A recent MacWorld description of Instapaper and Readability reminded me (and probably you if you try the link) that we accept conveniences that take advantage of others. These apps strip the text we want to read out of online pages and store the text for consumption at our leisure. We may accept this convenience with good intentions, but in doing so we accept an author’s content under conditions we and not the author have defined. The author may have wanted us to view and perhaps click an ad link. The author may have wanted us to view other work he or she created. We subvert such intentions even if we do so to improve our personal experience. We are functioning in an unethical fashion whether we choose to remain ignorant of the consequences of our behavior or not.
So much for my guilt trip, but I am on both sides of this issue. I really like Instapaper. I create content, not so much this blog, but book-length stuff that I want people to use from my site and not in a form and secured on a device of their choice. I could take my own content with Instapaper. This would be called a personal conflict.
As I understand the MacWorld article, Readability is creating and Instapaper is considering a model in which product users pay a fee that is partly dispersed to content providers. I think if you value such services this commitment is a good idea.
