8 ms·

I agree, but with a caveat. Google closing reader wasn't RSS' tombstone, for sure. Rss is stronger than ever and, as pointed out in the article, it's still wid

I agree, but with a caveat. Google closing reader wasn't RSS' tombstone, for sure. Rss is stronger than ever and, as pointed out in the article, it's still widely used by small and big players on the Web. Unfortunately Google Reader was the gateway into the RSS realm for those folks who just wanted a quick way to keep track of their news. For those folks, who aren't certainly programmer nor can appreciate the subtleties of RSS' survival, RSS is definitively dead. Those folks are the vast majority of Web users. I think we may say that the most popular front-end usage of RSS has died when Google closed reader. I don't agree with the void-to-be-filled theory, because that void has been quickly filled already by Twitter, Facebook and other self-sufficing, closed and mind numbing services that have nothing to do with the fluid open nature of RSS. Many many users have quickly shifted to that mindset and they won't be back. Do you think those millions of BuzzFeed reader can give a crap about RSS? So yeah, you can archive google reader closing shop in the "google's unforgivable mistake" directory. Source: I'm a web editor (not for English speaking websites as you may have understood) since 2006. I've seen the shift all happen under my eyes. It's sort of disgusting.

moggie 13y ago
What's to stop—not slow down, but stop some one or ones from, so to speak, turning the tide with regard to RSS's adoption by the tech-indifferent? What mindset was there to begin with prior to the shift to Twitter, et.al? Also, please, will you elaborate on the shift?
- pjc50 13y ago
  RSS won't be adopted by the tech-indifferent because it's a technology. It's not a service or a company and therefore doesn't have anyone with a vested financial interest pushing it as a platform. Also, it doesn't fit into the advertising-funded clickbaity world. It's therefore only adopted by people who think about what they are doing and what they want out of their internet, rather than people following the shiny path of least resistance and most popularity.
  - moggie 13y ago
    I'm in agreement. (My mistake on using adopt when it was probably better to say "use".)
weland 13y ago
> Unfortunately Google Reader was the gateway into the RSS realm for those folks who just wanted a quick way to keep track of their news I confess: I literally cannot understand this. There must be a thousand RSS readers, many of them allowing at least some privacy, some of them by e.g. not running on a remote server, which also means their existence and usefulness does not depend on someone always being kind enough not to pull the plug. What the bloody hell was so special about Google Reader?
- nanofortnight 13y ago
  Ease of use. Not everybody wants to setup an RSS reader (or knows what one is).
  - weland 13y ago
    But setting up an RSS reader is no different from installing any application. For crying out loud, that means going to an app store for much of the RSS-reading Internet or clicking next, next and finish for the rest of it. I know I sound like an elitist schmuck when I say it, but I'm increasingly starting to think all this ease-of-use thing is getting a bit out of hand. If there are people are willing to sacrifice performance (Google Reader's UI was slower than Liferea's first versions, and that's something!), privacy and reliability (an installed RSS reader does always work, as opposed to a public, remote service, ran by an advertising company) just because clicking "Install" is hard for them, I honestly wish all these bad, evil companies they're outraged about mine the shit out of them, from their eye color to the size of their underwear. I get legitimate cases (e.g. you're behind company firewall and you're on your work computer so you can't install anything), but installing a program really shouldn't be a difficult task otherwise.
    - edanm 13y ago
      While I get the sentiment, I'm thankful that you don't run the world. Most computer users forget that they have years and years of experience with computers, because they actually played with computers for their own fun for years. So the things that seem drop-dead simple for them are drop-dead simple if you have years of experience. I'm certainly thankful my doctor has never told me "you know, if you can't be bothered to understand biology, I'll just let the diseases kill you", when he has 7+ years of knowledge that I don't.
onion2k 13y ago
It'd be very interesting for a major player like Wordpress.com or Feedburner to release some statistics on the number of view their feeds actually get now compared to, say, 5 years ago. I suspect your "stronger than ever" is not backed up by the evidence.
chippy 13y ago
