Rockmelt Blog

We love the web.  The web is unparalleled in the depth and richness of content it offers.  No app comes close.  You can find stuff that makes you laugh or wonder.  You can find cute stuff and weird stuff.  You can spend a few seconds finding the answer to a specific question or hours exploring whatever interests you.

We love the iPad.  The beautiful display, the feel of it in our hands, and all the incredible things it enables us to do.  We love how it makes computing more accessible to more people.  The iPad entertains and informs; it helps us communicate and learn.

And we love our friends.  The web has gotten so big, we depend on our friends to help us sift through it.  We love our friends who send us links to funny or cute stuff.  We love that one friend who always finds the weirdest stuff out there.  We love sending stuff to them, and we love that they send great stuff to us.

At Rockmelt, for a while now we’ve been thinking about how to combine these loves - the web, the iPad and our friends - how could we make exploring the web even better on the iPad?
  • We knew it had to be fast.  Way faster than opening an empty window, pulling up the keyboard, entering a URL and then getting content.  It needed to start with great content, tailored to you, ready to go.
  • It had to be built for iPad.  To us, that meant beautiful and built for touch.  It had to take advantage of the display and the processor and fast Wifi and LTE.  Intuitive and easy…
  • It had to have access to the whole web, not some curated subset, but the whole thing. We wanted to enhance the serendipitous discovery that makes the web so awesome. One discovery leads to another and then another.
  • It had to make sharing great web content easier and faster than ever before.  We wanted to take our friends with us as we explored, sharing the great stuff we found with them, and letting them help us discover great stuff in the same way.
  • And, most importantly, it had to be fun.
After many trials, experiments and an eight-month all-company effort, we couldn’t be more excited to introduce to you Rockmelt for iPad.  It is an entirely new way to explore the web, built for you and your iPad from the ground up.

You can download the app by clicking here or clicking the image below.

We can’t wait to hear what you think!

Yesterday was Wacky (Architecture Review) Wednesday at RockMelt! Everyone was so spirited, we just had to share! 

If you’re sad you missed out, check out all the ways that you can come join in on the fun HERE :)

Happy new year, RockMelters! We’re starting the New Year with some exciting Social Reading news.

Starting today, sharing and discovering new articles from your Social Reading-supported apps will be easier than ever. When Social Reading is turned on, the articles you read can be added to your Timeline and will allow you and your friends to more quickly find and connect around the hottest news.

Social Reading launched in November and we’re already seeing some incredible usage, with RockMelters sharing an article with friends every second! With this update, you’ll discover even more awesome content you may have missed on your own.

As always, you have full control over the sites you want to share Social Reading activity from and those you don’t. You can also remove or hide stories from your Timeline and control how news appears on your Timeline from your private Activity Log. Plus, Social Reading is only available for a handpicked set of sites. Check out our Social Reading help page for more info.

We can’t wait to see what you think. Happy 2012 and happy browsing!

How to Upgrade

Your RockMelt will automatically upgrade over the next 24 hours so stay tuned! From that point on, you’ll be able to add the Social Reading experience to your Timeline.

p.s. A bunch of you have already told us how much you love the Social Omnibox. If you haven’t quite familiarized yourself with it yet, just know that — in addition to the social features — you can type in keywords and search directly from the Social Omnibox. Easy, right?

Just in time for the holidays, RockMelt Beta 5 is here! We wanted to give you a present to finish 2011 with a bang, so we’ve been working non-stop to get RockMelt Beta 5 ready. 

Since you spend seven hours a day using RockMelt, Beta 5 was built to let you do all the things you love even faster and easier: staying in touch with friends, getting new updates from your favorite sites, and discovering sweet new content.

Here’s what’s new:

Social Omnibox

The omnibox has been completely re-designed to help you find what you’re looking for even faster. 

