13 ms·

What Safari’s Reading List means for Instapaper

193 points by ankimal 15y ago

st3fan 15y ago
Dunno about this. It is hard to compete with native features of the OS. Specially on iOS where integration hooks are terribly missing.
bproper 15y ago
Pretty amazing to see Apple building best elements of Dropbox, Kik, Instapaper and more directly into iOS. Quite the emotional rollercoaster for Marco - http://www.betabeat.com/2011/06/06/apple-killed-instapaper-reading-list-marco-arment-2011-06-06/ http://www.betabeat.com/2011/06/06/apple-killed-instapaper-r...
- nplusone 15y ago
  Indeed, Marco's initial reaction seems to have been http://twitter.com/#!/marcoarment/status/77796293510037504 http://twitter.com/#!/marcoarment/status/77796293510037504 He's clearly thought of this possibility, as evidenced by his post in late April about the potential impact of Reading List on Instapaper.
mcritz 15y ago
There seemed to have been a lot of pessimism regarding Apple announcements that seem similar other offerings like Dropbox & Reminder apps. Marco has the best response. He’s rightly convinced of the superiority of his product. Apple is chasing him at his own game. When people realize that there’s a whole untapped market for content reading services he’ll definitely stay the upscale, market leader in the field.
dctoedt 15y ago
I'm a happy (paid) Instapaper user and hope it prospers, but I'm old enough to remember what happened when IBM brought out its original PC back in the early 1980s. Apple claimed that IBM's entry into the space was a good thing because it validated the concept of personal computing, of which Apple had been a pioneer. Then IBM proceeded to eat Apple's lunch, even though (in the opinion of many) Apple had the superior machine. (Edited slightly for style.)
- btucker 15y ago
  For the curious, here's Apple's famous ad: http://www.flickr.com/photos/kengz/198041571/sizes/o/ http://www.flickr.com/photos/kengz/198041571/sizes/o/
  - nikcub 15y ago
    someone should do a parody of that ad
- msbarnett 15y ago
  > I remember Apple's response when IBM brought out its original PC back in the early 1980s: Apple claimed that IBM's entry into the personal computing space was a good thing, because it validated the concept. Then IBM proceeded to eat Apple's lunch. It seems to me you're stopping the story in kind of a weird place, there. Apple's market cap is currently something like half-again as much as IBM's. Apple became a better company for the competition, and it's impossible to understate how much their current success benefits from the vast explosion in personal computer adoption that IBM's entry into the market brought about. Competition makes products better. Increased awareness brings a lot more people and money into the market. Marco is a smart, talented guy who is well-poised to benefit, here.
  - bergie 15y ago
    Yes, but Apple still nearly died before they got their act together. That kind of turnarounds are rare
    - msbarnett 15y ago
      Apple nearly died because during that period because they were an inflexible organization that reacted slowly to changing market conditions while operating under increasingly out-of-touch management. Unless the argument here is that Marco is a dumb guy who for some reason isn't in a position to pivot quickly and react to change, I'm not seeing any parallel here with what happened to Apple in the early 90s. Marco's still the market leader here. He has to fuck up before he's in the position of needing a turn-around. I'm not sure why you're taking it as fait accompli that he will be unable to react appropriately; he's a smart guy.
phuff 15y ago
Instapaper's killer-est feature for me is "Send to my kindle." I don't think Apple could get away with that anytime in the near future without some legal troubles with Amazon. Features like that are things that will continue to make apps like instapaper better than the baked in stuff. And it takes Marco a lot less turnaround time to deliver them than it would somebody like Apple, so I think there's still a lot of room to grow there.
- jccodez 15y ago
  You make an excellent point. You don't just integrate with one platform, you target and glue to others adding additional functionality. This will keep people coming back.
ChrisLTD 15y ago
Marco is in a tough position because he depends on revenue from only one app available on only iOS. It's a tough break, I'm sure he didn't expect anything like this before the Lion preview. I hope his business can survive.
mlinsey 15y ago
