15 ms·

Escape the walled garden and algorithm black boxes with RSS feeds

297 points by rekl 2y ago

terminaltrove 2y ago
[dead]
vaylian 2y ago
The article also mentions atom feeds. I've seen plenty of RSS feeds but I have never encountered an atom feed. Are atom feeds still relevant?
- giantrobot 2y ago
  Atom and RSS are functionally equivalent despite their technical differences. Effectively no one has ever implemented Atom push capabilities so Atom is primarily only ever used for syndication. The term "RSS" is just a generic term for "XML syndication feed".
  - progval 2y ago
    Atom push is actually implemented. SWORDv2 (but not v3) is based on Atom Push, and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SWORD_(protocol) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SWORD_(protocol) lists a few implementations. My employer maintains a SWORDv2 server, and we have a handful of clients pushing to us; most of them are not listed on that page.
- crtasm 2y ago
  As an example, feeds available on every github repo: https://github.com/EFForg/privacybadger/commits.atom https://github.com/EFForg/privacybadger/commits.atom https://github.com/EFForg/privacybadger/tags.atom https://github.com/EFForg/privacybadger/tags.atom https://github.com/EFForg/privacybadger/releases.atom https://github.com/EFForg/privacybadger/releases.atom
- superkuh 2y ago
  Google (Blogger, etc) pushes Atom feeds. Weather blogger is still relevant is up to perspective.
cadamsdotcom 2y ago
That helps find content to read. I wish it was easier to find out what my friends have been up to without getting them to sign up for some platform they’ve never heard of, then post in multiple places in perpetuity, and move on again when that platform also goes to shit. A hard problem but surely not unsolvable. It belongs in a pg “please solve these big problems” essay.
- meiraleal 2y ago
  That's an interesting problem. I'm thinking about creating a local-first RSS Reader that syncs using github. It seems doable to create a personal feed based on my feed and publish it also to github.
kcplate 2y ago
Def how I consume HN. It’s even nice to see flagged and dead which I wouldn’t see easily if I came via the HN homepage.
- xrd 2y ago
  How do you get this, may I ask? I asked because I didn't know how to get exactly that, so I'm building a site that finds RSS feeds from sites on the front page of HN. Then, at the end of the day it emails me with a summary if I miss one. https://RSS.surf https://RSS.surf If anyone wants to try the daily summary email would love feedback.
  - kcplate 2y ago
    I use Feedly, which as a RSS reader is ok but probably one of the better ones available on iOS/iPadOS platform. I loved Google Reader back in the day, but Google loves to kill every product of theirs that I actually like and used. I believe the HN feed is available here: https://news.ycombinator.com/rss https://news.ycombinator.com/rss
    - xrd 2y ago
      So, just to confirm, you prefer to read the news on hacker news via RSS? Why? I assumed you meant view the RSS for sites on HN but that's clearly different than what you were thinking.
      - jayemar 2y ago
        I do the same. I do it because I subscribe to sites other than HN, and by subscribing to the HN feed I can get the articles from HN as well as the other sites I subscribe to all in the same place, ie my feed reader (also using Feedly). Nothing overly original here as I assume personal content aggregation was one of the original intentions of RSS.
        kcplate 2y ago
ashryan 2y ago
This is so pushing happy buttons for me. Not that this is novel in any way, but I just started a repo call Subcurrent yesterday for the Astoria Tech Meetup in NYC at our Saturday hack session. Subcurrent aims to provide a feed aggregator page made of our community members' feeds. https://github.com/astoria-tech/subcurrent https://github.com/astoria-tech/subcurrent I did not know that Meetup.com exposes RSS feeds at all, so I will be adding that to our Subcurrent instance since our group keeps events on Meetup.com. I had never heard of Kill the Newsletter, but I'm a fan sight-unseen. Substack at least has feeds. You can append `/feed` to the newsletter's URL. Thanks for writing this!
soupfordummies 2y ago
So many RSS stories this week! I'm sensing a trend (hopefully)
- Pooge 2y ago
  I'm sorry to be the pessimist here, but I doubt it. HN users are the most likely to use RSS in the first place. I sincerely doubt that RSS is going to make a comeback this year with all my non-IT friends using it.
  - meiraleal 2y ago
    Don't underestimate what programmers with too much free time can achieve.
  - azemetre 2y ago
    Why is the goal to appeal to as many people as possible?
    - alserio 2y ago
      In this case having more people asking for it or expecting it can contribute to expanding the availability of RSS feeds to more websites. While the vast majority of technical stuff I follow uses RSS, the same cannot be said for some other resources I like to read. While some are kind enough to enable them when asked, I don't expect them to want to support them for just a handful of people in their target audience.