A big reason why chat is one of our most popular features — RockMelters now have seven chat conversations each day, up from three conversations six months ago — is because it’s so simple and accessible. With the new Facebook timelines rolling out, we wanted to make staying in touch with friends just as simple. So we built your friends into the omnibox. Now, when you enter a friend’s name into the Social Omnibox, you can navigate directly to their timeline or start a conversation. 

But the Social Omnibox isn’t just for friends. If you type in the name of an app, you’ll also see options to open or add apps. For convenience, you can use your keyboard’s arrow keys to pick and choose which action you’d like to take.

To try it out, just type a friend’s name into the omnibox.

The NEW New Tab

The brand new New Tab page (yes, double the NEW, just for you) lets you stay in touch with friends quickly. Pop open a new tab and you’ll see your friends’ pictures, have quick access to their profiles and even birthday reminders. Now, you won’t have any excuse not to wish them a Happy Birthday!  

Plus, we’ve added a ticker of your friends’ recent Social Reading activity in the top-right corner so you’ll never miss great new content. With a new “read” being shared among friends every second, Social Reading is a big hit.  But more importantly, it’s clear from your feedback that you love to discover the latest news (or cat videos) through your friends serendipitously. That’s why we built the Social Reading ticker right into New Tab page.

Open a new tab to take it for a spin!

Expandable, Scrollable App Edge

The App Edge is one of our favorite features because it makes reading news fun and easy (especially with Social Reading). It’s clear that you love the App Edge too: on average, RockMelters have 12 apps and click on them 26 times a day! 

That’s why we’ve made the App Edge better than ever. Now, the App Edge supports scrolling so you can add as many apps as you want and still navigate the Edge with ease. Don’t forget you can reorder the app icons by dragging and dropping them along the edge. Plus, it can now be expanded for easier app management. 

Try it for yourself by clicking the button at the bottom of the App Edge.

App Center

Because you love the App Edge so much, we wanted to make it easier to discover cool new apps and add apps from your favorite sites. That’s why we built the new App Center.

The App Center is a one-stop shop for everything apps. To open the App Center, click the + button at the top of your App Edge. Then, simply click on the icons of the sites in the App Center to start getting instant news from them in your App Edge. 

We have a lot more ideas for the App Center in the near future, so stay tuned.

EZ Text Sharing

Sharing text can now be done faster than ever. Select the text you want to share and right click to choose “Share text.” The text and link to the current page will automatically be included in a new Share window. Works like magic. No better! Works like computer science!

How to Upgrade to Beta 5

Your RockMelt will automatically upgrade over the next few days but you can upgrade immediately to RockMelt Beta 5 now by going to RockMelt menu > About RockMelt.

Happy browsing and happy holidays,
The RockMelt team

Welcome to RockMelt Beta 4.

RockMelt Beta 4 includes Social Reading which is our most exciting feature to date. By showing you what friends are reading and helping you discover cool content, Social Reading keeps you on top of the hottest news. Social Reading saves you time by making it easy to find relevant and interesting content.

We can’t wait for you to take RockMelt Beta 4 for a spin.

Social Reading 101

When you click on an app that supports Social Reading, the first thing you’ll notice is the new highlighted section at the top. There, you can see articles that are popular and trending with all RockMelt readers, as well as what’s hot with your own RockMelt friends.

Want to see what your friends have read recently? Just click on their picture for a list of recent reads.

If Social Reading is on, you can help your friends discover cool content just by clicking on articles inside the app and on the site itself (see below for a list of supported sites).

Not interested in sharing what you’re reading? Simply turn off Social Reading in one click. As always, RockMelt puts you in control. You decide if and when you want your reading activity shared with your friends.

Apps that Support Social Reading

Social Reading is available for some of the most popular sites on the web, including:

  • BBC
  • BuzzFeed
  • CNN
  • Cracked.com
  • Engadget
  • ESPN
  • Fail Blog
  • Fox News
  • Gizmodo
  • Huffington Post
  • Kotaku
  • Life Hacker
  • Mashable
  • New York Times
  • Pitchfork
  • Techcrunch
  • The Onion
  • Wall Street Journal
  • And much, much more — full list of supported sites coming soon!