Thanks to Safari's reading list, I'll likely stop using the Instapaper bookmarklet on my iPad. But the most common use case I have for Intapaper is when I see an article on my laptop in Chrome and want to read it later on my Kindle 3. So I expect I'll be using Instapaper for a while longer. This is a generalizable pattern for survival for all the other apps Apple "killed" today - you can still compete for any users that don't live 100% in the Apple ecosystem.
- joebadmo 15y ago
  This is a bit off-topic, but I have the exact same most common use case, and I just switched in the last few days to using the Readability add-on to Chrome, which has a "send to Kindle" button. I was previously using Wordcycler to sync my Kindle with Instapaper by plugging it into my laptop, but this allows me to skip that step. Now I can just hit the sync button on the Kindle directly and it downloads the saved articles. Readability seems to render articles slightly better, too, and more often keeps the byline, which was the most annoying part about Instapaper for me. https://www.readability.com/addons https://www.readability.com/addons
  - thefreshteapot 15y ago
    Cheapshot for link bait.
- samstokes 15y ago
  I don't even have an iDevice, but I'm still a fan of Instapaper: about 50% of my Kindle usage is reading Instapapered versions of tech blog posts on the train. In theory it automatically sends the articles every morning, although I've found that the automatic sending is a bit flaky. I would (as a matter of public record [1]) happily pay for the service if that feature were more reliable. [1] http://twitter.com/#!/samstokes/status/77852689605726208 http://twitter.com/#!/samstokes/status/77852689605726208
zipdog 15y ago
The competitive advantage for Instapaper is the ability to iterate quickly. If Apple delivers a growing band of people interested in reading the web later, Instapaper is better positioned to find out what tweaks and features will work best for them by risking changes to the core product.
antimatter15 15y ago
Except that foreseeably, there will be no way for Instapaper to have the same intuitive interface that Reading List benefits from. The only possible future for Instapaper is as a functionally superior app with a inferior interface. There's no way that Apple's going to lend the same degree of control over the functionality of Safari to any third-party app developer. A pessimistic response is logical and probably the only rational response. There's simply no way to compete with Apple's Reading List because Apple's made it that way. Instapaper, which is really a wonderful app has this weird workflow for use: Install the app, and to install the bookmarklet (some rudimentary Safari integration), you have to go to a page, create a empty bookmark, go back and edit the bookmark with a copied-and-pasted javascript: url. I'm sure Marco has tried his best to improve the interface, but Apple's restrictions on the platform forbids it.
- msbarnett 15y ago
  The best, easiest way to install the Instapaper bookmarklet was always to do it through the desktop browser and then rely on MobileMe to sync that to your iPad and iPhone. The problem was that not every iOS user was willing to throw down $99 a year for things like over-the-air bookmark synchronization. Now that that syncing is going to be free and available to every user of iOS 5, the Instapaper bookmarklet installation process just got simpler, not harder.
  - antimatter15 15y ago
    It might get simpler, but the interface will never be as nice as Reading List has it. It'll never be as intuitive or user friendly. It'll never be able to have Safari integration.
    - Steko 15y ago
      OTOH he could achieve superior integration with iCab, Skyfire, Opera, Sleipnir, etc.
  - omaranto 15y ago
    An equally easy but free way to install is to sync browser bookmarks with iTunes.
jonursenbach 15y ago
I'm surprised that he doesn't start trying to capture the Android market.
- AllenKids 15y ago
  Google did the same thing to navigation service providers (arguably more brutal) If proven essential, none of the platform is safe for him to rest on his laurel.
- timmins 15y ago
  Having read Marco's blog and listened to his podcast, I can't see an official client for android from Marco ever. His opinion of android is crystal clear. As a Nexus One owner, it requires some effort to disregard most of the hyperbolic insults in his podcast. So, I'd like to say I'm surprised too but all too often he pans the platforms as well as acts like he's making enough revenue for the hassle.