  - bluebarbet 2y ago
    Realism shared. I work with journalists, exactly the type of normies who would most benefit from this technology. Years of evangelism has had no effect whatsoever. Nobody they know is using it, they don't see the logo anywhere, or a big friendly "Get started" button. It's all so unfamiliar and technical-sounding. Even the name itself was a disaster, IMO: a hopelessly geeky and opaque acronym. It should have been called Webfeeds! It's all such a wasted opportunity.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
jopsen 2y ago
This is missing planets. A good way to find interesting blogs is to subscribe to a few planets. These are essentially aggregations of blog related to some project/topic. https://planet.gnome.org/ https://planet.gnome.org/ https://planet.kde.org/ https://planet.kde.org/ https://planet.mozilla.org/ https://planet.mozilla.org/ https://planet.documentfoundation.org/ https://planet.documentfoundation.org/ PS. If you know any good planets worth skimming, please add to below :) That said, I don't really have a good RSS reader that syncs across devices. I currently use Feedly, but it tries to be too smart.
- ssttoo 2y ago
  (Disclaimer: my project) https://feed.perfplanet.com https://feed.perfplanet.com for web performance Also please open a GH issue if I’m missing a blog or 5
- gvurrdon 2y ago
  I tried Feedly after Google Reader shut down but eventually settled on Feedbin - that might be worth a look.
  - Gualdrapo 2y ago
    I'm on the Feedly train boat too since the sinking of Google Reader. Besides the ai bs it doesn't really let you search something in your feeds without a subscription, so once I tried Feedbin. But I went back because third world issues (and not a fan of microtransactions either) I could not find a way (if any) to change the layout on desktop. I really like the minimal list view at Feedly (and even on mobile too).
  - jopsen 2y ago
    If I read feeds daily I might spend 5 bucks per month, but I don't. It'll just be a subscription I forget that I have. I don't need more of those :)
- ognarb 2y ago
  Since planet.kde.org is mentioned, it's super easy to create something similar with a bit of python and a static site generator like Hugo :) https://invent.kde.org/websites/planet-kde-org/-/blob/master/scripts/custom_generation.py?ref_type=heads https://invent.kde.org/websites/planet-kde-org/-/blob/master...
qudat 2y ago
If anyone needs an rss-to-email service, check out https://pico.sh/feeds https://pico.sh/feeds
vishnu_ks 2y ago
Do try https://diff.blog https://diff.blog which is an aggregator of developer blogs which I built around 5 years back. diff.blog tracks over 2000 dev blogs at the moment. And you can also follow blogs and topics.
mococa 2y ago
+ for Reeder for macOS and iOS I follow several feeds and Youtube channels. Reeder have a very smooth experience.
fevangelou 2y ago
A handy bookmarklet to find & preview any site's feed (before subscribing): https://feedreader.xyz https://feedreader.xyz
- domysee 2y ago
  Similar tool here: https://lighthouseapp.io/tools/feed-finder https://lighthouseapp.io/tools/feed-finder Finds feeds even if they're not RSS autodiscoverable. Everything it does is described here: https://lighthouseapp.io/blog/deep-dive-finding-rss-feeds https://lighthouseapp.io/blog/deep-dive-finding-rss-feeds
frobnic 2y ago
Try Rss-Bridge [1] when the website does not have any feed, it might have an integration already. It also supports custom CSS-selectors to create feeds, or even use SEO-Sitemaps for your advantage to generate a feed from it. [1] https://github.com/RSS-Bridge/rss-bridge https://github.com/RSS-Bridge/rss-bridge
janice1999 2y ago
I see PolitePol mentioned. What do people use to run scrapers to generate RSS feeds themselves for sites without them? Do you self host scrapers?
- dagurp 2y ago
  I do. Just a raspberry pi with nginx and a cron job that runs python scripts. I'm not into AI but writing those scripts is boring so chatgpt is perfect for this.
- Havoc 2y ago
  There is one called rssbridge or something that can do that
PaulHoule 2y ago
The hate for algorithms boggles my mind. Chronological feeds are awful. You'll never see anything from the people who post occasionally because they get drowned out by the people who are posting all the time. There may be some algorithms that deliberately magnify hate because that's a way to increase engagement, but if you want to create one of those algorithms you can make a training set based on chronological feed + boosting/retweets/reposts. I'm amazed at how people keep making failing RSS readers that keep failing with the same failing user interfaces that have been failing since 1999; everybody knows RSS has been failing but they never ask why or if we have a choice. We still see the readers that make you mark things as read, that take their cues from email and newsreaders, that, when you subscribe to N feeds show you N boxes with a list of items, etc. My RSS reader works like TikTok because I'm not afraid of algorithms.
