400 WPM and Three Espressos: Engineering a Faster Way to Consume the Web

I’m subscribed to a lot of RSS feeds, and I’m now starting to get into Substack and its RSS feeds of people’s publications.

I’m currently using NetNewsWire. It works great, and it’s actively being worked on. Before that, I used Feedly and Google Reader (RIP).

I need something different. Something where I can choose to listen to a feed or read a feed at a fast pace.

My solution is making my own RSS reader that does what I want.

It should be web-based. Store account data locally and remotely. I want it to feel like Google Reader and NetNewsWire had a baby. It should also look and work great on mobile and desktop.

Most of all, for me personally, it should have a speed reader and a very good TTS.

TTS is for background listening while I work. Speed reader because it’s so much easier for me to read one word at a time flashing before my eye at 350-400 words per second while having my third espresso.

With the help of Google Gemini, I started this project this past weekend and have a strong prototype running. Gemini helped me code this idea from what I thought would take a couple of weeks part-time to just a few hours. Amazing.

What’s Next

There’s still plenty to apply this app before this is beta-worthy. My next steps are focused on making the experience seamless across all my devices:

• Cloud Sync: Moving beyond local storage so my “must-reads” follow me from the desktop to the couch.
• Refining the UI: Polishing that “Google Reader meets NetNewsWire” aesthetic to make sure it feels as good as it functions.
• The Beta Path: Dialing in the TTS and speed-reader logic until it feels like a natural extension of how I consume information.

It’s been a blast to build so far. I’ll be sharing more of the technical hurdles and the specific Gemini workflows that are making this happen very soon.

I’m just getting started.