  - joshuarrrr 15y ago
    Fair enough, that's his call to make. Meanwhile, I'll keep using InstaFetch for its value added to my Android phone.
biafra 15y ago
"And they’ll quickly find Instapaper in the App Store." Until Apple pulls the plug on Instapaper. Let's hope that never happens.
jashmenn 15y ago
I think marco is totally right that this can only help instapaper in the long run. Let me tell you a story from my own experience: My partner and I created an iPad game for cats. We wanted to get some extra marketing boost so we contacted friskies (purina). In Nov (2010) I exchanged a few emails, and talked to them on the phone about our game. I sent them a video and they told us they loved the idea and they would get back to us. Then one day, silence. We didn't hear anything for months. Then a couple weeks ago they released the Friskies "Games for Cats" which are suspiciously similar to our game. The blogosphere exploded. "Friskies releases creative iPad game for cats" "Friskies is oh so clever etc." We were pissed. But sales improved. A lot. I tried to track their rankings so I searched for them on the AppStore. Hmm, thats odd. I couldn't find them. It turns out /they didn't make native apps/ they were "simply" HTML5 pages on their website that you open in browser [1]. So what was/is happening is people see "Friskies iPad Game for Cats" they grab their iPad and search for "game for cats" on the AppStore and then they find our game and we profit. Also, most people who have cats and iPads don't even think to look for a game for their cat. So by Friskies putting marketing into this they actually increase the size of the market (to be honest, I hope they run a TV commercial advertising their "ipad game for cats"). Moral #1 of the story is: BigCo might steal your idea, but they will likely mess it up and it can end up helping you. Moral #2: high water raises all the boats [1] I realized HTML5 is a "real" app, but most normals don't yet view it that way. They expect to find apps in an app store. UPDATE: formatting
- ChrisLTD 15y ago
  But will people be unsatisfied with Reading List enough to bother looking for alternatives on the App Store? Non-Apple platform sync seems to be the biggest missing feature, but what else is there that folks would pay for?
  - msbarnett 15y ago
    Figuring out what else Reading List is missing that users would pay for is precisely what Marco is going to have to do. But that's where the broadened visibility will help significantly. With whole new classes of people discovering this category of App, wishing that it did X, and searching around for alternatives that provide X, he'll probably see an uptick in people asking him about features like X that he's in a far better position to quickly iterate around than Apple is.
Lazlo_Nibble 15y ago
The vast majority of the articles I add to Instapaper, I add from Firefox on my desktop at work. And virtually all the articles I read in Instapaper, I read when I'm off-network completely (I have an iPod touch). I don't think Marco has much to worry about yet.
- joshuarrrr 15y ago
  Agreed, in fact offline reading (+Kindle syncing) is why I sought out the app in the first place.
raganwald 15y ago
The true story of audion: http://panic.com/extras/audionstory/ http://panic.com/extras/audionstory/
- wallflower 15y ago
  This has been posted here many times, and it is absolutely one of the best first person accounts of doing business with Apple.
T_S_ 15y ago
Did Time Machine kill SuperDuper? Not for me. I use Chrome, so no.
donohoe 15y ago
I get the impression that Marco is putting a brave face on what is an awful realization. I use the 'reading list' functionality of Instapaper. I have only used the social and editorial aspects to see what they were about and nothing more.
- akent 15y ago
  I sure wouldn't want to be Marco. I think "nice while it lasted" might be the best spin to put on this.
- omaranto 15y ago
  I don't use the social and editorial stuff either, but I use two Instapaper features Apple's thing is not likely to have: (1) I use the bookmarklet (and also, ocasionally, read an article from the website) from my Windows and Linux boxes, and (2) in addition to reading on my iPod touch, I download my saved articles as an ePub file to read on my Sony PRS-505 eBook Reader.
rafski 15y ago
