6 ms·

Boy do I feel old if a short, low content PSA about the existence of RSS is considered "hacker news."

by k2enemy 1y ago

rufus_foreman 1y ago
You're one of today's unlucky 10,000.
senectus1 1y ago
I mean.. it shouldn't be controversial.. but people keep claiming rss is dead. not in my world it aint.
- nntwozz 1y ago
  Podcasts needs an RSS feed, that about sums it up how not dead it is.
- glenstein 1y ago
  Definitely not dead, thank goodness. I probably read 4-5 articles a day through RSS and skim through dozens. Even so it's no longer a de facto standard the way it used to be.
  - senectus1 1y ago
    haha, I skim through about 800 a day and read dozens of them. Every year around newyears time I trim it back, but it inevitably grows again.
- grep_name 1y ago
  I was extremely bummed when setting up RSS for the glance app to find that a bunch of stuff I'd assumed would just have RSS feeds, do not. Mostly local things that post regular updates to pages that already look like feeds. - Three local independent theaters - Every local venue I checked in my city (admittedly only checked a few I was specifically interested in) - The local dvd rental place (we still have one and it's neat. The announce their newer niche additions via an updating page) - My local folk school that hosts events and has an updated news page with no feed There were a few things I can't remember now that I was shocked to see regularly update pages with lists of updates that there is no way to subscribe to. I would have expected most of these sites to be built using some kind of automated tool that would just include rss or atom. I guess most of the offer email lists, which is a crappy way to get updates comparatively imo. I'm probably going to use a combination of changedetection.io and rss-bridge to get updates from these sites, but like, seriously?
  - imafikus 1y ago
    You can give notify-me.rs a try if you want as well. We have a free plan available, and we should be able to track all of the sites you mentioned. If you do give it a try, let me know what you think, since I'm one of the founders. Cheers!
    - sincarne 1y ago
      Something is up with your web page. It stutters when scrolling, and crashes my tab. I’m using Safari on an iPhone 14 Pro running iOS 18.6.2 (22G100). No content blockers or extensions.
user3939382 1y ago
RSS is the antidote to algorithm feeds. I’m glad for any mention of it. 90% of the tools users need were built 1970-2000 including RSS.
- 627467 1y ago
  Having restarted using rss in the past months (after probably 10+ years of not using it) i am now starting to remember why I stopped using it: lack of a personal "algorithm" that made hundreds (if not 1000s) of unread daily items to be manageable. I know part of it is on me. I need to let go, unsubscribe aggressively, etc... but this is... work? Im not a regular iOS user, but on it I have feeeeds which actually seem to have a sane personal "algorithm" of sorts that doesn't force ALL feeds items onto me, and also isn't purely chronological. More readers should have this
  - al_borland 1y ago
    The thing that made RSS work for me is to really limit my feeds. Instead of following 10 tech news sites that have a bunch of overlap, I follow 1 that has most of what I want. A few blogs are for apps I use and want to be informed of new information, but they post infrequently, which is good. Feed with dozens of posts per day turn into noise, especially if you have a lot of them. By choosing one site I trust, I let the editors edit, instead of the algorithm.
    - sewalsh 1y ago
      Yikes. I read THOUSANDS of RSS headlines on a daily basis. This is exactly why I use RSS. You can easily get a glimpse of headlines and keep browsing.
      - al_borland 1y ago
        That's the beauty of RSS, people can tailor it to their needs and wants. If I saw thousands of unread items, I'd shut down and give up. On the flip side, if you had my feed list, you'd probably feel like you were missing a ton of stuff. But we can both make it work for us. I did have a job where I got 10k email per day for a good 10 years, so I probably have some PTSD from that. I'd feel like I was right back there if I had thousands of items per day in my RSS reader. I've been out of that stage of my job for a good 8 years, and I'm just now starting to get a handle on my email again, after feeling like there was no way to control it for so long.
netule 1y ago
Not only that, but an ad for their mobile app. Pretty low quality content.
- al_borland 1y ago
  It’s not their app. NetNewsWire is developed by Brent Simmons and has been around for over 20 years. It’s free and open source. Last I saw, he didn’t even accept donations.
01HNNWZ0MV43FF 1y ago
Seen this? https://microformats.org/wiki/h-feed https://microformats.org/wiki/h-feed
cm2187 1y ago
Ask a junior at the office what is that "save"or "new directory" logo, or what "CC" stands for in an email, or what a dialup connection is!
lylo 1y ago
Anything that raises awareness of RSS to a new generation is a wonderful thing!

