8 ms·

Paper – stories from Facebook on the App Store

91 points by wdaareg 13y ago

tomasien 13y ago
Gut reaction review if anyone is interested - I moved FB off my home screen and moved Paper onto it. It's just Facebook with a better design and none of the features I never use. It has notifications, posting, stories, etc. It's great.
- josefresco 13y ago
  Sooo it's like Flipboard? I use Flipboard to view my Facebook feed and generally prefer it to the actual Facebook app.
  - tomasien 13y ago
    It's like Flipboard with Facebook notifications/posting as well. Read your timeline/other content (if you want, but they're totally separated which is great), get and respond to notifications, post statuses/content. What else do you do on Facebook?
  - nemothekid 13y ago
    Its exactly like Flipboard to me. I'm a heavy user of Flipboard and already the baby duck syndrome is making me hate Paper.
  - bcohen5055 13y ago
    I think I actually prefer the interface to flipboard, my only issue at this point is that I want to curate my feeds better. For instance the tech feed features Gizmodo, the verge, OZY, Techcrunch etc... but I only read 1 of those sites regularly. Also, I'd like to lump my friends into different feeds so college buddies, co-workers, family are on individual streams
    - kamilszybalski 13y ago
      We are working on solving this amongst other problems with www.discovle.com
- ruswick 13y ago
  I'm on Android, but you point seems to mesh with what I've come to like about Facebook's mobile strategy lately. Instead of trying to jam every single feature into a single Facebook App, FB is releasing different apps the serve niche functions, and allowing users to use the products (and, with Paper, the interface) that work for them. Personally, I don't have the Facebook app on my phone. The only FB app I use regularly is Messenger, which works well because everyone I know is on it. I also use Facebook for finding reading material and following the News, and so Paper looks really nice and I'm eagerly anticipating its arrival on Android. A lot of people deride Facebook for over-complicating their app strategy, but I really don't see the problem. Facebook is allowing users pick and choose the functions that matter to them. I wish other companies would take this approach.
- mcphilip 13y ago
  The only feature I'm missing so far is the ability to view all stories, not just top posts.
- thecosas 13y ago
  Favorite feature so far: Open FB notifications in Paper.
- thecosas 13y ago
  Least favorite feature so far: The icon.
- msutherl 13y ago
  For me it's all the features of Facebook I don't use with better design. I have everybody blocked from my News Feed and only use Facebook for a couple of Groups, Events, and Messages. I would love to see a dedicated Events app.
austenallred 13y ago
FYI: It appears to not be available for download in the United States.
- k-mcgrady 13y ago
  The US is the only place it is available (or so it was reported a few days ago).
- togasystems 13y ago
  Does anybody know their strategy here?
  - objclxt 13y ago
    It can take time for apps to propagate through the App Store once it goes live. It is not a 'flick a switch and the app appears everywhere' process.
- aneisf 13y ago
  It won't come in the search probably, but if you go to the page for the Facebook app and click through to Facebook, Inc. you'll find it in their apps.
- DasIch 13y ago
  Not available in Germany either.
- cristinacordova 13y ago
  I was able to download it from the US App Store: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/paper-stories-from-facebook/id794163692 https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/paper-stories-from-facebook/...
- codr 13y ago
  For me it was just hard to find.. had to look for "Related" apps under the main FB app.
- plorg 13y ago
k-mcgrady 13y ago
1. What a terrible icon. 2. Really well designed app. I think it might replace the main Facebook app for me.
- josefresco 13y ago
  Agreed on the icon, terrible design. I'm surprised they didn't make it red to further compete directly with Flipboard.
  - navs 13y ago
    I'm surprised they didn't spend a billion on buying Flipboard. Then again I don't know if Flipboard is in the same league as instagram in terms of active users.
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
ApacheEcho 13y ago
I don't see how they'll be benefiting from the release of Paper. Two things can happen: 1. Takes off and gets rid of regular FB app user base? Advertising is relatively in existent on Paper? Mobile profits go down for the next quarter. 2. The app becomes another flop like Poke or Home. I do see that FB is breaking apart to a more service like architecture instead of a behemoth.
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