Will Apple's solution be limited to Safari? I would think Marco's customers are rather a tech-savvy crowd who wouldn't tie themselves to just one particular browser. I use Instapaper for the multi-browser support (mostly in Firefox), but also for the Kindle support, both for reading in Kindle Webkit browser and as downloads. I think Marco has a big chance to catch the long tail of read-later'ing. If you look at desktop Safari's Reader Mode… It is a fantastic feature but I don't think I ever heard of anyone I know using it. It should've been implemented in iOS Safari long time ago, btw, this is where it's been missing.
hristov 15y ago
Take this with a grain of salt. Of course he is going to say it only helps him. That is just entrepreneurship 101. You must always be positive and incredibly self assured in public. Executives always assure you that their business is going great and everything is good news up to the moment they file the bankruptcy papers (and in the case of chapter 11 bankruptcies even for some time afterwards). But I doubt he is that optimistic on the inside. This is for reasons other people have already properly identified in this discussion (e.g., the Apple product will always have the better integration). So Apple just went out and ate this guy's lunch. That's pretty much it. You may argue it is ok, you may argue they have a right to do that, but let's not pretend it did not happen.
andrewljohnson 15y ago
I knew the guy who made the original faux-MMS app. When Apple added MMS to iPhone, his app died swiftly. I also knew the guy who made the original, best voice recorder app too. He made a mint, but then Apple made it a native app, and his app pretty much died too. Never underestimate the potential of the platform-owner to take what he wants from your business.
- Steko 15y ago
  "Never underestimate the potential of the platform-owner to take what he wants from your business." I'm not sure there's a more wrong way of looking at it. Apple didn't make an MMS app to steal some dev's profits. They made an MMS app because it's an obvious natural app to make and put on every phone. Never underestimate the potential of an early entrant to whine about the loss of their perceived feifdom.
- tptacek 15y ago
  Excuse me in advance for 'edw519'ing out: - - - - lots of features w/ mainstream appeal - -> - - - - has network effects -- - - - - - - - - - > - - - - wants to be cross-platform - - - - - - - > | LARGE MARKET | | | .-- instapaper? .-- MMS | | | | | | hard SPECTRUM of DIFFERENTIABILITY easy <-------------------------------------------------------> | | | | | | `-- voice | `-- music recorder| social | network? | | | | SMALL MARKET | It remains to be seen where deferred-reading is on this spectrum. My gut is that it's somewhere in the middle, but that the total market for it --- notably unlike special-purpose voice recorders --- is so big that you might not need to work too much harder to retain the status quo. My point is that it's not as simple as you make it out to be. There's plenty of room on iOS for a better calculator (like PCalc); plenty of room for portfolio tracking, even for special-purpose camera interfaces.
ignifero 15y ago
No they won't. Focus on the broader ecosystem (Windows, Android, Blackberry, Windows Phone) and greater integration.
- teyc 15y ago
  This is correct. Once you have a nice feature, you realize Apple's doesn't run everywhere. Marco is also correct about social. A simple commenting system and a highlighter and a red envelope would be useful. People want insightful quotes highlighted and commented, and want to be validated when people reply to their messages.
Getahobby 15y ago
So the message AAPL is sending to app developers: do your job well enough and we will bake it into the OS.
alexknight 15y ago
If Reading List gains a lot of ground, it may be time for Marco to think about developing an Android app. I'm a happy paid Instapaper user though, and continue to pay the subscription fee to support the service.
st3fan 15y ago
So it seems that Reading List does not support offline reading. For me that is the main reason to use Instapaper. I save a lot of stuff and then read it when I am for example on a flight without Wi-Fi. There is your added value.
jemeshsu 15y ago
Instapaper will be ok, it has superior features not in Reading List. Same for Camera+ even though Apple added enhancement to native Camera app. Sparrow vs Mail app. iOS market is big enough for Marco to happily survive.
krmmalik 15y ago
I cant comment whether this will help InstaPaper or not, having never tried the product, but i love the way that the owner of instapaper rises to the challenge. It inspires me greatly for if and when my business may face similar challenges.

