Currents, Google's Mobile App I'm Happy With

I never understood what is the big deal with RSS feeds until one day I experienced Epiphany, crammed everything in Google reader and never looked back. But RSS readers are so last decade now; new breed of tools can make nice electronic magazines out of feeds and even allow you to produce one by yourself. Not long after release of Ice Cream Sandwich, Google released its own magazine application, Currents. Last time I grumbled about mobile Google+; this time, I decided to review application that I am really happy with.

Currents filled the space created by absence of Flipboard, which happily provided similar functionality to iOS users. Although now I can get Flipboard for Android, I'm sticking with Currents. Both application can take text and pictures from the feed and lay them out in visually appealing way, but Currents are more in line with my way of doing things.

Unfortunately, since its introduction, Google treated Currents as a stepchild: although it brought some powerful media partners, like Forbes, it never pushed it very hard; updates were dripping slowly and application was plagued with not so serious, but annoying bugs. First big update came in April, when Currents got much improved syncing and it's own current. In that current, only five posts appeared, all on April 11th. Application was dormant for months until Google I/0 happened, when Google released new version with much smoother user interface, and virtually bug-less. The biggest boost is announcement that Currents will be included in Jelly Bean by default.

What sets Currents apart from other similar tools are clean, simple interface, easy configuration, and continuous reading. Let me explain last one: in most readers, you go through the list, select the article, exit back to list and select next one. You have to go in and out of articles all the time. In Currents, clicking "next" on the last page of article brings you to the beginning of the next article.I like this feature so much that I wouldn't even consider reader that doesn't have it. Second filter is paging; turning pages instead of scrolling helps me to focus on reading instead of constantly pushing the text up. Honorable mention: Pocket, which allows you to do the same for long texts.

There are only a couple of places that could be improved:

• It should be visible which articles were read, for example, by graying them out.
• If you go from list to article, browse through couple of articles, and then return to list, you will be at the same place in list, not at the latest article that you read.
• Switching from "Library" to "Trending" is clumsier than before, requiring two steps: opening the list and choosing one of the two. I know that this bring Currents design in line with Google+, but Google+ show lengthy list of circles, not just two options.
• Browsing through list of trending articles is also clumsy; when you leave one group of articles, Currents puts you not at the same place in the list, not even in the same topic, but rather at the very start of the list. Now you have to search again for the right place.

Last issue is only partially Currents related: if feed has only summaries, I have to open summary and then load full article in browser. It is both inconvenient and traffic-hungry as articles are not preloaded on Wi-Fi. All news readers that I know have same issue.

Tip: this blog's feed contains full articles so it is Currents-friendly. Add it. Now.

Currents also lacks social media integration that Flipboard has. Its roots are on iOS, and as iOS doesn't have elegant way of inter-application sharing as Android does, built-in Facebook and Twitter integration was a killer feature. On Android, it is not such a big deal.

I got so used on Currents that I read news on the phone even when I have regular computer with big screen near me. With just a bit more love from Google, it could become Android's reader of choice.

Photo credit: Željko Trogrlić