valvoja 13y ago
The app icon doesn't really look Facebook-like and the second screenshot look like a photoshop disaster. If I had never heard of the app, I wouldn't think it's an official Facebook product.
- travem 13y ago
  Agreed. When I first saw it in the app store all I could read was "Paper - stories from…"[1]. You don't even see the word Facebook until you click through. [1] http://pic.twitter.com/MoYtlFfxFv http://pic.twitter.com/MoYtlFfxFv
blueblob 13y ago
In the default font size this looks really bad in firefox 26 on archlinux. Is/did anybody else having/have this problem? How do I fix it other than making the font bigger?
fossuser 13y ago
It's a beautiful app - my initial impression is that it takes longer to move through content. It'll be interesting to see if people begin to use this regularly.
robinhoodexe 13y ago
Seems nice, but too bad it's not available on the Danish App Store
cfinke 13y ago
I tried it and found no redeeming qualities, except that the app is pretty when it's filled with demo content. * Do you find Facebook's iPhone app too easy to understand and navigate? Try Paper! * Is the type in Facebook's iPhone app too easy for you to read? Try Paper! * Are you tired of swiping down on Facebook's app and wish you could do some swiping left and right? Try Paper! * Do you enjoy losing your place in your newsfeed when you tap on a story to read more? Try Paper! * Do you enjoy voiceovers reading text to you that is already printed on your screen? Try Paper! * Want half of your iPhone screen taken up by distracting images unrelated to what you're reading? Try Paper! * Tired of having two good apps for news and Facebook and want a single app that does both poorly? Try Paper! * Do you LOVE generic app icons that could mean "news", "email", "flashcards", or "envelopes"? Try Paper! * Tired of not having to wave your phone in the real world to see the sides of a digital photo? Try Paper! * Prefer apps that require a tutorial before you can use them? Try Paper! * Want to read stories from "the world's best sources," but only inside of a walled garden? Try Paper!
- the_watcher 13y ago
  It basically turned my News Feed into Flipboard, which is pretty much what they advertised, right?
  - cfinke 13y ago
    Based on this Quora answer to "What was it like to help develop Paper?" (http://www.quora.com/Facebook-Launches-Paper-January-2014/What-was-it-like-to-help-develop-Paper http://www.quora.com/Facebook-Launches-Paper-January-2014/Wh...), I expected it to at least fold my laundry and wash my car.
    - ashishgandhi 13y ago
      For what it's worth someone did a humorous "translation" of that answer. https://gist.github.com/anonymous/b31d213d5a0d4e97b59e/raw/91797ebb08f0ff0b4dcde46cb394914fae86eaa7/gistfile1.txt https://gist.github.com/anonymous/b31d213d5a0d4e97b59e/raw/9...
caiob 13y ago
As usual, Canadian users are left out. ugh...
- 0x0 13y ago
  Europeans too. Had to switch over to my fake-us account to get it. Which means I'm unlikely to update it since that means signing out and in and out and in again.
- mikeevans 13y ago
  and Android users.
rafeed 13y ago
Just downloaded onto my iPhone and it's pretty cool... however, I don't think I'm the right audience. My life isn't nearly as interesting as Mike Matas and co. It just makes all the shitty pics that everyone posts on my newsfeed look that much worse.
Finster 13y ago
The biggest pain point I have is that when stuff pops up in the top half of the main view, and then goes away. There's no way to get back to that content without scrolling through the bottom half, and if you happen to miss it (which is easy to do) then you're left wondering where the heck is that article or post.
thecosas 13y ago
I'm interested to see how they're leveraging data on what you've clicked on or read in the past to deliver better content as you (and others) use it to read news in addition to friends' updates.
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
0x0 13y ago
Does anyone know how the app is able to login to facebook automatically? It doesn't show up in ios settings "allow these apps to use your facebook account", and it didn't seem to do the custom app-url-protocol flip-flop over to the main facebook app. Or is it as simple as a shared keychain entry because the app is signed by the same publisher as the main app?
- novum 13y ago
  Almost certainly a shared keychain.
- kenrikm 13y ago
  Best guess is they use "identifierForVendor" mixed and some other verifications to log it in. Might be worth looking into, security bugs are fun to find.
  - mmasashi 13y ago
    It seems you are right. Paper recognized my account even without iOS native Facebook login.
calbear81 13y ago
