Readability doesn't work on every site, but we tested it on most popular news sites and blogs, and it worked almost everywhere. Most of the time, Readability will also display comments when you are reading a blog post. While it displays most images, however, the bookmarklet sadly deletes every embedded video.

What About Those Ads?

Removing the clutter, of course, also means removing the advertising that a lot of sites need to run to make a living. For sites that rely on click-through ads, Readability is just about as bad as AdBlock Plus (or the more anarchic Add-Art), but sites that get paid per ad impression probably won't care too much about this, as the regular page still has to be loaded before you can activate the Readability bookmarklet.

Instapaper, which Arc90 credits as an inspiration, of course, also has a text-only reading mode for saved pages, but its focus is less on making the text readable and more on saving a copy of the page. Unlike Readability, Instapaper also doesn't display any of the images embedded in a text.

In this latest version, the metadata you're able to see includes the number of FriendFeed conversations, the number of Diggs, and the number of times the post has been shared in Google Reader or Feedly. To the right of those informational icons are more buttons that let you share the post in Google Reader/Feedly, save the page for later reading (star in Google Reader), Twitter the page, or email it to a friend.

When you've finished reading (and interacting) with the content on your screen, there's a "next" button which you can click to go to the next recommendation in your Feedly/Google Reader.

Integrated Twitter and FriendFeed

In addition to providing tools that help you better understand and share the blog posts you read, Feedly also reminds you how you came across them in the first place. If you originally saw the post on Twitter, a small notification will pop-up to remind you of that tweet and on the notification window there's an option to reply or re-tweet the information directly from the web page you're currently on.

Alternately, if the article you're reading is hot on FriendFeed, Feedly Mini's pop-up will notify you of a popular conversation around the blog's content occurring on FriendFeed. With one click, you can then join that conversation.

If you're not a fan of notifications or just want to dial them back a bit, you can do so from a preference knob called "Mini Friendfeed Notifications" which allows you to control and customize the behavior of these notifications.

How To Get It

All these new features will be made available today as part of a Feedly update to v 1.2 patch 170. If you're not seeing these features yet, don't worry - Feedly is good about delivering automatic updates to their users. In other words, you can install Feedly now, then sit back and wait for the magic to happen. If you do end up trying the new version, you can let @feedly on Twitter know what you think. If you run into any problems, you can log it on get satisfaction where every ticket is responded to within 24 hours.

You never know what Feedly will add next. Past updates includes integration with Ubiquity, integration with your Google Search, and more. Based on the image below, it appears that Twitter and FriendFeed are only the start of Feedly's planned integrations for this increasingly useful tool.

Ambient News is a new Firefox add-on written by Mozilla developer Atul Varma and is currently available as an alpha release. The add-on tracks your browsing habits, learning which sites you visit most frequently. It then pulls the headlines in from those sites and displays them for you in a beautifully fading list every time you open a new tab in Firefox. If you see something that interests you, just click the link and you'll be taken to the web site where the headline originated. Privacy advocates, rest assured - no data is shared outside your browser.

Intelligent Agents to the Rescue!

As Michael Calore of Wired notes, the add-on is a great workaround for the biggest usability problem facing RSS. "Many people don't know what it is or how to take advantage of it," he writes. "The first hint that a feed exists is a funky orange or blue icon. Click on it and, in most cases, you get prompted to load another application. Sometimes, you just see ugly, raw XML output."

But since we're mostly web geeks here at ReadWriteWeb, we're more enthralled with another aspect to this tool: its intelligence. As we mentioned not too long ago, cloud agents are on the rise. The term, coined by blogger Chris Arkenberg, refers to automated agents that help us better deal with the volumes of data we have to sort through every day. Although Ambient News isn't necessary a full-on cloud agent - it doesn't actually work in the cloud - it can still certainly be considered an agent, especially since it helps us sort through a barrage of information in a new way.

Other Alternatives

Ambient News is not the only alternative to the traditional RSS Reader. Over the past year at ReadWriteWeb, we've also made mention of other alternative news readers like Feedly, which puts a magazine-style interface on top of Google Reader. Another popular RSS reader is Snackr, an Adobe AIR app that scrolls headlines across your screen like a news ticker. Then there is, of course, FriendFeed, a lifestreaming application that's quickly becoming an alternative way to share information among the early adopter set.

