We’ve introduced an updated version. New features include 31 extra feeds (all of the mathematics feeds at www.arxiv.org), the ability to browse backwards in time through feeds, and an announcement blog. Many more things are still to come! The announcement blog is at:
http://academicreader.wordpress.com
We have had a few problems with feed continuity – some articles from the arxiv have failed to show up, or have showed up late. We’re working on this, and things seem to be smoothing out.
Thanks to everyone who signed up, especially those who provided feedback – we have nearly 250 registered users!
I recently had a look at the Academic Reader and I must say I really like the idea, so thanks for taking the initiative to set it up. Generally, I’m in favor of replacing things I usually store on my computer with online apps so that I can access them from any computer and don’t have to worry about transfering thousands of files when I get a new computer. I know Academic Reader is mainly intended to organize current reading, but it would be much more useful as a tool to manage papers in general. Two features that could be added in future versions would make me consider changing my current haphazard system involving random folders on my computer and bibdesk.
1. Tagging: I tend to organize papers by the project I am working on that they are relevant to as well as several general reading categories. This means that I usually end up with 3 or 4 copies of papers because I have forgotten where I put them. A simple tag and search system would enable me to do this more efficiently in the Academic Reader.
2. Ability to add links to other sources: The reader won’t replace my current system if it is restricted to sources that have rss feeds. It would be useful to be able to bring in other sources, such as older journal articles and Wikipedia pages, by having the ability to add html links to them to My Library.
As for the recommendation system, you should talk to Dave Bacon about incorporating SciRate features. Just as many web pages now have a “Digg This” button, you could have a “Scite This” button or the option to automatically Scite papers that have been added to My Library. Then you could pull in recommendations from SciRate as well.
Finally, perhaps comments should be turned on in the announcement blog because that’s probably a more appropriate place to give feedback.
Thanks for the comments, Matt. A couple of responses to specific points:
Our eventual intention is to many add tools to manage papers in general, not just as a feedreader for keeping track of the current literature. These other tools will be gradually rolled out over coming months.
We certainly will not just be using RSS feeds, and are currently in the process of adding archival data for a variety of sources. We may also add the possibility of linking to other sources (e.g., Wikipedia).
How is it different or better from Citeulike ( http://citeulike.org ) ? In particular, how do they compare in terms of source support, article detail retrieval ?
Since there is no demo, sandbox or features explanation in the website, it’s rather cumbersome to get those details (in particular, making email registration a requirement is highly annoying).