- beej71 2y ago
  I prefer time-based feeds, but that's just me. I don't think people are objecting to suggestive feeds in general; they're objecting to suggestive feeds whose primary objective is to keep you scrolling for as long as humanly possible to maximize company revenue. That's simply not what I want to do with my day. I'd train my own if I wanted to go that route.
  - PaulHoule 2y ago
    The problem with time based feeds is this. You can read x articles a day; your system ingests y articles a day. x=y is perfect but requires close-to-perfect balance (if x=0.9y to 1.1y maybe you can adjust your reading habit to your your feed) if x>y then your system isn't showing you enough, if y<x you are going to miss things you subscribe to based on some arbitrary or random characteristic. With an algorithmic feed of some kind you choose to read x items a day, your system shows you the best x items a day out of y based on some set of criteria and constraints. These things are common sense but seemingly nonsensical to a lot of people. For instance our impoverished rights-based discourse (see [1]) about "free speech" presupposes that 100% of people can read 100% of what everybody else posts, realistically platforms can only show people some fraction of what gets posted so one thing is going to get more visibility and other things get less and that's a choice -- it could be random but it's still a choice. (As Rush would put it, "if you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice") I think the discussion is so impoverished that we never hear that an algorithm could choose to do anything other than maximize profits for a platform, when in fact that is just one thing an algorithm could do out of countless options. [1] https://www.amazon.com/Rights-Talk-Impoverishment-Political-Discourse/dp/0029118239 https://www.amazon.com/Rights-Talk-Impoverishment-Political-...
edoceo 2y ago
I love RSS but how can we get more of it? Walled-ish gardens seem to dominate. Many good producers are on platforms that just don't syndicate. What kind of pressure can we, consumers, put on?
- tap-snap-or-nap 2y ago
  Request good producers to use platforms that syndicate.
- jefurii 2y ago
  If they're not using an RSS-capable platform maybe they're not so great?
- ColinWright 2y ago
  Every Mastodon account automatically has an RSS feed ... just append ".rss" to the account name: https://mathstodon.xyz/@ColinTheMathmo.rss https://mathstodon.xyz/@ColinTheMathmo.rss
openrisk 2y ago
An advanced RSS reader/browser could bring back the magic of the web.
- xrd 2y ago
  What does an advanced reader look like in your mind?
  - openrisk 2y ago
    1. Convergent desktop/mobile app that syncs between devices (open source and local) 2. Performant for large numbers of feeds 3. Integrated browser and automagical discovery and organization of feeds while you browse 4. Multiple taxonomies and viewing layout options, chronological, by subject etc 5. Advanced filtering by keywords 6. Transparent and pluggable locally runing algorithms to track usage and inform the user of patterns and if desired adjust presentation In a sense an advanced RSS 'reader' is what the web "browser" should have evolved to. There is really no real boundary between these two clients. An advanced RSS reader is essentially a more dynamic browser that queries the internet in more ways that the user-initiated visit of a bookmarked url or typing something into a search form.
    - xrd 2y ago
      Great summary. I'm using a combination of FreshRSS (self-hosted) and Readrops (for Android). I feel like #1 is handled by this combination. But, I wonder what convergent means here for you? I don't notice any performance issues. But, this feels like a simple task for a bunch of RSS feeds. Did you notice performance issues with other readers? There is something very interesting about what you call "automagical discovery." To me this is the biggest hole in my RSS experience. I want something that gives me magical discovery within the feeds I have based on my reading experiences. I subscribe to a lot of feeds because of one article, and then don't care about 90% of the other articles, but there are 10% that I do really want to read, but don't have the focus to find them. Is that what you mean by automagical? Why do you want #4? Filtering by keywords seems interesting. FreshRSS has a bunch of analytics that comes with the server. I never really use it, but it is interesting. I would be happy to share what I can see based on my limited usage over a few months if this would serve your purposes. I would be interested in understanding what you mean by that. The one thing I wish I had in my current setup is a way to take notes in a centralized way. When I'm on Android, I suppose I can copy and use a share intent. And, on a browser, I could install an extension to do that. But, it feels like that is an interesting opportunity for someone. I wish FreshRSS could layer a JavaScript app on posts, for example, and then I could build whatever I want. It has an extension API, but strangely documented. Thanks!
