UPDATE: I am no longer part of FeedLounge.
After a year of percolating and many months of development, I (along with Scott, my partner in this particular crime) am very pleased to announce the alpha launch of FeedLounge!
FeedLounge is a web-based feed reader that is a wonderful hybrid of the speed and power interface of a desktop application and the benefits of a web-based application. Pick your favorite web application buzzword: AJAX, tagging, keyboard commands, etc. - FeedLounge has got it. Take a look at some screenshots, and go through our little tutorial to get a feel for what FeedLounge has to offer.
While this is only an alpha release, I believe the user experience will already challenge existing web based feed readers, and may give more than a few desktop feed readers a run for their money as well.
We’re currently running FeedLounge on this server, but we’ll be moving it to a big beefy server soon so we can bring on many more users in our beta launch. This alpha release will help us determine exactly what hardware requirements we have so we don’t run into the problem of s-l-o-w server response. We’ve got a few more features we want to add before the beta release too - so many features, so little time. 
So why did we build a web-based feed reader when there are already a few out there, and there are good desktop feed readers already?
For me the answer is rather simple: none of these give me both a fast, powerful reading interface and access to my feeds from multiple computers and platforms. I also love designing software - especially something I use often throughout the day. 
We’ve got a lot of work still to do before FeedLounge is ready for general release, but everything is going well and we’re very excited about it. Stay tuned, we’ve got some great stuff planned.
UPDATE: Scott’s post says some of this better than this one.
Popularity: 16% [?]
Dougal Campbell adds this Comment:
Good timing. I was just thinking to myself this morning that I’ve been growing increasingly dissatisfied with using Thunderbird to read feeds (they’re really slow to release updates). I’ve been trying to decide what to switch to, and whether to stick with a desktop app or a web-based reader.
June 9th, 2005 at 7:13 am
dotnot adds this Trackback:
FeedLounge Alpha Announced
Having been quiet in the back of the room for the last few months, Alex and I are proud to announce our new project to the world.
Welcome to the world of FeedLounge, a web-based news reader that was designed and built to act like a rich-client, but d…
June 9th, 2005 at 7:15 am
Scott Sanders adds this Comment:
Thanks for all the hard work to make it happen. We have something here
June 9th, 2005 at 7:30 am
Stephan Segraves adds this Comment:
Very cool! I am not a huge feed reader fan but I’ll definitely check it out!
Keep up the great work!
June 9th, 2005 at 7:41 am
Roy Schestowitz adds this Comment:
Looks beautiful. I might use it once it’s stable.
June 9th, 2005 at 7:43 am
Alex adds this Comment:
Stephan - you should really try it, it is a great time saver.
Roy - “once it’s stable”? Of course it’s stable!
June 9th, 2005 at 7:48 am
Stephan Segraves adds this Comment:
Oh, I’ll definitely try it out. Already filled out my beta tester request!
June 9th, 2005 at 7:52 am
Mike adds this Comment:
Looks cool, all done in XML/XUL?
What’s the benefit of using this over Bloglines, my current feed reader of choice?
June 9th, 2005 at 8:16 am
The Indiana Jones School of Management adds this Trackback:
Gloating
Okay, so I’m one of the lucky bastards that’s a part of the invite-only alpha for FeedLounge. [That’s what I was hinting at last night.]
Let me give you my first-day-using thoughts, of which there are three:
OMFG, THIS IS AWESOM…
June 9th, 2005 at 8:26 am
Alex adds this Comment:
Mike: It’s all HTML, no XUL or anything special like that. The benefit over Bloglines, that will be yours to determine when you compare them.
Geof gives a nice comparison between FeedLounge and Feeds on Feeds in his post (linked above this).
June 9th, 2005 at 8:32 am
Bill Manning adds this Comment:
Once again Alex you (and Scott) have done it. The beginnings of a great application. Nice job..
June 9th, 2005 at 9:14 am
Derik adds this Comment:
It’s early, but is there any chance that you might open up a protocol for external applications (such as NetNewsWire) to connect to the service? I love NNW’s interface, but lament the lack of a way to access it externally.
June 9th, 2005 at 10:24 am
Alex adds this Comment:
I won’t get into specifics, but I will say we have had promising discussions with several other developers in this space.
June 9th, 2005 at 10:26 am
Blogosphere News: Blog News from Bloggers, for Bloggers adds this Trackback:
Alex King Announces FeedLounge
Alex King announced today on his blog that him and Scott Sanders have created a web-based feed reader called FeedLounge:
FeedLounge is a web-based feed reader that is a wonderful hybrid of the speed and power interface of a desktop application and t…
June 9th, 2005 at 10:50 am
Jeff Wheeler adds this Comment:
I recently switched to NewsGator and have found it wonderful, but this is very impressive. Sadly, I’m on Mac and can’t use something as ugly as Firefox.