Alternative RSS readers aren't for everyone, though - journalists, bloggers, researchers, and the like may still need to use a jam-packed feed reader in order to seek out the elusive info they seek on a regular basis. But for those of you who are more casual web surfers and blog readers, alternative RSS readers are a less stressful way to get your news without the news getting to you.

In case you're unfamiliar, Project Gutenberg is a volunteer effort where contributors digitize, archive, and distribute cultural works. Because of copyright law and restrictions, the majority of the site's content comes from public domain books. Unbelievably, the project was created in 1971, when founder Michael Hart keyed in The United States Declaration of Independence and informed the first 100 internet users.

Given the popularity and ubiquity of mobile phones, it's somewhat surprising that Project Gutenberg didn't already have a mobile edition until now. We suppose it's better late than never, though. And considering the vast size of their catalog, any effort to transform the books into mobile formats was surely not something they took lightly.

The PG Mobile software is based on the common Java file format (JAR) readable on nearly all handsets. The mobile books are downloaded as a Java applications and can be installed either using WAP (over the air), Bluetooth, serial connection, infrared, or data cable. There's no size limit to how many you can store - you are only limited by the storage capabilities of your handset. To access these books, just visit Gutenberg.org and click on the JAR link to have the mobile book installed on your phone.

What, No iPhone App?

In our world, it's perhaps hard to imagine that someone would choose to launch a Java-based app instead of (or perhaps prior to?) an iPhone version. However, that choice was certainly made based on the fact that Java runs on billions of phones worldwide where Apple, although strong in terms of revenue and growth, only represents 2.3% of the global handset marketshare.

However, iPhone readers already have several options for accessing eBooks on their mobile phones, including the popular Stanza eBook reader (iTunes link) as well as the other options we noted before. The trick is delivering that same access to large parts of the world where literature and educational materials are less available than they are for us. That's clearly what Project Gutenberg hopes to do with this mobile offering, and we have to applaud them for that.

When managing your reading list through the bookmarklet, you now have more options as well. You can view your list as either "normal" or "condensed," select how many items to show per page, open the list in the sidebar, and enable or disable various context menus and additional toolbar buttons.

However, the best feature to come to your reading list is the ability to sort it by PostRank. This functionality, formerly called AideRSS, is something we've been big fans of here at RWW for some time. With PostRank enabled, your reading list is intelligently filtered by popularity. Posts are scored in several ways, including number of comments it received, number of times it's been tagged in Del.icio.us, number of diggs, and how many inbound links it has received. So now, you can read your list in order of importance, an especially useful feature for those suffering from information overload.

Other improvements like updated privacy controls and tweaks to existing features round out this latest release, making Read It Later a great addition to your browser whether that's Firefox or IE. Now all we need is an iPhone bookmarklet and we'll be all set.

"Here Ends the Beginning is much more than a conventional e-book," wrote Furlong to us in an emailed press release. "The text is punctuated throughout with video clips and photographs of actors recreating the characters and scenes. Music and sound effects further enhance this novel experience."

The first 5 chapters of the 43-chapter-long book are available for free, with the full book available for $12.95 CDN. But is this really the future of the novel?

We've seen a lot of experimentation with the traditional book publishing format over the past year. From an author using Amazon's Kindle ebook reader to beta test his book to one using blog comments to peer review another. From books being written and released on cell phones to novels being serialized and released over LiveJournal, Twitter, and Google Maps. Unfortunately, none of these experiences have so far been able to match the enjoyable, intimate feeling of curling up with an real, printed book -- at least for me.

Writing about Penguin's Google Maps-based novel mashup in April, Booklist's Keir Graff wrote, "It's an odd sensation, really: simple words can evoke a world in our imaginations, but as soon as the words are married to real-world images, they lose much of their power." The same thing can be said of Furlong's Quillr concept. While videos and images flowed well as far as where and how they were inserted into the text, they seemed to detract from my reading experience by breaking up the continuity of the "inner movie" I develop whenever I read a piece of fiction. Also, constantly having to scroll and click while reading a long piece of writing can be frustrating -- it's just not as natural or satisfying as turning pages in a book.

