Blame it on Flipboard. The app that made it big on the iPad has pretty much redefined our expectations from newsreading apps,
pulling us away from the text-heavy RSS feeds of yore and tossing us
into territory that looks more like a digital news magazine than
anything else. The result: scarcely does a new platform pop up on the
horizon than the pundits nod indulgently at its interface and then pause
and ask “Ah yes, all very good. BUT does it have anything like
Flipboard in the app department?” (and Instagram too, but then hey, this
is a story about a Windows 8 news app). If you think we are exaggrating, just ask Android users how long they laboured under that slur.
Well,
the Windows 8 crowd won’t have to do that. For while, Flipboard itself
shows no sign of arriving on the platform, it does have a few handy
clones out there. The best of which is News Bento. No, it does not have
the kind of social network integration that Flipboard or Pulse have –
you cannot get a magazinifed look at your Twitter and Facebook account
on it – but if it is plain news you are after, then the app certainly
does enough to draw comparisons with Flipboard.
The concept of the app is the same as Flipboard – present news in the
form of a flippable digital magazine instead of the normal
mostly-text-and-odd-picture mix. The system too is rather the same – you
choose the channels you want to follow, and can also add the RSS feed
of a website if that is not among those mentioned, although there is a
very good selection of them available readymade. In a manner of
speaking, the app reflects Windows 8′s tiled interface look, with
different ’tiles’ representing different websites. Tap on one and you
see the content laid out in a magazine-like format which you can browse
through easily – you can flick through stories. There is Google Reader
support too so you can just check the feeds you follow there in a
flip-through format. You also have the option of viewing the article in
an even less uncluttered format using the ClearView option, or to just
view the story in the browser. And just like on the Windows 8
homescreen, you can move the ’tiles’ around and rearrange them in any
order you like. Of course, this being a Windows 8 app, you can use the
OS’ native sharing muscle to share stories on social networks.
All
in all, it makes reading a lot of fun on high-resolution Windows 8
tablets, with its abundance of white spaces and good formatting. No, it
is not quite as awesome as Flipboard which has subject-based channels of
its own, works signficantly faster, lets you even check and update your
social networks in that magazine-like form, and even seems to lay out
articles a whole lot better. But still, this is by far the best news
reading app we have seen on Windows 8. Pretty much a must-have if you
love keeping in touch with the news and have a Windows 8 tablet or
touchsreen device – the magic is not quite the same when it comes to
flicking between stories using a touchpad. Ah, but then that is
something we said about Windows 8 too.
Available from: Windows Store (Free)
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