193 points by ankimal 15y ago

Dunno about this. It is hard to compete with native features of the OS. Specially on iOS where integration hooks are terribly missing.

bproper 15y ago

Pretty amazing to see Apple building best elements of Dropbox, Kik, Instapaper and more directly into iOS. Quite the emotional rollercoaster for Marco - http://www.betabeat.com/2011/06/06/apple-killed-instapaper-reading-list-marco-arment-2011-06-06/ http://www.betabeat.com/2011/06/06/apple-killed-instapaper-r...

nplusone 15y ago
Indeed, Marco's initial reaction seems to have been http://twitter.com/#!/marcoarment/status/77796293510037504 http://twitter.com/#!/marcoarment/status/77796293510037504 He's clearly thought of this possibility, as evidenced by his post in late April about the potential impact of Reading List on Instapaper.

mcritz 15y ago

There seemed to have been a lot of pessimism regarding Apple announcements that seem similar other offerings like Dropbox & Reminder apps. Marco has the best response. He’s rightly convinced of the superiority of his product. Apple is chasing him at his own game. When people realize that there’s a whole untapped market for content reading services he’ll definitely stay the upscale, market leader in the field.

dctoedt 15y ago

I'm a happy (paid) Instapaper user and hope it prospers, but I'm old enough to remember what happened when IBM brought out its original PC back in the early 1980s. Apple claimed that IBM's entry into the space was a good thing because it validated the concept of personal computing, of which Apple had been a pioneer. Then IBM proceeded to eat Apple's lunch, even though (in the opinion of many) Apple had the superior machine. (Edited slightly for style.)

btucker 15y ago
For the curious, here's Apple's famous ad: http://www.flickr.com/photos/kengz/198041571/sizes/o/ http://www.flickr.com/photos/kengz/198041571/sizes/o/
- nikcub 15y ago
  someone should do a parody of that ad
msbarnett 15y ago
> I remember Apple's response when IBM brought out its original PC back in the early 1980s: Apple claimed that IBM's entry into the personal computing space was a good thing, because it validated the concept. Then IBM proceeded to eat Apple's lunch. It seems to me you're stopping the story in kind of a weird place, there. Apple's market cap is currently something like half-again as much as IBM's. Apple became a better company for the competition, and it's impossible to understate how much their current success benefits from the vast explosion in personal computer adoption that IBM's entry into the market brought about. Competition makes products better. Increased awareness brings a lot more people and money into the market. Marco is a smart, talented guy who is well-poised to benefit, here.
- bergie 15y ago
  Yes, but Apple still nearly died before they got their act together. That kind of turnarounds are rare
  - msbarnett 15y ago
    Apple nearly died because during that period because they were an inflexible organization that reacted slowly to changing market conditions while operating under increasingly out-of-touch management. Unless the argument here is that Marco is a dumb guy who for some reason isn't in a position to pivot quickly and react to change, I'm not seeing any parallel here with what happened to Apple in the early 90s. Marco's still the market leader here. He has to fuck up before he's in the position of needing a turn-around. I'm not sure why you're taking it as fait accompli that he will be unable to react appropriately; he's a smart guy.

phuff 15y ago

Instapaper's killer-est feature for me is "Send to my kindle." I don't think Apple could get away with that anytime in the near future without some legal troubles with Amazon. Features like that are things that will continue to make apps like instapaper better than the baked in stuff. And it takes Marco a lot less turnaround time to deliver them than it would somebody like Apple, so I think there's still a lot of room to grow there.

jccodez 15y ago
You make an excellent point. You don't just integrate with one platform, you target and glue to others adding additional functionality. This will keep people coming back.

