  1. The world's best reading app

    Great articles, no ads. Get started for free.

    blog.readup.comBill Loundy11/9/207 min
    32 reads10 comments
    9.7
    blog.readup.com
    32 reads
    9.7
    You must read the article before you can post or reply.
    • marius1 year ago

      I'm not sure. You could launch a freemium product like Pocket or Instapaper - Basic features as they are are free, advanced features and added values cost money?

      I'm really looking forward to learn how exactly you want to pay writers - it's quite similar to what Brave Browser and BAT try to accomplish.

      Whatever, I wish you all the best and I'm excited to see the new features!

      Also: How do you plan to deal with politics? (see Facebook, Twitter issues right now)

      • bill
        Top reader of all time
        1 year agoWriter

        Excellent feedback. I have read a lot about Brave/BAT. Very true that there's a similar thing going on ("proof-of-work" etc.) but there are also many really huge differences. Biggest is that Brave still shows ads (!) it's just that you have (slightly) more control over them. It's a shift towards more end-user autonomy, but nowhere near the full ad-free solution that we're proposing.

        Readers don't have problems talking about political topics. Only non-readers do. Readup's algorithm can't be bought. Our users attention can't be bought. Facebook and Twitter sell influence. Readup solves all of this.

        Man I have so much to write about! Great to have you here, @marius. I think you're going to really love what we're about to launch. Cheers!

        • marius1 year ago

          Good point, many many many issues will be solved when people actually read before commenting. We need a new culture of forming opinions. Maybe one could even make people read two opposing opinions before debating online about a current issue.

          What I miss currently is a "Read later" feature (now I use Pocket way more often than ReadUp - though I'm also on Android). Sometimes I really want to dig deep into an article - but later. :-)

          • bill
            Top reader of all time
            1 year agoWriter

            Stars!! Star things for later! Does that not work for you?

            • marius1 year ago

              I'd expect it to behave like the Pocket or Instapaper browser plugin where it simply dumps the article into a "read later" folder in Readup without opening reading view in the first place.

    • bartadamley
      Scout
      1 year ago

      I have such high hopes and belief in Readup to pull this thing off.

      Readup is fixing social media and saving the journalism industry. It costs five, fifteen, or twenty-five dollars per month. You choose how much you want to contribute. Readup keeps half. The other half will be evenly distributed amongst the writers whose articles you read fully. It’s the easiest way to support writers directly. And Readup will show you EXACTLY where all of your money is going, down to the penny.

      And remember: anybody who creates an account before the paid version goes live will be able to remain free for life. This is our gift to the people who made Readup possible. And, if everything goes according to plan, it will be a pretty cool thing to brag about when half the planet is on Readup.

      Over the weekend, I had stayed at a hotel and found myself unable to sleep due to the pure silence in our room in which we were staying in and random creaks out in the hall..

      So - I did as just about all of us do nowadays. I took out my phone, to take my mind off the silence and because I was frankly getting frustrated by my inability to fall asleep.

      Previously, the first app I would have opened up.. would have been Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snap you know the powerful four... of consumption, attention-extracting, FOMO-inducing.. platforms.

      However, thankfully being a Readup user the past year or so, I launched my Readup app. Now I have zero of the dominant social media platforms downloaded on my iPhone. Matter of fact, the only way I can access social media is by Safari on my phone, and this is a very porous user experience. (I highly recommend this if you are trying to quit social media).

      Nevertheless, I found myself diving deep into article after article that I have starred over the course of this last year. And as a matter of fact, I found a way to really enjoy my late night/early morning.. It went from a poor night of sleep, to a night of really great reading over a span of about an hour, of sustained focus and attention.. which is how reading is therapeutic in a sense.

      Readup served as a comfort for me. That comfort that Readup provides, on a night of broken sleep, is something I am very grateful for!

      For all of us 'early adopters' who are able to have an application free for life such as Readup is powerful and meditative.. so damnit let's do our best to find three friends and get them to download Readup!

      • bill
        Top reader of all time
        1 year agoWriter

        YES! I have had countless similar experiences. My favorite thing about using Readup is when I forget I'm using Readup. For example when I need to "get away" (happened recently when I couldn't stop looking at election results) and then, before I know it, 20 or 30 minutes have gone by and I'm deep into something wild, random and amazing. And when I do finally finish and realize what has happened, how lost I got in a particular article or story, I'm like, "Whoa. Readup totally just worked."

    • erica1 year ago

      So happy you're finally doing this. I'm in.

    • DellwoodBarker1 year ago

      Count me in for $15.

      queues Surfing On a Rocket by Air

    • Pegeen
      Top reader this weekReading streakScoutScribe
      1 year ago

      As I have said before, since joining Readup, two years ago, I canceled all my subscriptions to the very magazines that appear frequently on Readup. The quality of writing is superb, the community diverse, intelligent, thoughtful and trustworthy. It is how I start each day. - coffee and Readup. The fact that there are no adds is HUGE. Navigating Google is even more frustrating because I am spoiled by this platform of uninterrupted reading. You and Jeff have poured years of your lives into this app, slowly depleting your finances and I will be SO excited if Readup can finally be a means for you both to make a living - you certainly deserve it. I appreciate the free ride but will gladly financially support Readup because it has given me a much broader perspective and much joy. I truly can’t imagine my life without it. Thank you both for giving us an alternative to the noise and nonsense.
https://readup.com/comments/blogreadupcom/you-should-pay-to-read-things-online
readup.com
crawl=CC-MAIN-2022-33
110761
application/http; msgtype=response
sha1:O5LS6AUVMRGPVLULRXLXYXVDJSWSEKJR
<urn:uuid:7edda9b0-d134-4995-a57b-7569f09eae35>
2022-08-13T13:25:02Z
3.135.16.73
text/html
sha1:7P6DYUXMFKPNEG2UQ7MLRYGOLHGY43Z2
<urn:uuid:7f0def0e-271a-49e5-a108-9f43e46aa11f>
https://readup.com/comments/blogreadupcom/you-should-pay-to-read-things-online
response
<urn:uuid:1481e1f5-6ed8-48d3-ab78-f6cf2d577b16>
isPartOf: CC-MAIN-2022-33
publisher: Common Crawl
description: Wide crawl of the web for August 2022
operator: Common Crawl Admin (info@commoncrawl.org)
hostname: ip-10-67-67-227
software: Apache Nutch 1.18 (modified, https://github.com/commoncrawl/nutch/)
robots: checked via crawler-commons 1.4-SNAPSHOT (https://github.com/crawler-commons/crawler-commons)
format: WARC File Format 1.1
conformsTo: https://iipc.github.io/warc-specifications/specifications/warc-format/warc-1.1/