I think it's a well designed app and has a lot of nice gesture based interactions that become relatively natural once you play with it for a few minutes. You lose a bunch of the less used stuff and so far I don't think I've seen a sponsored post loaded in yet. - Adding in content categories are exposing me to sources that don't normally show up on my Facebook feed which increases my likelihood to "like" them and drive more interaction. - Massive real estate given to photos in HD resolution might increase the general quality of photos that folks post on Facebook since those really pop out in the article scroller. - This large card format is going to make advertisers salivate as you can now use vertical scrolling space (if FB allows it) within the Paper format. Scroll down for more details, etc.
LukeWalsh 13y ago
Aside from how beautiful it is I think buried inside is a unique solution for a problem that often occurred while browsing Facebook. Viewing widescreen photos in portrait was difficult without turning the phone (and many people lock portrait orientation). Paper uses the accelerometer to allow you to pan and view the entire image. I literally said "wow" out loud once I realized that I had already looked at two widescreen photos and not even noticed how seamless it was.
aaronbrethorst 13y ago
Three things of note: * It's really pretty, which makes perfect sense given the pedigrees of who was involved in its creation (http://www.mikematas.com/ http://www.mikematas.com/ and http://www.atebits.com http://www.atebits.com, among others) * The IPA file is huge given what it does. It seems like the bulk of the 50.4MB download is consumed by the completely unnecessary first-launch video. * I found the app difficult to use, which is especially surprising given the pedigrees of who was involved in its creation. The process of switching between different data feeds was unintuitive to me, and I felt like there several instances where it simply failed to respond to my touches (I have an iPhone 5s, so device performance shouldn't be a problem). Anyway, I promptly deleted it. I'll probably try it again in a couple months.
- 21echoes 13y ago
  looking at the unzipped ipa file, it looks like a solid 40.7 MB of the app is just the binary ! another 9.8MB is the FBMessenger assets.
  - aaronbrethorst 13y ago
    That's wild.
barce 13y ago
The strategy around paper seems pretty smart. Rather than re-design Facebook's mobile experience, they just created a new app to interface with it. Given the track record for re-designs simply failing and causing user revolt, this is very shrewd.
vasundhar 13y ago
UI is fantastic! * Its Facebook's attempt to bubble wrap you in what it thinks you fit. * Flipboard,Circle,NewsStand ... Why this ? *My Question would be, is it not essential to have USP for an established company to launch a product of their choice ? #justasking.
- vasundhar 13y ago
  I mean pulse not circle
product50 13y ago
It is kind of sad that Facebook threatens legal action on any company which uses "Face" or "book" in their names BUT they find it ok to use an already well-established app's name ("Paper") for their own app. Not sure how anyone at Facebook can reason that with a straight face.
- k-mcgrady 13y ago
  Because Facebook owns the trademark on Facebook and therefore has to protect it. FiftyThree doesn't appear to own a trademark on Paper.
  - calbear81 13y ago
    Thank you k-mcgrady, surprising that so many folks didn't realize that if you own a trademark, you are obligated to both use it actively and protect it unless you want to lose some or all rights to that mark.
  - hhandoko 13y ago
    "Paper by FiftyThree" is a registered trademark. [1] - http://tess2.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4807:qzi8jw.3.1 http://tess2.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4807:qzi8jw...
0x0 13y ago
I wish there was an option to disable relative timestamps. They are very poorly executed in this app in particular. After playing around with the app for a couple of hours, even stories that are more than an hour old are still rendered with "just now" or "3 minutes ago" as the timestamp. :( In general: If you are going to hide the timestamps and replace them with an oh-so-convenient "X minutes ago" relative time, you should make damn sure that relative time is current at all times. Preferably even in screenshots and printouts.
IE5point5 13y ago
> In our push for polish we had a goal of never dropping a frame on high-end devices, and we mostly achieved that goal. The engineering complexity here is finding a way to fully utilize the multicore architecture of newer iPhones Sorry… but all the app shows are a bunch of photos and a bit of text. Never dropping a frame on the most high end of devices isn't anything to boast about, To be honest for what it's doing it shouldn't be dropping a frame on any device in the past 3 years