But perhaps that's due to my advanced age of 24 years old (ha!). Maybe multimedia-enhanced, web-delivered books will resonate better with a younger set of readers. Give Furlong's book a chance and then come back here and leave a comment letting us know what you thought. Is this an enjoyable way to read a book? Or are publishers barking up the wrong tree with experiments in web publishing that mash books with web technology?

Jakob Nielson, web usability consultant, author, and owner of useit.com, writes on his site about a recent research study by Harald Weinreich, Hartmut Obendorf, Eelco Herder, and Matthias Mayer: "Not Quite the Average: An Empirical Study of Web Use."

What Nielsen found by analyzing the data in the study was that although people spend more time on pages with more words and more information, they only spend 4.4 seconds more for each additional 100 words. By calculating reading rates, he concluded that when you add more verbiage to a page, people will only read 18% of it.

Some other interesting findings include:

• On an average visit, users read half the information only on those pages with 111 words or less.
• People spend some of their time understanding the page layout and navigation features, as well as looking at the images. People don't read during every single second of a page visit.
• On average, users will have time to read 28% of the words if they devote all of their time to reading. More realistically, users will read about 20% of the text on the average page

Nielsen has been interested in how users read on the web for a long time and he has determined that the truth is that people don't read very much, often scanning text instead of really reading it. His recent eyetracking studies validate this finding, as well.

Unlike with newspapers, books, magazines and other print media, it's not just images that distract people from fully digesting the web content they're reading. As social media users ourselves, we know how difficult it is to get through a long article when dealing with email notifications, pop-ups of new replies on Twitter, instant messages, not to mention that urge to check for the latest news in our RSS feeds.

Do Some People Have a Natural Info Processing Mechanism?

Given that the world of online readers have turned to scanning text to keep up with the constant flow of information, we wonder if some people are better than others at doing so. Are there people who have a natural ability to scan and process massive amounts of information, yet still be able to find the signal amongst the noise?

It's an interesting question to ponder, especially considering the conversations of late surrounding whether or not it's possible to truly understand, interact, and engage with others when taking in so much information.

For example, in Scoble's blog post where he explained why he was following 20,000 users on Twitter, he had people wondering how he could really keep up. After calculating how fast the tweets came in, Brian Sullivan wrote:

I know there are claims that Robert is a cyborg...so that seems not a plausible explanation. I think then that Robert's claim is somewhat suspect (of course his definition of "follow" may be different from mine -- or my math may be wrong)...Are you really "following" 20,000 on Twitter - at least in any real sense of the word "follow"?

Morgan wondered, "How can this type of information flow be beneficial to anyone?" But it was Elliott Ng, who wished for  "the same massive information processing gene as Robert Scoble."

Although meant perhaps jokingly, the question is valid. How do these people do it?

Our very own Marshall Kirkpatrick hinted at some of his tricks in his "7 Tips for Making the Most of Your RSS Reader post," claiming he doesn't worry about trying to read every item in his reader. Louis Gray, on the other hand, declares he never marks all as read. But everyone really needs to find their own balance when it comes to digesting the information they consume.

Do you read or do you just skim? What's your strategy for keeping up?

Here's Sean's full comment:

"My 'gut feeling' thoughts exactly...good to hear them supported with data!

I'm a great example of the digital native (though I haven't been a teen for some time, I was an early net adopter in the early 90's when I actually was a teen). Like you mentioned, I hardly ever read books. Probably only about one or two a year, and even then they're typically non-fiction as opposed to 'literature'. Magazines? Only during flights.

Despite that, I scored a perfect 6/6 GMAT writing score, and my while I forget the specific verbal vs. quantitative, my overall was in the 97th percentile.

Granted, one could argue I'm missing out on the cultural value associated with great literary works, however because I tend to lean toward heavier reading (quality news, science, etc) I don't think I'm missing out too much with regards to developing or maintaining my reading ability. And because of blogs, forums, and email, I probably write several dozen pages worth of text each week, which is probably more than many members of previous generations can claim!"

