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Exactly! The social media platforms have effectively "devoured" and "engulfed" the very idea behind RSS in order to exploit the political economy of content pu

by raldu 8y ago

Exactly! The social media platforms have effectively "devoured" and "engulfed" the very idea behind RSS in order to exploit the political economy of content publication, for monopoly. When Google Reader has been shut down in 2013, it had left millions of loyal fans behind who had loved and used the platform over the years. There had been a strong disappointment, especially in communities like Reddit, HN and Slashdot. Reader platform still seems to have been missed even today [2]. Judging by the range of Google products that had got shut down along with the Reader [2] that time, it seems that it had been a strategic move to preserve their interests in rising social media and mobile market. Google had failed to "build products that people love," by betraying what people loved. With Google killing the Reader, Twitter shutting down support for RSS, AI having had started deciding what is most relevant for you, and feeds having buried behind giant walls of API interfaces, Legacy of Aaron Swartz had been turned into "social media," the new television! 1: https://www.reddit.com/r/google/comments/897hr1/i_made_mockups_of_how_google_reader_could_look_if/dwpi69h https://www.reddit.com/r/google/comments/897hr1/i_made_mocku... 2: https://googleblog.blogspot.com.tr/2013/03/a-second-spring-of-cleaning.html https://googleblog.blogspot.com.tr/2013/03/a-second-spring-o...

bhnmmhmd 8y ago
Excuse me, but I need to put it out there: how exactly is RSS useful if the sources themselves (websites) are more and more biased? I believe nowadays, people are interested in "content", not in "source". As long as the content is valid and trustworthy, I don't care if it's on social media or an RSS feed. As a matter of fact, my problem with RSS is that I can't be sure the websites I'm receiving their notifs are going to keep up the good work and are not "deviated" or "biased" after a while. RSS is solid, but it's also rigid, meaning that it relies on websites to deliver you content. Other alternatives (such as news aggregators) do the reverse: they bring you content based on your own interests and regardless of where that news was published in. I think this is way better than "blindly" trusting our favorite websites to tell us the truth.
- naravara 8y ago
  A website has an editorial perspective and voice of its own. Their biases are known and can be accounted for when you read them. News aggregators are having editorial decisions made by the vagaries of some opaque voting algorithm and get gamed by motivated actors and bots. If manipulative bias is your concern, aggregators are way worse.
- sizzle 8y ago
  What's never failed me is to remain sceptical of everything you read on the internet and verify sources.

by raldu 8y ago

bhnmmhmd 8y ago

Excuse me, but I need to put it out there: how exactly is RSS useful if the sources themselves (websites) are more and more biased? I believe nowadays, people are interested in "content", not in "source". As long as the content is valid and trustworthy, I don't care if it's on social media or an RSS feed. As a matter of fact, my problem with RSS is that I can't be sure the websites I'm receiving their notifs are going to keep up the good work and are not "deviated" or "biased" after a while. RSS is solid, but it's also rigid, meaning that it relies on websites to deliver you content. Other alternatives (such as news aggregators) do the reverse: they bring you content based on your own interests and regardless of where that news was published in. I think this is way better than "blindly" trusting our favorite websites to tell us the truth.

naravara 8y ago
A website has an editorial perspective and voice of its own. Their biases are known and can be accounted for when you read them. News aggregators are having editorial decisions made by the vagaries of some opaque voting algorithm and get gamed by motivated actors and bots. If manipulative bias is your concern, aggregators are way worse.
sizzle 8y ago
What's never failed me is to remain sceptical of everything you read on the internet and verify sources.