Faster reading through column size.

Sameer Vasta points out this very interesting program that purports to help you read faster and retain more information by reshaping text into a cascading column. It does seem to make reading easier, so I experimented this morning with Google Reader. I just resized my window so that the text of each post is about an inch and a half wide. It really helps! Try it!

Of course, this isn't exactly a new idea. That's why newspapers print stories in columns. But the relationship between column size and reading speed might just have been lost in the digital world.