However, in general terms, Jobs was speaking towards a growing trend in the print industry. It's not that people don't read anymore - of course, many still do - it's just that today's young generation of consumers, and Jobs' future customers, aren't bothering to read "offline media" - that is books, magazines, or newspapers.

Newspapers

A recent comScore Plan Metrix study backs this up, finding that young news readers are less likely to read printed newspapers. In fact, those that are between 18 and 24 are 38 percent more likely than average to NOT read a newspaper during a typical week. However, non-newspaper readers are heavy news consumers - in fact, they read a lot, they just prefer to get their news online, and not just from online newspaper web sites, like WSJ.com, but also from TV News brands (like CNN and FoxNews) and Internet News brands (like Digg and Topix).

“Non-newspaper readers are a particularly important segment to reach because they are heavier than average news consumers – they just prefer to consume it in a digital format,” says Jack Flanagan, executive vice president of comScore.

Magazines

Again, overall, the magazine industry is doing OK, except when it comes to young readers. On March 6th, members of the magazine publishing industry held a MediaTel seminar where the challenges of their industry were discussed. The problem is not in readership decline, it seems, but in teen readership decline.

Duncan Edwards, chief executive of National Magazine Company, said that, despite a slight down-turn in actively purchased magazines by 1.1 per cent, the print magazine industry still generates huge profits.

However, MediaTel managing director Derek Jones said the industry must find new ways of engaging with the teen market which has suffered a steady decline in sales. The problem, according to ShortList chief executive Mike Soutar, is that the younger generation like to consume media for free and they have come to expect free content through online extensions.

Books

In 2004 the U.S. Department of Education asked 17-year-olds "How often do you ... read for fun on your own time?" With no limitation specified on where or how this reading was done, 19% replied "Never or hardly ever", more than double the 1984 rate of 9%. Since online reading wasn't specified, the kids probably took this to mean, "how often do you read books?" Still, the figure should not be dismissed as it highlights the decline of offline reading activities.

The study found also that as kids enter high school and adolescence they tend to read less often, and their reading skills stagnate or worsen compared with teens of previous years. In 2003, only 4% of American high-school graduates who did not earn college degrees could be called "proficient" readers.

Yikes.

The Flip Side

Some, like Steve Johnson of the Guardian, says that reports of reading decline doesn't take into consideration the amount of reading we doing on our computers every day. He counters a recent NEA report "To Read or Not to Read," which details the decline of literacy in the U.S.

Johnson writes, that it "raises an interesting question: if people are reading less, why haven't [standarized test] scores dropped more dramatically?" He goes on to point out that a recent British Library study of onscreen research activities found that "new forms" or reading are emerging...like "power browsing," a habit of the new "digital natives."

He concludes that "the only reason the intellectual benefits are not measurable is that they haven't been measured yet. There have been almost no studies that have looked at the potential positive impact of electronic media."

Meanwhile, Sunil Iyengar of the NEA and Mark Bauerlin, formerly of the NEA, say that Johnson ignores some of the study's findings, like the fact that "non-required" reading (picking up a book for the fun of it) is down 7% since 1992 for all adults, and 12% for 18-24 year olds. They claims that Johnson chooses to look only at other findings that support his opinion.

They point out that, sure, "new forms of reading" may exist, but it's not a good thing: the study claims that "from undergraduates to professors, people exhibit a strong tendency towards shallow, horizontal, 'flicking' behavior in digital libraries. Power browsing and viewing appear to be the norm for all ... Society is dumbing down."

Iyengar and Bauerlin even cite that there is evidence of damage linked with excessive viewing and surfing - enough sufficient data, in fact, which led the American Academy of Pediatrics to advise parents to keep children's rooms free of electronic media.

Conclusion

So is a diet of only digital media bad? With today's youngest generations being some of the first to be raised in a world where the internet and computers are as common as TVs and microwaves ovens, it will take more time to thoroughly examine the side effects, if any, of an all-digital lifestyle. However, successes like those of the Harry Potter books, show that even now, kids will read print media if it's good enough and captures their interest. And in the meantime, whether they read online or off, isn't it just good enough that they are, in fact, reading?