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Feedly is indeed great, I just wish they'd stop trying to add AI and automated topic highlighting which clearly doesn't work.

woleium 3y ago
this is what made me switch to innoreader
jseliger 3y ago
I just wish they'd stop trying to add AI and automated topic highlighting which clearly doesn't work. A bunch of companies are also doing or attempting to do AI and automated trial finding for clinical trials, and that's not working either: https://bessstillman.substack.com/p/please-be-dying-but-not-too-quickly https://bessstillman.substack.com/p/please-be-dying-but-not-.... Fortunately, the stakes are low, since patients who don't find the right clinical trial for cancers will only die.
- orzig 3y ago
  Do you think the solution is better software, or is real blocker on the business/policy/cultural/incentives side? Inspired by that series I looked into building a better front end for clinical trials.gov but after seeing a few organizations try similar approaches without (yet) nailing it, I became convinced that I’d become one more classic naive-technologist story. But have the existing approaches really missed a low hanging solution, even if it’s partial and maybe impossible to monetize?
stanislavb 3y ago
Have you tried Lenna.io? I’d guess no, but it could regard some of the pains. (Disclosure - a product I work on)
- stavros 3y ago
  I'd guess no too, since there's no site at that domain.
smsm42 3y ago
Yeah their AI efforts are weird. It's like they are ashamed of "just" making an excellent product for rss, and want to do something special but nothing useful, at least for me, came out of it do far. TBH, I'm ok with them just being an excellent rss reader and will keep paying for it.
- nirav72 3y ago
  I think they're adding lot of these features as incentives to entice users to switch to their subscription service. Not sure what percentage of their users pay for the subscription.
  - smsm42 3y ago
    I actually signed up for AI enabled plan out of curiosity (I had non AI subscription for years prior). Had to downgrade back because it was too annoying and I couldn't figure out how to make it stop completely. Whoever inside the company is pushing this is not doing them a service.
nerdjon 3y ago
Feedly seems like a company that is trying anything that will stick to get people to subscribe without getting rid of their free offering. Their free plan is likely enough for most people. I know for me none of those features matter. Especially since I just never log into Feedly themselves. I just use the Reeder app as my frontend and have gone a couple years without logging in. I also just don't change my actual feeds much.
- IgorPartola 3y ago
  This is a great example of a business built on what should not really be a business. There are certain types of things that are fundamental to the internet, and trying to sell a premium version of that is always an uphill battle. Imagine that in 2024 I tried to sell you a web browser. One that maybe has a slightly cleaner UI or some fancy plugin system but ultimately is just a plain old browser. Maybe some very small percentage of people would pay for it, but most are entirely happy with the free and FOSS choices available since the core features of a browser are standard. RSS by all means should be similar: just like ping, cat, sh, browsers, email clients, video players, etc. the core features are well defined and an open source project should be the default choice. If you want something fancy or proprietary then sure you should be free to pay for it. But I can’t imagine wanting to build a company that pays salaries around any of this. There are situations where a person or a team of 2-3 can make a lifestyle business out of selling something that I have seen referred to as “legacy software” (this doesn’t mean old, but rather fundamental and “boring”, aka the Linux kernel). But Feedly competes with its own free product and cannot see the forest for the trees.
  - heresie-dabord 3y ago
    > RSS by all means should be similar: just like ping, cat, sh, I must say that reading an RSS feed is as simple as this: wget "myURL" -O - | python3 -c ' import sys import xml.etree.ElementTree as et tree = et.fromstring(sys.stdin.read()) for el in tree.findall("./channel/item"): print(el.find("title").text)' But the other applications that you mention are not simple applications: > browsers, email clients, video players, etc. the core features are well defined and an open source project should be the default choice. [1] _ Sample URL: "https://www.tomshardware.com/feeds/all https://www.tomshardware.com/feeds/all"
maxglute 3y ago
It works alright, and TBH it's time RSS readers moved PAST google reader and add more useful features. Deduplciation, AI summarization etc. Stuff that helps manage RSS for those with lots of feeds, as one is likely to accumulate over time.
archon810 3y ago
Feedly is great, but it baffles me it still doesn't support notifications on Android. It's strictly pull, and I'm now used to push.

