News Aggregators of today have data-oriented UI, meaning the UI reflects how the data is structured (items, categories) and distributed (feed URL).  News articles are separated and filed under categories or feeds.  Outlook-like three-pane UI seems natural from this perspective, but this approach is not very user-friendly, turning news reading into an annoying experience.

I predict that the next generation of news aggregators will sport more user-oriented UIs.  For example, people are used to reading newspapers.  Newspaper layout is, while seemingly simple, a complex subject that mix aestetics with artificial intelligence.  From UI designers' point of view, newspaper metaphor is a powerful tool that evolved over more than hundred years to communicate large amount of information effectively without sacrificing readability.

Imagine a browser-like window displaying a newspaper frontpage-like view with columns of articles under bold headlines.  Articles are pulled from direct or indirect (via editorial process) RSS feeds as well as syndicated news feeds.  Merging articles from a large number of sources into a single newspaper is the key idea here.  News sources are demoted from being an important UI artifact to a single line at the end of an article.

There are visual artifacts at corners and edges for nativigating to other sections.  Each sections are topic oriented.  Important articles from each section are displayed either partially or entirely on the frontpage.  Importance is determined by a combination peer feedback and a hierarchy of editorial input.  Users can click on an article to view it different zoom levels for more comfortable reading size.

Each article is adorned with visual artifacts that allows:

• the reader to request more details which creates a special news section that fills up over time as news articles related to the special section is arrives.
• express interested other news written by the author.
• participate in polls related to the news.
• forward to friends by e-mail, IM, or your own newspaper (more on this later).
• comment or make a blog post within the context of the article
• save for reference later

Visual layout and article selection and placement policies should customizable by the user as well as saved and shared with others.  Professional versions ('designer-newspapers') can be bought.  Professional version of the software adds editing and publishing features.  This will allow creation of specialized quality newspapers.

While I could write this tool myself, I would be happier seeing a new explosion of news aggregators sporting such a user-friendly UI and 'community' features.