quinto_quarto 2y ago
i built this site (https://fanzine.world https://fanzine.world) to help people discover micro-creators and share their top 5 faves. not sure what to do with it. maybe someone here has a suggestion?
geor9e 2y ago
Feedbro is my favorite reader.
pyromaker 2y ago
Is RSS really coming back? :) (you'll say it was never gone!) Lots of RSS related posts and comments recently. I've released Mashups a few weeks ago. https://www.mashups.io https://www.mashups.io It's yahoo pipes clone - so you can mix and filter RSS feeds that you want.
- RamblingCTO 2y ago
  awesome! good luck
pigeons 2y ago
I need to find some way to see a chronological feed of what people I am friends with on facebook post. I literally get randomly suggested posts from unrelated accounts, and scrolling through them all will start to repeat them, never showing me content from some people who are actual friend connections.
- BugsHack 2y ago
  Try this: https://www.facebook.com/?filter=friends&sk=h_chr https://www.facebook.com/?filter=friends&sk=h_chr
  - pigeons 2y ago
    Thanks!
- Beijinger 2y ago
  You need this: https://socialfixer.com/ https://socialfixer.com/ At socialfixer, options, hide post put everything that should disappear follow reals etc.. I am not on my laptop otherwise I would post my block list here.
ColinWright 2y ago
Every Mastodon account automatically has an RSS feed ... just append ".rss" to the account name: https://mathstodon.xyz/@ColinTheMathmo.rss https://mathstodon.xyz/@ColinTheMathmo.rss
xyst 2y ago
RSS feeds, so underrated. Rediscovering RSS and adding my YT subs as RSS feeds feels so liberating. Plus, RSS feeds combines the reg videos + short videos into single feed.
rubicks 2y ago
Relevant: https://newsboat.org/ https://newsboat.org/ If you like your email in mutt, then you'll probably like your feeds in newsboat.
OisinMoran 2y ago
I love this! I'm trying to build a new corner of the old web with my social link sharing site https://lynkmi.com https://lynkmi.com, and every tag automatically has an RSS feed so you don't need to know anything about them to set one up, or even need an account to follow one. The main idea is instead of following everything a person posts you can just follow a subset of their interests. So if I post about Irish Dairy Innovations [0] and also about Advice [1] you can follow whichever combination of those you like. If you'd like to sign up, my email is in my bio. And if you don't want to sign up, my email is still in my bio. [0] https://lynkmi.com/oisin/Irish%2520dairy%2520innovation https://lynkmi.com/oisin/Irish%2520dairy%2520innovation [1] https://lynkmi.com/oisin/advice https://lynkmi.com/oisin/advice
toofy 2y ago
i would love to see Bluesky add RSS to user feeds the same way Mastodon does by just adding /rss to the end of the url. it really is rad to add my most read users to the feed.
- xavdid 2y ago
  Bluesky supports them! If you append `/rss` to any profile, it redirects to a feed. e.g.: https://bsky.app/profile/xavd.id https://bsky.app/profile/xavd.id -> https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:fp2izjrrcsbsqphlu7f5sixa/rss https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:fp2izjrrcsbsqphlu7f5sixa/rs... More info: https://openrss.org/blog/bluesky-has-launched-rss-feeds https://openrss.org/blog/bluesky-has-launched-rss-feeds
aboardRat4 2y ago
I've been trying to make it work for ages, but it's not going to work. "News" are not actually that easy to automate as in "serialising posts". Big companies are experimenting with UI all the time for a reason. Especially because it would involve a lot of heuristics.
renegat0x0 2y ago
ooooh I so escaped walled gardens. I use my own set of domains to find places on the internet [0]. A working example how it could be used is at [1]. It is a domain viewer in javascript. I also use my own RSS client [2] that stores all links in [3], but don't get me wrong, I also have my storage for bookmarks [4] Links: [0] https://github.com/rumca-js/Internet-Places-Database https://github.com/rumca-js/Internet-Places-Database [1] https://rumca-js.github.io/quickstart/public/static_lists/viewerzip.html?file=top https://rumca-js.github.io/quickstart/public/static_lists/vi... [2] https://github.com/rumca-js/Django-link-archive https://github.com/rumca-js/Django-link-archive [3] https://github.com/rumca-js/RSS-Link-Database-2025 https://github.com/rumca-js/RSS-Link-Database-2025 [4] https://github.com/rumca-js/RSS-Link-Database https://github.com/rumca-js/RSS-Link-Database
domysee 2y ago
Really great to see so many RSS stories recently. I'm working on a feed reader, called Lighthouse (https://lighthouseapp.io/ https://lighthouseapp.io/). It combines RSS feeds with read-it-later, by putting new content into Inbox, where you can either archive or bookmark. Bookmarked content shows up in Library. It's fantastic for content curation.
sys_64738 2y ago
There's also https://brutalist.report https://brutalist.report
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]

