I'm in love with Times Reader 2.0, the New York Times on-line newspaper application (using Adobe AIR). It offers so much of what's great about printed paper, and it's always as fresh as the website (updates every five minutes). It's pure UX joy: simply gorgeous to look at, easy to read, compelling usefulness, usable offline, entertaining (crossword puzzles, multimedia), and seamlessly tied to live updates and archives. And less is more: its brevity (just today's content) and visual form factor keep it tight and manageable, compared to the NYT website.
So, the Times Reader has done the impossible: it's renewed my faith in future of virtual paper publications, after having been repulsed by countless PDF page-turners of various forms. For me, the experience feels very different from reading a website, one that's even worth (gasp) paying for.
Because of how my brain works, I'm irresistibly drawn to News in Pictures: an always changing slideshow of images with captions. I can scan through a hundred in minutes, always able to click through to the full story for any that call to me. For my very visual mind and chronic rushed state, this scanning strategy is a compelling way to browse the newspaper, coming away with a head full of thoughtful photography to ruminate on even when I don't have time to read every gem.
