I used to think Google's vision for Google Reader was to be a "content subscription" service, where anyone could "subscribe" to any site and get that content de

I used to think Google's vision for Google Reader was to be a "content subscription" service, where anyone could "subscribe" to any site and get that content delivered to them directly - like a Google Currents for any site: blogs, media, etc. "RSS" would be dropped as a concept, since the general Internet user has no idea what that is. Behind-the-scenes, it might still be used though, along with content crawling (something Google already does). The value to Google would be another data point on content ranking. For example, if someone subscribes to a site, that site must be of high value. Time-on-site (or time-on-article) might even be a useful proxy of how engaging that content is, as are tags, social shares, and other meta-actions a user could take on an article. But perhaps there isn't a big enough opportunity for Google to pursue that. Too bad. P.S. I'm not a Google Currents user. If I basically described Google Currents, then perhaps Google IS thinking about this. But then, why not merge Google Reader & Google Currents together?