Dave Winer on Unread Counts

Dave Winer:

Why does Twitter work better for news than Google Reader? Simple, Twitter gives you what’s new now. You don’t have to hunt around to find the newest stuff. And it doesn’t waste your time by telling you how many unread items you have. Who cares. (It’s like asking how many NYT articles you haven’t read. It would be gargantuan. I don’t bother you with the number of Scripting News posts you haven’t read, so why does Google?)

Update: Good point from Anil Dash:

Unread counts have always sucked, @davewiner is right. But sadly, on iOS devices they’re the only thing you can add to an icon.

★ Friday, 17 September 2010