Information is Power! Time is Money! How to Have It All On Your Apple Mac and iPhone!

The connection between information and power is extremely important today, as it has been throughout history. The difference between then and now, is the vast amount of information, both relevant and irrelevant, that is available to you and the speed and convenience with which you can access it.

But today, there are more efficient methods of getting the “right” information. Today, you can have such information delivered to you—instead of searching for it yourself!

About a month ago I came across the news that PC Magazine will shutter its print offering after it issues its final print edition in January 2009.

While this news may come as a shock to some, it was to be expected and I believe this trend will affect many more print magazines, especially in the tech domain.

The reason for this is because information changes rapidly and by the time a printed magazine ships for sale, the information within may already be outdated.

Furthermore, digital media has finally become profitable without the need for dependence on print ads or subscription revenues of the outdated format.

So how and why does this concern you?

Increasingly, more of the information you want to better yourself, your family, your business, or for just good old leisure reading, will come to you courtesy of the worldwide web.

In your fast-paced, hectic, no-time-to-grab-a-Starbuck’s-coffee day, you want relevant and timely delivery of this data, automatically and directly to you. The axiom that “time is money” applies here.

Finding a place and time to digest the details of that information is equally important and will need to be considered and worked into your schedule where appropriate, such as during your commute on the train, on your lunch break or when you are waiting to pick up your child from school.

Two fantastic applications that will help you achieve the above stated goals are NetNewsWire and Instapaper.

Both perform different tasks, but they can be used jointly to compliment each other and keep you abreast of vitally important and relevant topics anytime and anywhere.

NetNewsWire, the award winning RSS and Atom feed reader, is free for the Mac and iPhone.

Subscribe to feeds that interest you, from the New York Times and Macworld to professional feeds from medical, dental or legal journals. Get the information you want delivered to you immediately as it is published.

Instapaper is an application that allows you to save web pages from your iMac, MacBook, iPhone and even your PC and access them offline on your iPhone. The readability of the saved articles in Instapaper for the iPhone is superb.

It is available for the iPhone and iPod Touch in both free and paid versions.

The free version has terrific functionality and the paid version has some cool extras!

Imagine receiving the latest articles that interest you from the newspapers, magazines and professional journals you love through NetNewsWire.

First, you save them from your computer or your iPhone by activating the “Read Later” bookmark (Install from Instapaper website), in Safari or FireFox.

Then, store them on your iPhone or iPod Touch by launching Instapaper and hitting the sync button. Once your selections are stored on your iPhone or iPod Touch, you can view them offline whenever and wherever it suits you.

TIME Magazine’s “Top Ten iPhone Apps of 2008” named Instapaper as #7 and NetNewsWire as #8, confirming a profound understanding that the new Millennia brings with it significant change in how we access and process published information.

Outdated modalities that were once used to disseminate information to a privileged few have been transformed and now reach billions of people instantaneously.

These applications, in conjunction with the Mac and iPhone, allow us to discern the relevant details more efficiently and empower us to achieve our lofty ambitions in a timely manner all the while enjoying the journey.

“Know where to find the information and how to use it - That’s the secret of success” Albert Einstein.

What apps or readers do you use and what publications do you read to stay up-to-date and informed?”