Times, a popular RSS app for the Mac developed by Acrylic Apps, made its way to the iPad with a beautiful mobile version known as Times for iPad which was a complete re-imagination and rewrite of the original desktop app, geared towards the new audience of “couch news readers” first discovered by the iPad itself. We reviewed Times for iPad when it came out:

Times is different from Flipboard. They’re different experiences with different goals. Times really is the ultimate visual newsreader for iPad and with Mac sync coming in Times for Mac 2.0 it’s going to be hard for all those other competitors to catch up. Once you see Times for iPad, you’ll understand that you don’t mess with an experienced OS X / iOS developer. Times is cleverly and beautifully crafted, it has its quirks and could use some additional online integrations – but it puts every similar app to shame.

Times for iPad was updated a few minutes ago, and it’s no longer known as Times. To stop dealing with media giants claiming the “Times” name was a no-no, Acrylic Apps changed it to “Pulp for iPad”. I’ve been beta testing the update for a while and it’s really good: most of all, because it brings a feature called “Magic Reader” which with the tap of a button will pull content from truncated RSS feeds and display it in-app. It’s fast (faster than web view), useful for 3G users and will piss off a lot of publishers. That’s what I call a great feature.

The update also brings full iOS 4.2 support, lots of improvements and optimizations and a new reading experience. The layout scheme has been revised, navigation buttons have been moved to the top and the shelf is now accessible without having to go back to the main page. The app feels faster, snappier and everything runs smoothly.

Times for iPad was a must-have before, but if you don’t buy Pulp now you’re a fool. Beautiful interface, magic reader functionality, iOS 4.2 support and a faster engine. Only $4.99 in the App Store.