Boy do I feel old if a short, low content PSA about the existence of RSS is considered "hacker news."

rufus_foreman 1y ago

You're one of today's unlucky 10,000.

senectus1 1y ago

I mean.. it shouldn't be controversial.. but people keep claiming rss is dead. not in my world it aint.

nntwozz 1y ago
Podcasts needs an RSS feed, that about sums it up how not dead it is.
glenstein 1y ago
Definitely not dead, thank goodness. I probably read 4-5 articles a day through RSS and skim through dozens. Even so it's no longer a de facto standard the way it used to be.
- senectus1 1y ago
  haha, I skim through about 800 a day and read dozens of them. Every year around newyears time I trim it back, but it inevitably grows again.
grep_name 1y ago
I was extremely bummed when setting up RSS for the glance app to find that a bunch of stuff I'd assumed would just have RSS feeds, do not. Mostly local things that post regular updates to pages that already look like feeds. - Three local independent theaters - Every local venue I checked in my city (admittedly only checked a few I was specifically interested in) - The local dvd rental place (we still have one and it's neat. The announce their newer niche additions via an updating page) - My local folk school that hosts events and has an updated news page with no feed There were a few things I can't remember now that I was shocked to see regularly update pages with lists of updates that there is no way to subscribe to. I would have expected most of these sites to be built using some kind of automated tool that would just include rss or atom. I guess most of the offer email lists, which is a crappy way to get updates comparatively imo. I'm probably going to use a combination of changedetection.io and rss-bridge to get updates from these sites, but like, seriously?
- imafikus 1y ago
  You can give notify-me.rs a try if you want as well. We have a free plan available, and we should be able to track all of the sites you mentioned. If you do give it a try, let me know what you think, since I'm one of the founders. Cheers!
  - sincarne 1y ago
    Something is up with your web page. It stutters when scrolling, and crashes my tab. I’m using Safari on an iPhone 14 Pro running iOS 18.6.2 (22G100). No content blockers or extensions.

user3939382 1y ago

RSS is the antidote to algorithm feeds. I’m glad for any mention of it. 90% of the tools users need were built 1970-2000 including RSS.

627467 1y ago
Having restarted using rss in the past months (after probably 10+ years of not using it) i am now starting to remember why I stopped using it: lack of a personal "algorithm" that made hundreds (if not 1000s) of unread daily items to be manageable. I know part of it is on me. I need to let go, unsubscribe aggressively, etc... but this is... work? Im not a regular iOS user, but on it I have feeeeds which actually seem to have a sane personal "algorithm" of sorts that doesn't force ALL feeds items onto me, and also isn't purely chronological. More readers should have this
- al_borland 1y ago
  The thing that made RSS work for me is to really limit my feeds. Instead of following 10 tech news sites that have a bunch of overlap, I follow 1 that has most of what I want. A few blogs are for apps I use and want to be informed of new information, but they post infrequently, which is good. Feed with dozens of posts per day turn into noise, especially if you have a lot of them. By choosing one site I trust, I let the editors edit, instead of the algorithm.
  - sewalsh 1y ago
    Yikes. I read THOUSANDS of RSS headlines on a daily basis. This is exactly why I use RSS. You can easily get a glimpse of headlines and keep browsing.
    - al_borland 1y ago
      That's the beauty of RSS, people can tailor it to their needs and wants. If I saw thousands of unread items, I'd shut down and give up. On the flip side, if you had my feed list, you'd probably feel like you were missing a ton of stuff. But we can both make it work for us. I did have a job where I got 10k email per day for a good 10 years, so I probably have some PTSD from that. I'd feel like I was right back there if I had thousands of items per day in my RSS reader. I've been out of that stage of my job for a good 8 years, and I'm just now starting to get a handle on my email again, after feeling like there was no way to control it for so long.

netule 1y ago

Not only that, but an ad for their mobile app. Pretty low quality content.

al_borland 1y ago
It’s not their app. NetNewsWire is developed by Brent Simmons and has been around for over 20 years. It’s free and open source. Last I saw, he didn’t even accept donations.

01HNNWZ0MV43FF 1y ago

Seen this? https://microformats.org/wiki/h-feed https://microformats.org/wiki/h-feed

cm2187 1y ago

Ask a junior at the office what is that "save"or "new directory" logo, or what "CC" stands for in an email, or what a dialup connection is!

lylo 1y ago

Anything that raises awareness of RSS to a new generation is a wonderful thing!