297 points by rekl 2y ago

[dead]

The article also mentions atom feeds. I've seen plenty of RSS feeds but I have never encountered an atom feed. Are atom feeds still relevant?

giantrobot 2y ago
Atom and RSS are functionally equivalent despite their technical differences. Effectively no one has ever implemented Atom push capabilities so Atom is primarily only ever used for syndication. The term "RSS" is just a generic term for "XML syndication feed".
- progval 2y ago
  Atom push is actually implemented. SWORDv2 (but not v3) is based on Atom Push, and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SWORD_(protocol) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SWORD_(protocol) lists a few implementations. My employer maintains a SWORDv2 server, and we have a handful of clients pushing to us; most of them are not listed on that page.
crtasm 2y ago
As an example, feeds available on every github repo: https://github.com/EFForg/privacybadger/commits.atom https://github.com/EFForg/privacybadger/commits.atom https://github.com/EFForg/privacybadger/tags.atom https://github.com/EFForg/privacybadger/tags.atom https://github.com/EFForg/privacybadger/releases.atom https://github.com/EFForg/privacybadger/releases.atom
superkuh 2y ago
Google (Blogger, etc) pushes Atom feeds. Weather blogger is still relevant is up to perspective.

cadamsdotcom 2y ago

That helps find content to read. I wish it was easier to find out what my friends have been up to without getting them to sign up for some platform they’ve never heard of, then post in multiple places in perpetuity, and move on again when that platform also goes to shit. A hard problem but surely not unsolvable. It belongs in a pg “please solve these big problems” essay.

meiraleal 2y ago
That's an interesting problem. I'm thinking about creating a local-first RSS Reader that syncs using github. It seems doable to create a personal feed based on my feed and publish it also to github.

kcplate 2y ago

Def how I consume HN. It’s even nice to see flagged and dead which I wouldn’t see easily if I came via the HN homepage.

xrd 2y ago
How do you get this, may I ask? I asked because I didn't know how to get exactly that, so I'm building a site that finds RSS feeds from sites on the front page of HN. Then, at the end of the day it emails me with a summary if I miss one. https://RSS.surf https://RSS.surf If anyone wants to try the daily summary email would love feedback.
- kcplate 2y ago
  I use Feedly, which as a RSS reader is ok but probably one of the better ones available on iOS/iPadOS platform. I loved Google Reader back in the day, but Google loves to kill every product of theirs that I actually like and used. I believe the HN feed is available here: https://news.ycombinator.com/rss https://news.ycombinator.com/rss
  - xrd 2y ago
    So, just to confirm, you prefer to read the news on hacker news via RSS? Why? I assumed you meant view the RSS for sites on HN but that's clearly different than what you were thinking.
    - jayemar 2y ago
      I do the same. I do it because I subscribe to sites other than HN, and by subscribing to the HN feed I can get the articles from HN as well as the other sites I subscribe to all in the same place, ie my feed reader (also using Feedly). Nothing overly original here as I assume personal content aggregation was one of the original intentions of RSS.
      - kcplate 2y ago

ashryan 2y ago

This is so pushing happy buttons for me. Not that this is novel in any way, but I just started a repo call Subcurrent yesterday for the Astoria Tech Meetup in NYC at our Saturday hack session. Subcurrent aims to provide a feed aggregator page made of our community members' feeds. https://github.com/astoria-tech/subcurrent https://github.com/astoria-tech/subcurrent I did not know that Meetup.com exposes RSS feeds at all, so I will be adding that to our Subcurrent instance since our group keeps events on Meetup.com. I had never heard of Kill the Newsletter, but I'm a fan sight-unseen. Substack at least has feeds. You can append `/feed` to the newsletter's URL. Thanks for writing this!

soupfordummies 2y ago

So many RSS stories this week! I'm sensing a trend (hopefully)

Pooge 2y ago
I'm sorry to be the pessimist here, but I doubt it. HN users are the most likely to use RSS in the first place. I sincerely doubt that RSS is going to make a comeback this year with all my non-IT friends using it.
- meiraleal 2y ago
  Don't underestimate what programmers with too much free time can achieve.
- azemetre 2y ago
  Why is the goal to appeal to as many people as possible?
  - alserio 2y ago
    In this case having more people asking for it or expecting it can contribute to expanding the availability of RSS feeds to more websites. While the vast majority of technical stuff I follow uses RSS, the same cannot be said for some other resources I like to read. While some are kind enough to enable them when asked, I don't expect them to want to support them for just a handful of people in their target audience.
- bluebarbet 2y ago
  Realism shared. I work with journalists, exactly the type of normies who would most benefit from this technology. Years of evangelism has had no effect whatsoever. Nobody they know is using it, they don't see the logo anywhere, or a big friendly "Get started" button. It's all so unfamiliar and technical-sounding. Even the name itself was a disaster, IMO: a hopelessly geeky and opaque acronym. It should have been called Webfeeds! It's all such a wasted opportunity.

