One of the thing I was most excited about when I got my iPad was reading newspapers and magazines on it. However I quickly learned that both of those where pretty limited. So you can imagine my excitement when I learned that my local newspaper now had an iPad app. The app is free but you do have to have a subscription to use it. Right now they are offering an introductory price of $1.99 for a month, which isn’t bad at all. I have no idea how much the full price will be. The app is laid out like a newspaper and to read an article tap it and it becomes full screen. They were very smart in using standard iPad guessers to navigate in the app. The app is updated everyday but you have to launch the app and hit a button to have it download that days newspaper. That to me is the one downside. Why didn’t they set it up to use Newstand, which I believe gives the app maker the ability to push out new content even when the app is closed. That though so far is my only real complaint about the app. The nice thing about it downloading is that you don’t need an internet connection to read it once you have downloaded it. I think that was a very smart move.

I know most of you who read this blog do not live in the Savannah area but do a quick search for your local newspaper and see if they have an app. If they don’t they should because of people like me. I don’t have a subscription to the newspaper and haven’t ever had one for long. I don’t like the way newspapers are and hated having to remember to grab them every morning. However now with this app I have been reading the paper every morning and as long as the price doesn’t get to much I will continue reading.

iTunes Store

Flipboard is a very nice looking reader for your Facebook, Twitter, Twitter list, Google Reader and more. It takes these feeds and puts it into a nice looking magazine format.

I’ve gone back and forth if I liked Flipboard. I was lucky enough to get into the beta and see what all the fuss was about, before it was open to the public. At the time Flipboard only allowed you to put in your Facebook and Twitter feeds and to read several feeds they had picked. Now however they let you put in Twitter list and Google Reader. I honestly had deleted it off my iPad until they added some of the extras they now have.

Being able to put your own RSS feed from Google Reader is really nice. Now you can look at it as if you were reading a magazine that you built. By that I mean you pick the feeds in Google Reader so it’s only stuff you are interested in reading. The Twitter list however has become what I use the most.

For those who don’t know you can make a list of Twitter people who you like to read. Then you go to Flipboard and put the name of that list as a new feed and that’s it. Now you have a feed of Twitter accounts that you want to hear from. Why would you want to this? Well in my case I have several sites that I go to for deals. All of these sites have their sites tied into Twitter, so when they post a new post I see it in Flipboard. Some of these sites also tweet deals that they don’t put on their website so I don’t miss out on those deals either. Also it doesn’t have to be your Twitter list. If you know someone who has a good list of people that interest you, then you can put the feed for that list as well.

Flipboard was always pretty but adding Twitter list and Google Reader for me changed the way I looked at Flipboard. They also added the ability to send things to Read it Later or Instapaper. With all that it now offers Flipboard is a great way to read post, Twitter or Facebook.

Flipboard Website