woleium 3y ago

this is what made me switch to innoreader

jseliger 3y ago

I just wish they'd stop trying to add AI and automated topic highlighting which clearly doesn't work. A bunch of companies are also doing or attempting to do AI and automated trial finding for clinical trials, and that's not working either: https://bessstillman.substack.com/p/please-be-dying-but-not-too-quickly https://bessstillman.substack.com/p/please-be-dying-but-not-.... Fortunately, the stakes are low, since patients who don't find the right clinical trial for cancers will only die.

orzig 3y ago
Do you think the solution is better software, or is real blocker on the business/policy/cultural/incentives side? Inspired by that series I looked into building a better front end for clinical trials.gov but after seeing a few organizations try similar approaches without (yet) nailing it, I became convinced that I’d become one more classic naive-technologist story. But have the existing approaches really missed a low hanging solution, even if it’s partial and maybe impossible to monetize?

stanislavb 3y ago

Have you tried Lenna.io? I’d guess no, but it could regard some of the pains. (Disclosure - a product I work on)

stavros 3y ago
I'd guess no too, since there's no site at that domain.

smsm42 3y ago

Yeah their AI efforts are weird. It's like they are ashamed of "just" making an excellent product for rss, and want to do something special but nothing useful, at least for me, came out of it do far. TBH, I'm ok with them just being an excellent rss reader and will keep paying for it.

nirav72 3y ago
I think they're adding lot of these features as incentives to entice users to switch to their subscription service. Not sure what percentage of their users pay for the subscription.
- smsm42 3y ago
  I actually signed up for AI enabled plan out of curiosity (I had non AI subscription for years prior). Had to downgrade back because it was too annoying and I couldn't figure out how to make it stop completely. Whoever inside the company is pushing this is not doing them a service.

nerdjon 3y ago

Feedly seems like a company that is trying anything that will stick to get people to subscribe without getting rid of their free offering. Their free plan is likely enough for most people. I know for me none of those features matter. Especially since I just never log into Feedly themselves. I just use the Reeder app as my frontend and have gone a couple years without logging in. I also just don't change my actual feeds much.

IgorPartola 3y ago
This is a great example of a business built on what should not really be a business. There are certain types of things that are fundamental to the internet, and trying to sell a premium version of that is always an uphill battle. Imagine that in 2024 I tried to sell you a web browser. One that maybe has a slightly cleaner UI or some fancy plugin system but ultimately is just a plain old browser. Maybe some very small percentage of people would pay for it, but most are entirely happy with the free and FOSS choices available since the core features of a browser are standard. RSS by all means should be similar: just like ping, cat, sh, browsers, email clients, video players, etc. the core features are well defined and an open source project should be the default choice. If you want something fancy or proprietary then sure you should be free to pay for it. But I can’t imagine wanting to build a company that pays salaries around any of this. There are situations where a person or a team of 2-3 can make a lifestyle business out of selling something that I have seen referred to as “legacy software” (this doesn’t mean old, but rather fundamental and “boring”, aka the Linux kernel). But Feedly competes with its own free product and cannot see the forest for the trees.
- heresie-dabord 3y ago
  > RSS by all means should be similar: just like ping, cat, sh, I must say that reading an RSS feed is as simple as this: wget "myURL" -O - | python3 -c ' import sys import xml.etree.ElementTree as et tree = et.fromstring(sys.stdin.read()) for el in tree.findall("./channel/item"): print(el.find("title").text)' But the other applications that you mention are not simple applications: > browsers, email clients, video players, etc. the core features are well defined and an open source project should be the default choice. [1] _ Sample URL: "https://www.tomshardware.com/feeds/all https://www.tomshardware.com/feeds/all"

maxglute 3y ago

It works alright, and TBH it's time RSS readers moved PAST google reader and add more useful features. Deduplciation, AI summarization etc. Stuff that helps manage RSS for those with lots of feeds, as one is likely to accumulate over time.

archon810 3y ago

Feedly is great, but it baffles me it still doesn't support notifications on Android. It's strictly pull, and I'm now used to push.