ChrisLTD 15y ago

Marco is in a tough position because he depends on revenue from only one app available on only iOS. It's a tough break, I'm sure he didn't expect anything like this before the Lion preview. I hope his business can survive.

mlinsey 15y ago

Thanks to Safari's reading list, I'll likely stop using the Instapaper bookmarklet on my iPad. But the most common use case I have for Intapaper is when I see an article on my laptop in Chrome and want to read it later on my Kindle 3. So I expect I'll be using Instapaper for a while longer. This is a generalizable pattern for survival for all the other apps Apple "killed" today - you can still compete for any users that don't live 100% in the Apple ecosystem.

joebadmo 15y ago
This is a bit off-topic, but I have the exact same most common use case, and I just switched in the last few days to using the Readability add-on to Chrome, which has a "send to Kindle" button. I was previously using Wordcycler to sync my Kindle with Instapaper by plugging it into my laptop, but this allows me to skip that step. Now I can just hit the sync button on the Kindle directly and it downloads the saved articles. Readability seems to render articles slightly better, too, and more often keeps the byline, which was the most annoying part about Instapaper for me. https://www.readability.com/addons https://www.readability.com/addons
- thefreshteapot 15y ago
  Cheapshot for link bait.
samstokes 15y ago
I don't even have an iDevice, but I'm still a fan of Instapaper: about 50% of my Kindle usage is reading Instapapered versions of tech blog posts on the train. In theory it automatically sends the articles every morning, although I've found that the automatic sending is a bit flaky. I would (as a matter of public record [1]) happily pay for the service if that feature were more reliable. [1] http://twitter.com/#!/samstokes/status/77852689605726208 http://twitter.com/#!/samstokes/status/77852689605726208

zipdog 15y ago

The competitive advantage for Instapaper is the ability to iterate quickly. If Apple delivers a growing band of people interested in reading the web later, Instapaper is better positioned to find out what tweaks and features will work best for them by risking changes to the core product.

antimatter15 15y ago

Except that foreseeably, there will be no way for Instapaper to have the same intuitive interface that Reading List benefits from. The only possible future for Instapaper is as a functionally superior app with a inferior interface. There's no way that Apple's going to lend the same degree of control over the functionality of Safari to any third-party app developer. A pessimistic response is logical and probably the only rational response. There's simply no way to compete with Apple's Reading List because Apple's made it that way. Instapaper, which is really a wonderful app has this weird workflow for use: Install the app, and to install the bookmarklet (some rudimentary Safari integration), you have to go to a page, create a empty bookmark, go back and edit the bookmark with a copied-and-pasted javascript: url. I'm sure Marco has tried his best to improve the interface, but Apple's restrictions on the platform forbids it.

msbarnett 15y ago
The best, easiest way to install the Instapaper bookmarklet was always to do it through the desktop browser and then rely on MobileMe to sync that to your iPad and iPhone. The problem was that not every iOS user was willing to throw down $99 a year for things like over-the-air bookmark synchronization. Now that that syncing is going to be free and available to every user of iOS 5, the Instapaper bookmarklet installation process just got simpler, not harder.
- antimatter15 15y ago
  It might get simpler, but the interface will never be as nice as Reading List has it. It'll never be as intuitive or user friendly. It'll never be able to have Safari integration.
  - Steko 15y ago
    OTOH he could achieve superior integration with iCab, Skyfire, Opera, Sleipnir, etc.
- omaranto 15y ago
  An equally easy but free way to install is to sync browser bookmarks with iTunes.

jonursenbach 15y ago

I'm surprised that he doesn't start trying to capture the Android market.