91 points by wdaareg 13y ago

Gut reaction review if anyone is interested - I moved FB off my home screen and moved Paper onto it. It's just Facebook with a better design and none of the features I never use. It has notifications, posting, stories, etc. It's great.

josefresco 13y ago
Sooo it's like Flipboard? I use Flipboard to view my Facebook feed and generally prefer it to the actual Facebook app.
- tomasien 13y ago
  It's like Flipboard with Facebook notifications/posting as well. Read your timeline/other content (if you want, but they're totally separated which is great), get and respond to notifications, post statuses/content. What else do you do on Facebook?
- nemothekid 13y ago
  Its exactly like Flipboard to me. I'm a heavy user of Flipboard and already the baby duck syndrome is making me hate Paper.
- bcohen5055 13y ago
  I think I actually prefer the interface to flipboard, my only issue at this point is that I want to curate my feeds better. For instance the tech feed features Gizmodo, the verge, OZY, Techcrunch etc... but I only read 1 of those sites regularly. Also, I'd like to lump my friends into different feeds so college buddies, co-workers, family are on individual streams
  - kamilszybalski 13y ago
    We are working on solving this amongst other problems with www.discovle.com
ruswick 13y ago
I'm on Android, but you point seems to mesh with what I've come to like about Facebook's mobile strategy lately. Instead of trying to jam every single feature into a single Facebook App, FB is releasing different apps the serve niche functions, and allowing users to use the products (and, with Paper, the interface) that work for them. Personally, I don't have the Facebook app on my phone. The only FB app I use regularly is Messenger, which works well because everyone I know is on it. I also use Facebook for finding reading material and following the News, and so Paper looks really nice and I'm eagerly anticipating its arrival on Android. A lot of people deride Facebook for over-complicating their app strategy, but I really don't see the problem. Facebook is allowing users pick and choose the functions that matter to them. I wish other companies would take this approach.
mcphilip 13y ago
The only feature I'm missing so far is the ability to view all stories, not just top posts.
thecosas 13y ago
Favorite feature so far: Open FB notifications in Paper.
thecosas 13y ago
Least favorite feature so far: The icon.
msutherl 13y ago
For me it's all the features of Facebook I don't use with better design. I have everybody blocked from my News Feed and only use Facebook for a couple of Groups, Events, and Messages. I would love to see a dedicated Events app.

austenallred 13y ago

FYI: It appears to not be available for download in the United States.

k-mcgrady 13y ago
The US is the only place it is available (or so it was reported a few days ago).
togasystems 13y ago
Does anybody know their strategy here?
- objclxt 13y ago
  It can take time for apps to propagate through the App Store once it goes live. It is not a 'flick a switch and the app appears everywhere' process.
aneisf 13y ago
It won't come in the search probably, but if you go to the page for the Facebook app and click through to Facebook, Inc. you'll find it in their apps.
DasIch 13y ago
Not available in Germany either.
cristinacordova 13y ago
I was able to download it from the US App Store: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/paper-stories-from-facebook/id794163692 https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/paper-stories-from-facebook/...
codr 13y ago
For me it was just hard to find.. had to look for "Related" apps under the main FB app.
plorg 13y ago

k-mcgrady 13y ago

1. What a terrible icon. 2. Really well designed app. I think it might replace the main Facebook app for me.

josefresco 13y ago
Agreed on the icon, terrible design. I'm surprised they didn't make it red to further compete directly with Flipboard.
- navs 13y ago
  I'm surprised they didn't spend a billion on buying Flipboard. Then again I don't know if Flipboard is in the same league as instagram in terms of active users.

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

ApacheEcho 13y ago

I don't see how they'll be benefiting from the release of Paper. Two things can happen: 1. Takes off and gets rid of regular FB app user base? Advertising is relatively in existent on Paper? Mobile profits go down for the next quarter. 2. The app becomes another flop like Poke or Home. I do see that FB is breaking apart to a more service like architecture instead of a behemoth.

