So here's how I understand the app - you can start "boards" from:
your social networks: facebook, twitter, instagram, etc.
RSS: google reader, etc.
flipboard / specific websites & content providers
flipboard / algorithmic "topics"
Correct. There is an "Accounts" section, which will add your social media accounts, and I recommend creating a Flipboard Account so your content is synced across devices - that will save you a lot of time if you have a phone and a tablet, or like me and have a ton of each and switch often. In addition to the dozen or so social media accounts, you can also use Flipboard to read your NYT subscription, which I find very nice.
You can then add any RSS feeds that you'd like. I'd also recommend you add the "Flip It"
Bookmarklet to your Chromebar so you can easily add pages/feeds to your board from your browser. Otherwise you can use simple search or scrolling through their pre-listed Feeds, organized by subject. On rare occasions, I've had to add the RSS feed via cut and paste, though that usually only happens when I stumble on a page via my tablet's browser.
You can preview (or simply view) any of their pre-populated feeds, which is nice. It only gets added to your account when you hit the plus sign. I use this ability a lot for news I'm looking for but wouldn't appear in my regular boards. For example - I subscribe to an RSS feed that is specific to my camera so I know when new lenses and firmware are available, but will browse the Photos and Design section occasionally to see what's up in the photoworld.
I use twitter, facebook, and RSS in much the same way - to follow specific websites & content providers - so I have tons of overlap between these "boards" in flipboard. I'd like to find a way to best organize all this content - any suggestions?
Let's be honest - twitter is why Google is killing Reader. Now, Google may announce a replacement at I/O in May, but I haven't heard, so we're left wondering.
That being said, sadly, I don't do the same. I rarely use Flipboard for Social Media. I check FB once or twice a day (absent notifications) and have a widget on my phone and tablet home screen that keeps me up to date on Twitter (which I check about every 20 minutes).
I also use extensions on my Chrome Browser that keep me current on FB notifications and Twitter on a very regular basis.
This might be where Flipboards "Cover Stories" could help you out....
do you use flipboard's native "boards" for specific content? how are they different than your RSS feed of the same content? do you find flipboard's algorithmic "boards" for topics useful?
Yes, I do.
"Cover Stories" is only my content, which is good in a pinch, though I'm too anal to fully trust it.
However the other topical boards "Sports," "Technology" etc. have other content that I don't usually peruse. I have found some interesting stuff there when I have the time to go through it.
can you group a number of RSS feeds into a single "board"?
EDIT: how about the "top stories" board? useful or do you find yourself missing things?
This is the big loss of Reader to me. I can find RSS readers all over the place, but it was the ability to choose a handful of my favorites in my Reader account, and have the RSS reader group them together. As I mentioned before, I have taken the RSS feeds and made individual boards in case I lose the feature when Reader goes away. But it is very nice to be able to open up my Google Reader account on Flipboard and hammer through the 10 that I love in a relatively easy fashion. I have yet to be able to recreate this.
In the Top Stories, I usually find a lot of useful stuff, but it has never kept me from checking the 10 Boards I am addicted to and must check on at least a daily basis.
There are a couple of things I have suggested they fix:
(1) Allow me to rename the board. It uses the title of the RSS feed, but given it's limited space, they start to all look the same after a while. I'd like to be able to rename them to my needs.
(2) Sometimes it isn't clear to me when I scroll up and down to keep reading and when I scroll left and right. They could be a little more consistent there, because sometimes it takes me to the next story and sometimes it takes me to the next page.
Lastly, I have no idea what this new magazine stuff they rolled out yesterday is. I haven't had time to check it out.
