Flud

Flud was a social news reader application for iPad, iPhone, Android and Windows Phone. It is designed to display RSS feeds from blogs and news sites into individual streams for easy viewing. In Flud, articles and stories can be stored for later reading with the Reading List, shared as a favorite read with the Flud button, and shared with Facebook, Twitter, email, Tumblr, InstaPaper, and ReadItLater.^[1]

Flud has been tagged as "the first true social news reader"^[2] where users can create a personal profile, follow others who share their interests, and become influencers to their followers by sharing content (known as Fluding).

Flud logo

For Fluding via the web, a bookmarklet is also available. A full web application had been under development.^{[citation needed]}

Starting August 8th, Flud will no longer be in service. The company will move forward by selling its technology and intellectual property, but Flud CEO Bobby Ghoshal did not detail the reason behind the application's exit from the marketplace. Users have till August 8 to download all their data, before the service is discontinued.

Features

• Create a profile to display profile image, username, followers, following, most read sources, number of Fluded and Reading List articles.
• Activity Feed shows what a user's followers are reading and fluding.
• Add, reorder, edit category, or remove feeds.
• Pre-loaded featured feeds for adding and browsing.
• Connect to other users with similar interests in news, blogs and topics.
• Flud favorite articles.
• Most Fluded feed displays the articles most fluded by users.
• Connect to Tumblr, Google Reader, Twitter, Facebook, Read It Later, Instapaper and email.
• Create a Reading List of interesting headlines.
• Access to Reading List when offline.
• Play video, view images, read stories.
• Account preferences transfer across devices.

History

Flud started as a secret sauce project in the summer of 2010 between Bobby Ghoshal and Matthew Ausonio, cofounders of Made By Rabbit, Inc., a startup out of San Diego, California. Flud 1.0 for the iPad hit the iOS App Store in August 2010 and was made available for the iPhone in the following months.

The Flud team at HQ in San Diego, CA

Soon after the initial launch of Flud 1.0, Fast Company distinguished Flud's iPad user interface as the "Best UI Design of 2010",^[3] NBC called Flud the “future of news^[4]” and Mashable distinguished Flud as 1 of 3 news readers actively changing and innovating the news industry.

Flud received $1 million in seed funding in April 2011 and became available on Android mobile devices in August 2011.^[5]

In December 2011, Flud 2.0 hit the App Store as a new type of social news reader, allowing users to create their own news personalities and become a trusted source on topical interests. Major changes included the addition of social features, an updated user interface design, and Tumblr support. Flud 2.0 launched on Windows Phone and Android devices in March 2012.

Starting August 8th, the Flud service will be discontinued. Users have till August 8 to download all their data.

Flud is headquartered in the historic Spreckels Theater Building, San Diego, California with remote offices in Detroit and Chicago.

External links

• Flud Website
• CrunchBase: Company Profile

References