I can’t wait for support for Safari though.
June 9th, 2005 at 11:23 am
Alex adds this Comment:
Shh, don’t tell anyone but you can see that I actually used Camino for the screenshots.
June 9th, 2005 at 11:37 am
Stephan Segraves adds this Comment:
*cough* That’s because Camino’s better
June 9th, 2005 at 12:05 pm
Alex adds this Comment:
I completely agree - do a search on ‘camino’ here.
That said, Firefox has much better dev tools.
June 9th, 2005 at 12:18 pm
Chris G. adds this Comment:
Man do I want to be part of the beta testing. Actually, skip that, get me into the alpha now!
This looks spectacular. Great job!
June 9th, 2005 at 1:45 pm
Thom adds this Comment:
I’m up for alpha or beta testing! (Just submitted the form) This really looks like what I’ve been wanting. SharpReader is cool, but I’m tired of copying the config and cache back and forth between work desktop, laptop, and home desktop depending on where I’ll be.
June 9th, 2005 at 1:56 pm
jason thurber's weblog adds this Trackback:
Feedlounge: Radio Silence has been broken!
Alex and Scott have announced Feedlounge!
June 9th, 2005 at 4:34 pm
Chris Gonyea adds this Trackback:
Feedlounge
Feedlounge looks like it will be an outstanding web-based feed reader (think Bloglines on steroids). I have a feeling Scoble is going to freak out when he sees it.
Alex King has the announcement on his blog.
Now when someone talks about AJAX (like w…
June 9th, 2005 at 5:13 pm
Roy Schestowitz adds this Comment:
Alex, as I skimmed the announcement I came by “alpha” and then spotted the interest in beta testers. That’s what confused me.
June 9th, 2005 at 5:59 pm
FeedLounge adds this Trackback:
Thrilled
Today’s response has been wonderful. Thank you to everyone who has signed up for the beta, posted comments and blogged about FeedLounge.
It’s been pretty cool to see the Feedster results go from 2 to 30+ and show up on Technorati. It̵…
June 9th, 2005 at 8:04 pm
[ECHENG.COM] Web Journal adds this Trackback:
FeedLounge Alpha Announced
Alex King and Scott Sanders have announced the alpha release of FeedLounge, a web-based feed reader designed to be as functional as a desktop application. It looks really, really nice, and I can’t wait to try it out.
I currently use FeedDemon on…
June 9th, 2005 at 11:19 pm
eric adds this Comment:
looks very impressive. congratulations. =)
June 10th, 2005 at 6:50 am
lucatogni|ch adds this Trackback:
FeedLounge
Alex King e Scott Sanders hanno realizzato un nuovo ed interessante web-based feed reader chiamato FeedLounge.
FeedLounge is a web-based feed reader that is a wonderful hybrid of the speed and power interface of a desktop application and the benef…
June 10th, 2005 at 11:16 am
TechBlog adds this Trackback:
New Web-based RSS reader for Firefox users
Firefox users get tired and frustrated running into sites that only work with Internet Explorer. FeedLounge is, for now, refreshing revenge. It’s a new, Web-based RSS reader that works only with Firefox. That’s not necessarily by design — FeedLounge…
June 11th, 2005 at 6:35 am
The Hitchhiker's Guide to 650 adds this Trackback:
AJAX Rising: WebApp 2.0
Ever since my Yahoo!Sports Boxscore learned to update itself I thought I had sensed the future of web application development. I couldnt put my finger on it quite yet back then and it took a while for the trickle of innovation to finally coalesce its…
June 11th, 2005 at 12:36 pm
monkeypup adds this Comment:
Man. I soo want to try this out. Looks better than all the other options out there.
I’ll wait for my beta tester request to filter through the queue, but it won’t be easy!
June 11th, 2005 at 1:57 pm
Sören Kuklau adds this Comment:
Any chance we’ll see syncing features between this and desktop clients?
June 12th, 2005 at 6:41 am
Alex adds this Comment:
We’ve got a lot of ideas that we’d like to see happen.
June 12th, 2005 at 9:42 am
Aubrey adds this Comment:
Huh, I took a look at the feedlounge site a few days ago, signed up to be notified of the beta, and just now found out it’s done by someone I’ve heard of! You guys rule, and now I’m even more excited to see the release of this. Keep up the good work!
June 13th, 2005 at 7:49 pm
aim's blog adds this Trackback:
FeedLounge
Я тормозил Ñ? Ñ?той новоÑ?тью поÑ?кольку хотел Ñ?разу поделитÑ?Ñ? впечатлениÑ?ми от дейÑ?твующего Ñ?ервиÑ?а, но к Ñ?ожалению пока моÑ? проÑ?ьба Ñ?тать …
June 18th, 2005 at 5:17 pm