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

jopsen 2y ago

This is missing planets. A good way to find interesting blogs is to subscribe to a few planets. These are essentially aggregations of blog related to some project/topic. https://planet.gnome.org/ https://planet.gnome.org/ https://planet.kde.org/ https://planet.kde.org/ https://planet.mozilla.org/ https://planet.mozilla.org/ https://planet.documentfoundation.org/ https://planet.documentfoundation.org/ PS. If you know any good planets worth skimming, please add to below :) That said, I don't really have a good RSS reader that syncs across devices. I currently use Feedly, but it tries to be too smart.

ssttoo 2y ago
(Disclaimer: my project) https://feed.perfplanet.com https://feed.perfplanet.com for web performance Also please open a GH issue if I’m missing a blog or 5
gvurrdon 2y ago
I tried Feedly after Google Reader shut down but eventually settled on Feedbin - that might be worth a look.
- Gualdrapo 2y ago
  I'm on the Feedly train boat too since the sinking of Google Reader. Besides the ai bs it doesn't really let you search something in your feeds without a subscription, so once I tried Feedbin. But I went back because third world issues (and not a fan of microtransactions either) I could not find a way (if any) to change the layout on desktop. I really like the minimal list view at Feedly (and even on mobile too).
- jopsen 2y ago
  If I read feeds daily I might spend 5 bucks per month, but I don't. It'll just be a subscription I forget that I have. I don't need more of those :)
ognarb 2y ago
Since planet.kde.org is mentioned, it's super easy to create something similar with a bit of python and a static site generator like Hugo :) https://invent.kde.org/websites/planet-kde-org/-/blob/master/scripts/custom_generation.py?ref_type=heads https://invent.kde.org/websites/planet-kde-org/-/blob/master...

qudat 2y ago

If anyone needs an rss-to-email service, check out https://pico.sh/feeds https://pico.sh/feeds

vishnu_ks 2y ago

Do try https://diff.blog https://diff.blog which is an aggregator of developer blogs which I built around 5 years back. diff.blog tracks over 2000 dev blogs at the moment. And you can also follow blogs and topics.

mococa 2y ago

+ for Reeder for macOS and iOS I follow several feeds and Youtube channels. Reeder have a very smooth experience.

fevangelou 2y ago

A handy bookmarklet to find & preview any site's feed (before subscribing): https://feedreader.xyz https://feedreader.xyz

domysee 2y ago
Similar tool here: https://lighthouseapp.io/tools/feed-finder https://lighthouseapp.io/tools/feed-finder Finds feeds even if they're not RSS autodiscoverable. Everything it does is described here: https://lighthouseapp.io/blog/deep-dive-finding-rss-feeds https://lighthouseapp.io/blog/deep-dive-finding-rss-feeds

frobnic 2y ago

Try Rss-Bridge [1] when the website does not have any feed, it might have an integration already. It also supports custom CSS-selectors to create feeds, or even use SEO-Sitemaps for your advantage to generate a feed from it. [1] https://github.com/RSS-Bridge/rss-bridge https://github.com/RSS-Bridge/rss-bridge

janice1999 2y ago

I see PolitePol mentioned. What do people use to run scrapers to generate RSS feeds themselves for sites without them? Do you self host scrapers?

dagurp 2y ago
I do. Just a raspberry pi with nginx and a cron job that runs python scripts. I'm not into AI but writing those scripts is boring so chatgpt is perfect for this.
Havoc 2y ago
There is one called rssbridge or something that can do that

PaulHoule 2y ago

The hate for algorithms boggles my mind. Chronological feeds are awful. You'll never see anything from the people who post occasionally because they get drowned out by the people who are posting all the time. There may be some algorithms that deliberately magnify hate because that's a way to increase engagement, but if you want to create one of those algorithms you can make a training set based on chronological feed + boosting/retweets/reposts. I'm amazed at how people keep making failing RSS readers that keep failing with the same failing user interfaces that have been failing since 1999; everybody knows RSS has been failing but they never ask why or if we have a choice. We still see the readers that make you mark things as read, that take their cues from email and newsreaders, that, when you subscribe to N feeds show you N boxes with a list of items, etc. My RSS reader works like TikTok because I'm not afraid of algorithms.

