Richard MacManus asks whether desktop readers are on a decline. One of his polls shows a huge lead for the online readers over the other options. They sure are losing popularity, but I still cannot let go off my desktop reader.
The online readers provide a lot of benefits, however I miss offline reading. I also like the possibility that the desktop feed reader can act as an information agent by participating in search and organizing information, like email. I end up using both the versions for their corresponding benefits.
Popularity of the online feed readers is because of the ease of adoption. However they are also equally easy to dispose off and forget. I know a lot of people who have online accounts, but they do not find feed readers very useful. They find it beneficial to bypass the reader and most of the times it acts just as a blogroll. In my opinion the online readers are necessary, to handle the possibility of having to use a different machine, but they still cannot replace the desktop readers.
