The main thing for me wasn't the simple feed-reader aspect of it; it was the syncing. I could use my choice of clients on different platforms and as Reader was

The main thing for me wasn't the simple feed-reader aspect of it; it was the syncing. I could use my choice of clients on different platforms and as Reader was effectively a monopoly, all the clients would sync with it, allowing me to view the same list of feeds whereever I was - and more importantly, keep those lists up to date with new feeds, and which articles I had read.