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

valvoja 13y ago

The app icon doesn't really look Facebook-like and the second screenshot look like a photoshop disaster. If I had never heard of the app, I wouldn't think it's an official Facebook product.

travem 13y ago
Agreed. When I first saw it in the app store all I could read was "Paper - stories from…"[1]. You don't even see the word Facebook until you click through. [1] http://pic.twitter.com/MoYtlFfxFv http://pic.twitter.com/MoYtlFfxFv

blueblob 13y ago

In the default font size this looks really bad in firefox 26 on archlinux. Is/did anybody else having/have this problem? How do I fix it other than making the font bigger?

fossuser 13y ago

It's a beautiful app - my initial impression is that it takes longer to move through content. It'll be interesting to see if people begin to use this regularly.

robinhoodexe 13y ago

Seems nice, but too bad it's not available on the Danish App Store

cfinke 13y ago

I tried it and found no redeeming qualities, except that the app is pretty when it's filled with demo content. * Do you find Facebook's iPhone app too easy to understand and navigate? Try Paper! * Is the type in Facebook's iPhone app too easy for you to read? Try Paper! * Are you tired of swiping down on Facebook's app and wish you could do some swiping left and right? Try Paper! * Do you enjoy losing your place in your newsfeed when you tap on a story to read more? Try Paper! * Do you enjoy voiceovers reading text to you that is already printed on your screen? Try Paper! * Want half of your iPhone screen taken up by distracting images unrelated to what you're reading? Try Paper! * Tired of having two good apps for news and Facebook and want a single app that does both poorly? Try Paper! * Do you LOVE generic app icons that could mean "news", "email", "flashcards", or "envelopes"? Try Paper! * Tired of not having to wave your phone in the real world to see the sides of a digital photo? Try Paper! * Prefer apps that require a tutorial before you can use them? Try Paper! * Want to read stories from "the world's best sources," but only inside of a walled garden? Try Paper!

the_watcher 13y ago
It basically turned my News Feed into Flipboard, which is pretty much what they advertised, right?
- cfinke 13y ago
  Based on this Quora answer to "What was it like to help develop Paper?" (http://www.quora.com/Facebook-Launches-Paper-January-2014/What-was-it-like-to-help-develop-Paper http://www.quora.com/Facebook-Launches-Paper-January-2014/Wh...), I expected it to at least fold my laundry and wash my car.
  - ashishgandhi 13y ago
    For what it's worth someone did a humorous "translation" of that answer. https://gist.github.com/anonymous/b31d213d5a0d4e97b59e/raw/91797ebb08f0ff0b4dcde46cb394914fae86eaa7/gistfile1.txt https://gist.github.com/anonymous/b31d213d5a0d4e97b59e/raw/9...

caiob 13y ago

As usual, Canadian users are left out. ugh...

0x0 13y ago
Europeans too. Had to switch over to my fake-us account to get it. Which means I'm unlikely to update it since that means signing out and in and out and in again.
mikeevans 13y ago
and Android users.

rafeed 13y ago

Just downloaded onto my iPhone and it's pretty cool... however, I don't think I'm the right audience. My life isn't nearly as interesting as Mike Matas and co. It just makes all the shitty pics that everyone posts on my newsfeed look that much worse.

Finster 13y ago

The biggest pain point I have is that when stuff pops up in the top half of the main view, and then goes away. There's no way to get back to that content without scrolling through the bottom half, and if you happen to miss it (which is easy to do) then you're left wondering where the heck is that article or post.

thecosas 13y ago

I'm interested to see how they're leveraging data on what you've clicked on or read in the past to deliver better content as you (and others) use it to read news in addition to friends' updates.