AllenKids 15y ago
Google did the same thing to navigation service providers (arguably more brutal) If proven essential, none of the platform is safe for him to rest on his laurel.
timmins 15y ago
Having read Marco's blog and listened to his podcast, I can't see an official client for android from Marco ever. His opinion of android is crystal clear. As a Nexus One owner, it requires some effort to disregard most of the hyperbolic insults in his podcast. So, I'd like to say I'm surprised too but all too often he pans the platforms as well as acts like he's making enough revenue for the hassle.
- joshuarrrr 15y ago
  Fair enough, that's his call to make. Meanwhile, I'll keep using InstaFetch for its value added to my Android phone.

biafra 15y ago

"And they’ll quickly find Instapaper in the App Store." Until Apple pulls the plug on Instapaper. Let's hope that never happens.

jashmenn 15y ago

I think marco is totally right that this can only help instapaper in the long run. Let me tell you a story from my own experience: My partner and I created an iPad game for cats. We wanted to get some extra marketing boost so we contacted friskies (purina). In Nov (2010) I exchanged a few emails, and talked to them on the phone about our game. I sent them a video and they told us they loved the idea and they would get back to us. Then one day, silence. We didn't hear anything for months. Then a couple weeks ago they released the Friskies "Games for Cats" which are suspiciously similar to our game. The blogosphere exploded. "Friskies releases creative iPad game for cats" "Friskies is oh so clever etc." We were pissed. But sales improved. A lot. I tried to track their rankings so I searched for them on the AppStore. Hmm, thats odd. I couldn't find them. It turns out /they didn't make native apps/ they were "simply" HTML5 pages on their website that you open in browser [1]. So what was/is happening is people see "Friskies iPad Game for Cats" they grab their iPad and search for "game for cats" on the AppStore and then they find our game and we profit. Also, most people who have cats and iPads don't even think to look for a game for their cat. So by Friskies putting marketing into this they actually increase the size of the market (to be honest, I hope they run a TV commercial advertising their "ipad game for cats"). Moral #1 of the story is: BigCo might steal your idea, but they will likely mess it up and it can end up helping you. Moral #2: high water raises all the boats [1] I realized HTML5 is a "real" app, but most normals don't yet view it that way. They expect to find apps in an app store. UPDATE: formatting

ChrisLTD 15y ago
But will people be unsatisfied with Reading List enough to bother looking for alternatives on the App Store? Non-Apple platform sync seems to be the biggest missing feature, but what else is there that folks would pay for?
- msbarnett 15y ago
  Figuring out what else Reading List is missing that users would pay for is precisely what Marco is going to have to do. But that's where the broadened visibility will help significantly. With whole new classes of people discovering this category of App, wishing that it did X, and searching around for alternatives that provide X, he'll probably see an uptick in people asking him about features like X that he's in a far better position to quickly iterate around than Apple is.

Lazlo_Nibble 15y ago

The vast majority of the articles I add to Instapaper, I add from Firefox on my desktop at work. And virtually all the articles I read in Instapaper, I read when I'm off-network completely (I have an iPod touch). I don't think Marco has much to worry about yet.

joshuarrrr 15y ago
Agreed, in fact offline reading (+Kindle syncing) is why I sought out the app in the first place.

raganwald 15y ago

The true story of audion: http://panic.com/extras/audionstory/ http://panic.com/extras/audionstory/

wallflower 15y ago
This has been posted here many times, and it is absolutely one of the best first person accounts of doing business with Apple.

T_S_ 15y ago

Did Time Machine kill SuperDuper? Not for me. I use Chrome, so no.

donohoe 15y ago

I get the impression that Marco is putting a brave face on what is an awful realization. I use the 'reading list' functionality of Instapaper. I have only used the social and editorial aspects to see what they were about and nothing more.

akent 15y ago
I sure wouldn't want to be Marco. I think "nice while it lasted" might be the best spin to put on this.
omaranto 15y ago
I don't use the social and editorial stuff either, but I use two Instapaper features Apple's thing is not likely to have: (1) I use the bookmarklet (and also, ocasionally, read an article from the website) from my Windows and Linux boxes, and (2) in addition to reading on my iPod touch, I download my saved articles as an ePub file to read on my Sony PRS-505 eBook Reader.