Want Social Reading for an app that currently doesn’t have it? Let us know by sending an email to questions-at-rockmelt.com.

How to Upgrade to Beta 4

Your RockMelt will automatically upgrade over the next few days. To upgrade to Beta 4 now, click on About RockMelt under the RockMelt menu.

Happy browsing!

One of our favorite apps, the Gmail Notifier App, has always let you quickly see the number of unread emails you have and share links over email. We’ve now updated it to be more flexible than ever by adding  support for multiple accounts and individual email labels.

New Features

Here’s what’s new in the Gmail Notifier App:

  • Notifications for multiple Gmail accounts
  • Notifications for individual email labels
  • Automatic login to different inboxes when the app is clicked
  • Ability to share from any of your email accounts (by clicking Switch Account on the new email window

How to add the Gmail Notifier App

To add the Gmail Notifier App to RockMelt, just click the button below. If you already have the app installed, yours will update automatically in the next few hours, but you can also click the button below to update it now.

You can also add the Gmail Notifier App to RockMelt by clicking here.

We took everything you liked about RockMelt’s one-click Share and made it 10x better.

In addition to new features like thinner Edges and easier App adding, the latest RockMelt includes a completely re-designed Share button that lets you share to multiple people and services simultaneously.

Looking for Social Reading? It’s coming VERY soon.

Here’s what’s new in RockMelt:

Incredible Sharing

If you liked the Share button before, you’re going to love it now. Thanks to all your feedback, the Share button now lets you do all the following — at the same time:

  • Post to multiple friends’ walls on Facebook
  • Send multiple Facebook messages
  • Update your own Facebook status
  • Share to multiple Twitter accounts
  • Share to Facebook groups

Easier App Adding

You can now add Apps to your App Edge in one click. As you surf the web, your RockMelt will suggest sites at the top of your App Edge — just click on them to start getting instant updates.

Thinner Edges

The Edges and the navigation bar in the latest RockMelt are now thinner than before. The result? More room for you to browse.

Chromium 14

This RockMelt upgrade also includes all the enhancements from the latest stable version of Chromium to make it better than ever.

Coming Soon: Social Reading

Click here for a preview of Social Reading.

How to Upgrade

As always, your RockMelt will upgrade automatically over the next few days but you can manually upgrade now by going to RockMelt menu > About RockMelt.

Happy browsing!

Click the video above to hear RockMelt CEO Eric Vishria’s talk about the time he was learning the most.

In the next few weeks, everybody will be updated to RockMelt Beta 4! 

One feature we’re especially excited about is Social Reading. RockMelt is one of the first companies to launch Facebook integration to make reading news more social, and we’ve done it in a way that’s uniquely RockMelt.

By building social right into the App Edge and browsing experience, Social Reading lets you and your friends connect around reading online like never before.

Social Reading



With Social Reading enabled in RockMelt, you can:

  • Discover what friends are reading
  • See what’s popular and trending online
  • Help friends find new content by sharing what you’re reading

Social Reading will initially be available for some of the most popular sites, including CNN, ESPN, Fail Blog, Gizmodo, and others. Like all things RockMelt, you are in control of how activity is shared and who can view it.

Stay tuned for more info — reading news online will never be the same!

As you know, the YouTube App is an easy way to search for and watch videos from the App Edge. Now, you can watch all your subscriptions right inside the app itself!

New Features

Here are all the new things you can do with the upgraded YouTube App:

  • Watch all your video subscriptions right from the App Edge
  • Instant notifications of new subscriptions
  • Clear recent searches with one click
  • Create new playlists right from the My Playlists section

How to add the YouTube App

To add the YouTube App to RockMelt, just click on the button below. If you already have the YouTube App installed, yours will update automatically in the next few hours but you can also click below to update it now.

You can also add the YouTube App to RockMelt by clicking here.

p.s. Don’t forget that you can keep the YouTube App open while browsing by dragging it off of your App Edge