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

0x0 13y ago

Does anyone know how the app is able to login to facebook automatically? It doesn't show up in ios settings "allow these apps to use your facebook account", and it didn't seem to do the custom app-url-protocol flip-flop over to the main facebook app. Or is it as simple as a shared keychain entry because the app is signed by the same publisher as the main app?

novum 13y ago
Almost certainly a shared keychain.
kenrikm 13y ago
Best guess is they use "identifierForVendor" mixed and some other verifications to log it in. Might be worth looking into, security bugs are fun to find.
- mmasashi 13y ago
  It seems you are right. Paper recognized my account even without iOS native Facebook login.

calbear81 13y ago

I think it's a well designed app and has a lot of nice gesture based interactions that become relatively natural once you play with it for a few minutes. You lose a bunch of the less used stuff and so far I don't think I've seen a sponsored post loaded in yet. - Adding in content categories are exposing me to sources that don't normally show up on my Facebook feed which increases my likelihood to "like" them and drive more interaction. - Massive real estate given to photos in HD resolution might increase the general quality of photos that folks post on Facebook since those really pop out in the article scroller. - This large card format is going to make advertisers salivate as you can now use vertical scrolling space (if FB allows it) within the Paper format. Scroll down for more details, etc.

LukeWalsh 13y ago

Aside from how beautiful it is I think buried inside is a unique solution for a problem that often occurred while browsing Facebook. Viewing widescreen photos in portrait was difficult without turning the phone (and many people lock portrait orientation). Paper uses the accelerometer to allow you to pan and view the entire image. I literally said "wow" out loud once I realized that I had already looked at two widescreen photos and not even noticed how seamless it was.

aaronbrethorst 13y ago

Three things of note: * It's really pretty, which makes perfect sense given the pedigrees of who was involved in its creation (http://www.mikematas.com/ http://www.mikematas.com/ and http://www.atebits.com http://www.atebits.com, among others) * The IPA file is huge given what it does. It seems like the bulk of the 50.4MB download is consumed by the completely unnecessary first-launch video. * I found the app difficult to use, which is especially surprising given the pedigrees of who was involved in its creation. The process of switching between different data feeds was unintuitive to me, and I felt like there several instances where it simply failed to respond to my touches (I have an iPhone 5s, so device performance shouldn't be a problem). Anyway, I promptly deleted it. I'll probably try it again in a couple months.

21echoes 13y ago
looking at the unzipped ipa file, it looks like a solid 40.7 MB of the app is just the binary ! another 9.8MB is the FBMessenger assets.
- aaronbrethorst 13y ago
  That's wild.

barce 13y ago

The strategy around paper seems pretty smart. Rather than re-design Facebook's mobile experience, they just created a new app to interface with it. Given the track record for re-designs simply failing and causing user revolt, this is very shrewd.

vasundhar 13y ago

UI is fantastic! * Its Facebook's attempt to bubble wrap you in what it thinks you fit. * Flipboard,Circle,NewsStand ... Why this ? *My Question would be, is it not essential to have USP for an established company to launch a product of their choice ? #justasking.

vasundhar 13y ago
I mean pulse not circle

product50 13y ago

It is kind of sad that Facebook threatens legal action on any company which uses "Face" or "book" in their names BUT they find it ok to use an already well-established app's name ("Paper") for their own app. Not sure how anyone at Facebook can reason that with a straight face.

k-mcgrady 13y ago
Because Facebook owns the trademark on Facebook and therefore has to protect it. FiftyThree doesn't appear to own a trademark on Paper.
- calbear81 13y ago
  Thank you k-mcgrady, surprising that so many folks didn't realize that if you own a trademark, you are obligated to both use it actively and protect it unless you want to lose some or all rights to that mark.
- hhandoko 13y ago
  "Paper by FiftyThree" is a registered trademark. [1] - http://tess2.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4807:qzi8jw.3.1 http://tess2.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4807:qzi8jw...

0x0 13y ago

I wish there was an option to disable relative timestamps. They are very poorly executed in this app in particular. After playing around with the app for a couple of hours, even stories that are more than an hour old are still rendered with "just now" or "3 minutes ago" as the timestamp. :( In general: If you are going to hide the timestamps and replace them with an oh-so-convenient "X minutes ago" relative time, you should make damn sure that relative time is current at all times. Preferably even in screenshots and printouts.

IE5point5 13y ago

> In our push for polish we had a goal of never dropping a frame on high-end devices, and we mostly achieved that goal. The engineering complexity here is finding a way to fully utilize the multicore architecture of newer iPhones Sorry… but all the app shows are a bunch of photos and a bit of text. Never dropping a frame on the most high end of devices isn't anything to boast about, To be honest for what it's doing it shouldn't be dropping a frame on any device in the past 3 years