While some folks still enjoy the pleasures of an early morning newspaper, the world is rapidly moving towards a future where all forms of press are going digital. The importance of news coupled with the eminence of smartphones in our day to day lives has created a pressing need for quality news applications. While there are a good number of news readers out there, most of them fall short of the mark due to various compromises, in areas ranging from speed and versatility to experience and design but there is one among them that stands out rather strikingly.
Paperboy News Reader didn’t appear on the Play Store with a bang, acquiring thousands of users overnight. Instead, the developer, Dotted Circle, chose to undertake an arduous development approach, carrying out user validation every step of the way. Beginning as an MVP (Minimum Viable Product) a few years ago, initial versions of the app contained curated news sources in a minimal non-intrusive interface and 8 versions down the line, Paperboy stands on a strong, user-validated foundation augmented with a Feedly backend and a pleasing Material Design aesthetic.
From the time you open the app and log in until you’re done reading for the day, Paperboy continues to delight you with its intuitive layout, perfectly synchronized animations and easy userflow. Powered by the Feedly API, the app provides an innumerable list of news sources that can easily be sorted according to their category and if you’re already a Feedly user, your existing feeds will automatically be imported. In addition to the standard search-add-read flow, the app also draws up a list of popular and recommended articles based on trends or personalized recommendations based on your Facebook or Twitter feeds.
Scrolling through the list of articles, you can either read the article, share it with someone, save it or glance through a quick summary, providing well co-ordinated drop-off points in the userflow. Once you begin reading, Paperboy enters a semi-immersive mode with clear and concise typography providing excellent readability. No stranger to feature additions, a floating menu is present to serve your every article-related need from text-to-speech to quickly adding it to Pocket. With an acute sense of detail, a number of features and easter-eggs have been added aimed to augment your interaction with the app through delightful details such as sensor-driven images and a swipe-controlled brightness setting.
With content and design perfected, Dotted Circle expanded the app to include an expansive list of under-the-hood as well as user controlled features ranging from limitless customization and contextual app themes to power user features and experimental tweaks. Paperboy is free to download on Google Play, and matches your expectations on every front, providing a memorable experience and leaving you wanting more.
Article Posted by Faiz Malkani in XDA Developers
