I only use Safari's reading list and purge it every
| morning. If it's important/really interesting, I'll read it
| immediately -- all these services just provide peace of mind but
| won't solve the time or discipline issue.
| badtension wrote:
| Sorry if this is a bit off-topic but for me the website is
| overwhelming. Everything is very large and animated which makes
| me dizzy. I don't know what is happening when I scroll.
| shkliarau wrote:
| It is on-topic :) Thanks for saying that, I felt a bit like
| that when designing it but the feedback we've gotten so far was
| really positive. Might consider something less in a good sense
| overwhelming for the next version
| tnjm wrote:
| While this isn't for me as I don't use iOS daily, I wanted to
| say that I'm impressed with your response to feedback.
|
| And, for what it's worth, I saw the landing page on desktop
| and it felt nicely done, and the animations had a purpose.
| shkliarau wrote:
| Ha, thanks! Just trying my best, first time (or maybe
| second) posting here
| tailspin2019 wrote:
| It's really nicely done on the whole!
|
| My feeling is that there is just a bit too much motion
| happening at once. I think the issue is that as you scroll
| (I'm on an iPhone) your eye is drawn to the content that has
| just scrolled into view but the content below then starts to
| animate too early, so you're distracted by the motion
| happening below the content that you're trying to read.
|
| This happens multiple times (for each content block...)
|
| I think you probably just need to delay the start of the next
| animation until you've scrolled down a bit further, and
| perhaps even reduce the amount of movement? It doesn't need
| much motion to still give that dynamic feel.
|
| It's so close to being quite an awesome landing page
| otherwise!
|
| Edit: also while we're all here playing backseat designer....
| The first animation of the iPhone showing some sort of
| archiving sequence seems to run too early for me - I don't
| really understand what it's demonstrating. By the time I've
| scrolled the iPhone into view, the archive overlay has
| already popped out and I didn't get chance to see what the
| screen before that was showing. So it's slightly confusing
| (though it looks nice!)
| shkliarau wrote:
| Thanks a lot for such a detailed reply! I agree with a lot
| of your feedback but I'm limited by Readymag which I used
| to create the site which doesn't allow me to set animations
| quite right but I'll try again :)
| systemride wrote:
| I actually came here to say the opposite. I thought the landing
| page was really well done.
| badtension wrote:
| How do you access it? I tried to open it on mobile just now
| and it looks ok, it's the PC version that bugs me.
| thom wrote:
| Same feeling here, I'm on a 1920x1200 display. There are things
| animating at the bottom of the viewport that have disappeared
| by the time they're centred. The entire page is about 5 bullet
| points worth of text, but is in a massive font and requires
| three pages of distracting animated boxes. I can't just scan
| the text and see what the app does. Gimme all the info with no
| scrolling, and if you really want to go wild, do it below the
| fold.
| trwhite wrote:
| I've been thinking recently about making something that would
| allow me to print my daily saved articles. Kind of like my own
| newspaper. I hardly use my inkjet printer as it is and I much
| prefer reading from paper than a screen.
| shkliarau wrote:
| Love the idea! Haven't tried but there's this
| https://www.myscreenbreak.com/?ref=producthunt
| smugglerFlynn wrote:
| Any chance of integrating it with built-in Reading List in
| Safari?
| finiteseries wrote:
| Impossible on iOS, no APIs available. Would need a macOS
| companion app and even then it probably won't be allowed on the
| App Store.
| shkliarau wrote:
| We'd love to but not possible (no surprise from Apple here)
| icakir wrote:
| Seems offering nothing better than Pocket. Pocket is
| multiplatform and integrated in Firefox.
| shkliarau wrote:
| Ex-Pocket users that have since moved to Alfread would disagree
| with you :)
| sofixa wrote:
| It seems to offer reminders (at time and place) to read unread
| articles, which is pretty cool.
| shkliarau wrote:
| And a pretty cool Tinder-like interface, stats, streaks,
| sorting options (including shuffle) and much more!
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