Snippet: NetNewsWire and Syncing ☇

Brent Simmons (the original creator of NetNewsWire) shares some speculation on what the Black Pixel folks might have up their sleeve:

Over the span of its life it has synced via Bloglines, NewsGator, .Mac, and Google Reader. None of these syncing systems still exist, but NetNewsWire continues.

Were I in charge of NetNewsWire, this alone would clinch it. I’d write my own system.

The reason is simple: if you can rely on a system to actually exist, you can avoid putting your users through the periodic upheavals of switching from one system to another. You can avoid having to rewrite the client side of syncing every few years—and you have more time to spend on making the rest of the app awesome. (I know about this from experience.)

I remember the days of no synchronization, then NewsGator sync, and the eventual push to Google Reader (and some arguably better iOS alternatives), which led me to drift away from NetNewsWire. With the seeming renewed commitment by Black Pixel, I happily picked up a copy of the beta and got myself reacquainted with an old friend. I’ll still be keeping an eye on alternatives as it will be months before we see sync or iOS compatibility, however.