Unfortunately, the ability to quickly tap a button to add something to your reading list was so easy - perhaps too easy - that users ended up with long, unwieldy lists of saved content. Now ReadItLater is introducing a new Digest feature which helps you get caught up by automatically sorting and organizing articles for you.

ReadItLater's creator Nate Weiner calls the new Digest "Read It Later with a brain." Instead of being presented with a simple list of headlines as you were before, the Digest organizes all your articles and groups them into topics.

Its layout is somewhat reminiscent of Feedly, the popular start page made up of your Google Reader RSS feeds and Twitter posts. Like Feedly, which organizes topics by Google Reader folder names and tags, the Digest also employs a categorization system of sorts. The difference is, in ReadItLater's case, that filtering and organization is performed automatically with no extra effort required on your part.

Articles you saved about the latest gadgets would end up in one section, for example, and those about politics would end up in another. Even if you're typically focused on just one topic - like, let's say technology - the Digest is able to break down those similar articles by sub-category.

Case in point - my digest. All the articles are focused on tech but are broken up into categories like "mobile," "Apple," "business," and "advertising." The sorting algorithm slips up a little though and creates one page of "Technology" articles - well, that would be all of them, wouldn't it? It also oddly categorizes a CNet article about Google Buzz's privacy issues under "advertising." Still, even with these small misfires, this new organized homepage - like a personal TechMeme of saved content, makes it much easier to know where to begin attacking your long list of unread items.

Interacting with Articles and other Features

When you click on an item to read it, it pops up in a separate overlay window on the screen. Options at the top let you see "more" or "less" of the article or you can click "original" to be redirected to the website where the article was first posted. And as before, you clear an item off the list by clicking the check mark.

Other Digest features include an "edit topics" option that lets you create your own categories and a sharing feature that allows you publicize your digest for others to read.

Future Plans: ReadItLater for iPad and Premium Services

For now, the Digest is free for all beta testers on a first-come, first-serve basis. However, in a few weeks, the new Digest option will transform into a subscription-based premium service. Those who use ReadItLater's free service will be presented with just a simple list of headlines as before while the Digest will only be available to subscribers. Pricing for the service will be announced in the coming weeks.

Weiner says this represents "a very good taste of what to expect from ReadItLater on the iPad," hinting at the service's future offering for users of Apple's highly anticipated slate computer.

Those interested in beta testing the Digest feature can sign up at http://readitlaterlist.com/digest to try the new service for themselves.

But the bigger news from this company is the release of an API that will allow anyone to build their own Read It Later applications - and not just for mobile, but for any platform.

The Read It Later application on the iPhone, available in both a free and paid version, lets you mark articles you're reading in Safari using a customized bookmarklet. Originally, the installation of this bookmarklet was a bit of a challenge as you first have to save a link then edit it, but thanks to iPhone OS 3.0's introduction of copy-and-paste, the process is much simpler.

With the update to Read It Later version 1.3, iPhone users will have access to a number of new features. Although each one is a minor tweak or upgrade, when combined, the overall experience of using the application is greatly improved.

1) Better Access to Articles: The first of the many changes includes support for multi-page articles. These articles will be detected by the application and combined into offline web and text modes. Also supported are articles that sit behind a paywall or are password-protected in some way - such as those on the Wall Street Journal's site, for example. Now Read It Later can store that content by caching your login credentials so you don't have to enter them again when the app needs to download that content. And while you're reading these saved articles, a new scroll bar makes it easier to navigate.

2) Reading List Improvements: To keep track of your reading list, the new app introduces a "Currently Reading" section where your list of "to-read" articles are tracked. It even remembers your position in every article you're reading! When you finish an article, it's moved to the newly created archive (the "Recently Read" section).

3) More Sharing, Rotation Lock (Pro Users Only): For users of the Pro (paid) version, you'll now be able to share articles to other iPhone Twitter applications like Twitterlator, TwitterFon, and Tweetie. Also added is Evernote, which complements the current list of sharing methods that already included Facebook, Delicious, and email.

Another new feature for Pro users is the ability to lock the rotation of the phone so that it stays put in the viewing mode you want (portrait or landscape) - a feature we wish the iPhone itself would include, to be honest!

The Read It Later API

As developer Nate Weiner explains on his blog, "as a solo developer, it's just not possible for me to develop for every mobile device and browser." That's why he decided to open up his API so others could build apps that do everything his does including tagging, syncing, account management, and more.

Hopefully, this new openness will encourage other developers to step in and help build applications for Palm, Android, Blackberry, and Chrome or implement the good features he hears suggested to him on a regular basis.

There's a good chance that developers will jump on this opportunity - and not just because Read It Later already has a user base of 1 million that grows by 5000 new users per day - that's just one incentive. The other is that API is open for both free and commercial applications, meaning the first (or best) apps developed for new platforms can actually earn money for their creators, just as Read It Later has done for Nate on the iPhone.

To access the API, sign up for an API key here.

For the new iPhone applications, you can download Read It Later Free here or Pro here ($2.99).

Because the iPhone doesn't allow users to easily copy and paste a code snippet into a bookmark (yet), installing the bookmarklet is a bit complicated, but the company provides a good set of instructions, and installing the bookmarklet shouldn't take more than a minute.

Once you have installed the bookmarklet, you just have to open up your bookmarks folder, click the Read It Later bookmark, and the page will be saved for you. Because your data is saved on the company's server, you can easily sync bookmarks from multiple devices.

In the app itself, you can then read your bookmarked stories in the built-in browser at your leisure. You can also sort your reading list by date, title, or site.

Read It Later's most important feature, however, is that it caches the content of your saved Web pages and lets you read it offline. Thanks to this, you can catch up on some of your reading while on a plane, for example.

Pro Version

The paid version, which costs $2.99 (iTunes link), adds a number of great features to the app, including a 'Tap To Save' bookmarklet that allows you to save any link on a given page (see this video for how it works), a full-screen reader that hides the Read It Later bookmarks, the ability to share links on various social bookmarking services, and an unread count on the apps icon on the iPhone's home screen.

Verdict

Read It Later's closest competitor is probably Instapaper, which also offers a free and pro version (at $9.99). Both apps are very similar, and Instapaper has a dedicated following that swears by the product. We like both apps, and would recommend that you try the free version of both Read it Later and Instapaper to see which one works best for you. For us, Read It Later's 'Tap to Save' bookmarklet is a killer feature in the pro version, but not everybody will really need this.