beej71 2y ago
I prefer time-based feeds, but that's just me. I don't think people are objecting to suggestive feeds in general; they're objecting to suggestive feeds whose primary objective is to keep you scrolling for as long as humanly possible to maximize company revenue. That's simply not what I want to do with my day. I'd train my own if I wanted to go that route.
- PaulHoule 2y ago
  The problem with time based feeds is this. You can read x articles a day; your system ingests y articles a day. x=y is perfect but requires close-to-perfect balance (if x=0.9y to 1.1y maybe you can adjust your reading habit to your your feed) if x>y then your system isn't showing you enough, if y<x you are going to miss things you subscribe to based on some arbitrary or random characteristic. With an algorithmic feed of some kind you choose to read x items a day, your system shows you the best x items a day out of y based on some set of criteria and constraints. These things are common sense but seemingly nonsensical to a lot of people. For instance our impoverished rights-based discourse (see [1]) about "free speech" presupposes that 100% of people can read 100% of what everybody else posts, realistically platforms can only show people some fraction of what gets posted so one thing is going to get more visibility and other things get less and that's a choice -- it could be random but it's still a choice. (As Rush would put it, "if you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice") I think the discussion is so impoverished that we never hear that an algorithm could choose to do anything other than maximize profits for a platform, when in fact that is just one thing an algorithm could do out of countless options. [1] https://www.amazon.com/Rights-Talk-Impoverishment-Political-Discourse/dp/0029118239 https://www.amazon.com/Rights-Talk-Impoverishment-Political-...

edoceo 2y ago

I love RSS but how can we get more of it? Walled-ish gardens seem to dominate. Many good producers are on platforms that just don't syndicate. What kind of pressure can we, consumers, put on?

tap-snap-or-nap 2y ago
Request good producers to use platforms that syndicate.
jefurii 2y ago
If they're not using an RSS-capable platform maybe they're not so great?
ColinWright 2y ago
Every Mastodon account automatically has an RSS feed ... just append ".rss" to the account name: https://mathstodon.xyz/@ColinTheMathmo.rss https://mathstodon.xyz/@ColinTheMathmo.rss

openrisk 2y ago

An advanced RSS reader/browser could bring back the magic of the web.

xrd 2y ago
What does an advanced reader look like in your mind?
- openrisk 2y ago
  1. Convergent desktop/mobile app that syncs between devices (open source and local) 2. Performant for large numbers of feeds 3. Integrated browser and automagical discovery and organization of feeds while you browse 4. Multiple taxonomies and viewing layout options, chronological, by subject etc 5. Advanced filtering by keywords 6. Transparent and pluggable locally runing algorithms to track usage and inform the user of patterns and if desired adjust presentation In a sense an advanced RSS 'reader' is what the web "browser" should have evolved to. There is really no real boundary between these two clients. An advanced RSS reader is essentially a more dynamic browser that queries the internet in more ways that the user-initiated visit of a bookmarked url or typing something into a search form.
  - xrd 2y ago
    Great summary. I'm using a combination of FreshRSS (self-hosted) and Readrops (for Android). I feel like #1 is handled by this combination. But, I wonder what convergent means here for you? I don't notice any performance issues. But, this feels like a simple task for a bunch of RSS feeds. Did you notice performance issues with other readers? There is something very interesting about what you call "automagical discovery." To me this is the biggest hole in my RSS experience. I want something that gives me magical discovery within the feeds I have based on my reading experiences. I subscribe to a lot of feeds because of one article, and then don't care about 90% of the other articles, but there are 10% that I do really want to read, but don't have the focus to find them. Is that what you mean by automagical? Why do you want #4? Filtering by keywords seems interesting. FreshRSS has a bunch of analytics that comes with the server. I never really use it, but it is interesting. I would be happy to share what I can see based on my limited usage over a few months if this would serve your purposes. I would be interested in understanding what you mean by that. The one thing I wish I had in my current setup is a way to take notes in a centralized way. When I'm on Android, I suppose I can copy and use a share intent. And, on a browser, I could install an extension to do that. But, it feels like that is an interesting opportunity for someone. I wish FreshRSS could layer a JavaScript app on posts, for example, and then I could build whatever I want. It has an extension API, but strangely documented. Thanks!

quinto_quarto 2y ago

i built this site (https://fanzine.world https://fanzine.world) to help people discover micro-creators and share their top 5 faves. not sure what to do with it. maybe someone here has a suggestion?

geor9e 2y ago

Feedbro is my favorite reader.

pyromaker 2y ago

Is RSS really coming back? :) (you'll say it was never gone!) Lots of RSS related posts and comments recently. I've released Mashups a few weeks ago. https://www.mashups.io https://www.mashups.io It's yahoo pipes clone - so you can mix and filter RSS feeds that you want.