rafski 15y ago

Will Apple's solution be limited to Safari? I would think Marco's customers are rather a tech-savvy crowd who wouldn't tie themselves to just one particular browser. I use Instapaper for the multi-browser support (mostly in Firefox), but also for the Kindle support, both for reading in Kindle Webkit browser and as downloads. I think Marco has a big chance to catch the long tail of read-later'ing. If you look at desktop Safari's Reader Mode… It is a fantastic feature but I don't think I ever heard of anyone I know using it. It should've been implemented in iOS Safari long time ago, btw, this is where it's been missing.

hristov 15y ago

Take this with a grain of salt. Of course he is going to say it only helps him. That is just entrepreneurship 101. You must always be positive and incredibly self assured in public. Executives always assure you that their business is going great and everything is good news up to the moment they file the bankruptcy papers (and in the case of chapter 11 bankruptcies even for some time afterwards). But I doubt he is that optimistic on the inside. This is for reasons other people have already properly identified in this discussion (e.g., the Apple product will always have the better integration). So Apple just went out and ate this guy's lunch. That's pretty much it. You may argue it is ok, you may argue they have a right to do that, but let's not pretend it did not happen.

andrewljohnson 15y ago

I knew the guy who made the original faux-MMS app. When Apple added MMS to iPhone, his app died swiftly. I also knew the guy who made the original, best voice recorder app too. He made a mint, but then Apple made it a native app, and his app pretty much died too. Never underestimate the potential of the platform-owner to take what he wants from your business.

Steko 15y ago
"Never underestimate the potential of the platform-owner to take what he wants from your business." I'm not sure there's a more wrong way of looking at it. Apple didn't make an MMS app to steal some dev's profits. They made an MMS app because it's an obvious natural app to make and put on every phone. Never underestimate the potential of an early entrant to whine about the loss of their perceived feifdom.
tptacek 15y ago
Excuse me in advance for 'edw519'ing out: - - - - lots of features w/ mainstream appeal - -> - - - - has network effects -- - - - - - - - - - > - - - - wants to be cross-platform - - - - - - - > | LARGE MARKET | | | .-- instapaper? .-- MMS | | | | | | hard SPECTRUM of DIFFERENTIABILITY easy <-------------------------------------------------------> | | | | | | `-- voice | `-- music recorder| social | network? | | | | SMALL MARKET | It remains to be seen where deferred-reading is on this spectrum. My gut is that it's somewhere in the middle, but that the total market for it --- notably unlike special-purpose voice recorders --- is so big that you might not need to work too much harder to retain the status quo. My point is that it's not as simple as you make it out to be. There's plenty of room on iOS for a better calculator (like PCalc); plenty of room for portfolio tracking, even for special-purpose camera interfaces.

ignifero 15y ago

No they won't. Focus on the broader ecosystem (Windows, Android, Blackberry, Windows Phone) and greater integration.

teyc 15y ago
This is correct. Once you have a nice feature, you realize Apple's doesn't run everywhere. Marco is also correct about social. A simple commenting system and a highlighter and a red envelope would be useful. People want insightful quotes highlighted and commented, and want to be validated when people reply to their messages.

Getahobby 15y ago

So the message AAPL is sending to app developers: do your job well enough and we will bake it into the OS.

alexknight 15y ago

If Reading List gains a lot of ground, it may be time for Marco to think about developing an Android app. I'm a happy paid Instapaper user though, and continue to pay the subscription fee to support the service.

st3fan 15y ago

So it seems that Reading List does not support offline reading. For me that is the main reason to use Instapaper. I save a lot of stuff and then read it when I am for example on a flight without Wi-Fi. There is your added value.

jemeshsu 15y ago

Instapaper will be ok, it has superior features not in Reading List. Same for Camera+ even though Apple added enhancement to native Camera app. Sparrow vs Mail app. iOS market is big enough for Marco to happily survive.

krmmalik 15y ago

I cant comment whether this will help InstaPaper or not, having never tried the product, but i love the way that the owner of instapaper rises to the challenge. It inspires me greatly for if and when my business may face similar challenges.