RamblingCTO 2y ago
awesome! good luck

pigeons 2y ago

I need to find some way to see a chronological feed of what people I am friends with on facebook post. I literally get randomly suggested posts from unrelated accounts, and scrolling through them all will start to repeat them, never showing me content from some people who are actual friend connections.

BugsHack 2y ago
Try this: https://www.facebook.com/?filter=friends&sk=h_chr https://www.facebook.com/?filter=friends&sk=h_chr
- pigeons 2y ago
  Thanks!
Beijinger 2y ago
You need this: https://socialfixer.com/ https://socialfixer.com/ At socialfixer, options, hide post put everything that should disappear follow reals etc.. I am not on my laptop otherwise I would post my block list here.

ColinWright 2y ago

Every Mastodon account automatically has an RSS feed ... just append ".rss" to the account name: https://mathstodon.xyz/@ColinTheMathmo.rss https://mathstodon.xyz/@ColinTheMathmo.rss

xyst 2y ago

RSS feeds, so underrated. Rediscovering RSS and adding my YT subs as RSS feeds feels so liberating. Plus, RSS feeds combines the reg videos + short videos into single feed.

rubicks 2y ago

Relevant: https://newsboat.org/ https://newsboat.org/ If you like your email in mutt, then you'll probably like your feeds in newsboat.

OisinMoran 2y ago

I love this! I'm trying to build a new corner of the old web with my social link sharing site https://lynkmi.com https://lynkmi.com, and every tag automatically has an RSS feed so you don't need to know anything about them to set one up, or even need an account to follow one. The main idea is instead of following everything a person posts you can just follow a subset of their interests. So if I post about Irish Dairy Innovations [0] and also about Advice [1] you can follow whichever combination of those you like. If you'd like to sign up, my email is in my bio. And if you don't want to sign up, my email is still in my bio. [0] https://lynkmi.com/oisin/Irish%2520dairy%2520innovation https://lynkmi.com/oisin/Irish%2520dairy%2520innovation [1] https://lynkmi.com/oisin/advice https://lynkmi.com/oisin/advice

toofy 2y ago

i would love to see Bluesky add RSS to user feeds the same way Mastodon does by just adding /rss to the end of the url. it really is rad to add my most read users to the feed.

xavdid 2y ago
Bluesky supports them! If you append `/rss` to any profile, it redirects to a feed. e.g.: https://bsky.app/profile/xavd.id https://bsky.app/profile/xavd.id -> https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:fp2izjrrcsbsqphlu7f5sixa/rss https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:fp2izjrrcsbsqphlu7f5sixa/rs... More info: https://openrss.org/blog/bluesky-has-launched-rss-feeds https://openrss.org/blog/bluesky-has-launched-rss-feeds

aboardRat4 2y ago

I've been trying to make it work for ages, but it's not going to work. "News" are not actually that easy to automate as in "serialising posts". Big companies are experimenting with UI all the time for a reason. Especially because it would involve a lot of heuristics.

renegat0x0 2y ago

ooooh I so escaped walled gardens. I use my own set of domains to find places on the internet [0]. A working example how it could be used is at [1]. It is a domain viewer in javascript. I also use my own RSS client [2] that stores all links in [3], but don't get me wrong, I also have my storage for bookmarks [4] Links: [0] https://github.com/rumca-js/Internet-Places-Database https://github.com/rumca-js/Internet-Places-Database [1] https://rumca-js.github.io/quickstart/public/static_lists/viewerzip.html?file=top https://rumca-js.github.io/quickstart/public/static_lists/vi... [2] https://github.com/rumca-js/Django-link-archive https://github.com/rumca-js/Django-link-archive [3] https://github.com/rumca-js/RSS-Link-Database-2025 https://github.com/rumca-js/RSS-Link-Database-2025 [4] https://github.com/rumca-js/RSS-Link-Database https://github.com/rumca-js/RSS-Link-Database

domysee 2y ago

Really great to see so many RSS stories recently. I'm working on a feed reader, called Lighthouse (https://lighthouseapp.io/ https://lighthouseapp.io/). It combines RSS feeds with read-it-later, by putting new content into Inbox, where you can either archive or bookmark. Bookmarked content shows up in Library. It's fantastic for content curation.

sys_64738 2y ago

There's also https://brutalist.report https://brutalist.report

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