People forget about the social element of Google Reader. It never took off - the ability to follow your friends and see what they are reading - to share articles with contacts etc. I'd have liked more leveraging of the social graph with that app - they missed an opportunity
- alxndr 13y ago
  I believe that's a central feature of NewsBlur now. I use InoReader primarily because it de-emphasizes the social element; it's something I don't feel the need to use. It does still have an option to view "trending" content across (presumably) all users' subscriptions, it's just not in your face if you don't want it.
greggman 13y ago
Millions of non-geeks subscribe to podcasts. Those podcasts are delivered, (notification of new podcast), through RSS. The user doesn't have to know they are using RSS. They just download install any podcast app from the app store or the play store and search for podcasts inside the app. The fact that RSS is what makes it work is irrelevant to them but it does make it work. I suspect it also powers things like Flipboard and Zite (no idea of people still use those).
jerf 13y ago
"that void has been quickly filled already by Twitter, Facebook and other self-sufficing, closed and mind numbing services that have nothing to do with the fluid open nature of RSS." RSS was there before Facebook and Twitter. RSS will be there after Facebook and Twitter. One of the neat things about RSS is that I don't have to care whether it's the Most Popular Thing. I just need a reader, and someone publishing it. No "boil the ocean" required. I used RSS back when the number of publishers could be counted in the dozens. It was still a useful technology! If you're then inclined to argue "but what if everyone stops publishing it?", a "boil the ocean" of its own, my response is that I'll worry about that when it happens. That would take a lot of people to stop publishing it, and... in modern times, it's so easy to publish RSS, and you own it, not like your Twitter or Facebook integration, so I don't expect the value proposition to go sour for everyone for a long time. (And I don't really have to worry about all the readers going belly up, there's enough open-source desktop readers if nothing else. To say nothing of the open source server-delpoyable ones.)
- untog 13y ago
  just need a reader, and someone publishing it. But publishing it takes effort, and if usage isn't high enough people might stop.
  - jerf 13y ago
    It takes effort proportional to the number of content creation methods, though, not proportional to the amount of content. On an amortized basis the effort is tiny, and the gain is often greater than the cost. Even if you want to argue the gain is tiny itself. And, frankly, that's already a dubious claim and getting more dubious. An RSS subscriber is very "stickied", and thus very valuable in a lot of ways. I mean that even beyond mere money. A lot of the other putatively "better" approaches are a great deal less powerful, again, because you don't own it, the "better" service does. Witness the way Facebook decides whether or not your "subscribers" get to see your posts, making them a great deal less valuable than an RSS-subscribed reader. I expect this to play out over and over, and for RSS to retain its position of indicating "I am a serious subscriber" for a good long time. Facebook et al can offer you a better short-term outcome, but as such things scale up, the incentives pretty inevitably turn towards trying to capture the value of your subscriber base themselves. RSS disintermediates that fairly successfully. And since nothing particularly stops you from offering that on the side... why not?

moggie 13y ago

What's to stop—not slow down, but stop some one or ones from, so to speak, turning the tide with regard to RSS's adoption by the tech-indifferent? What mindset was there to begin with prior to the shift to Twitter, et.al? Also, please, will you elaborate on the shift?

pjc50 13y ago
RSS won't be adopted by the tech-indifferent because it's a technology. It's not a service or a company and therefore doesn't have anyone with a vested financial interest pushing it as a platform. Also, it doesn't fit into the advertising-funded clickbaity world. It's therefore only adopted by people who think about what they are doing and what they want out of their internet, rather than people following the shiny path of least resistance and most popularity.
- moggie 13y ago
  I'm in agreement. (My mistake on using adopt when it was probably better to say "use".)

weland 13y ago

> Unfortunately Google Reader was the gateway into the RSS realm for those folks who just wanted a quick way to keep track of their news I confess: I literally cannot understand this. There must be a thousand RSS readers, many of them allowing at least some privacy, some of them by e.g. not running on a remote server, which also means their existence and usefulness does not depend on someone always being kind enough not to pull the plug. What the bloody hell was so special about Google Reader?

nanofortnight 13y ago
Ease of use. Not everybody wants to setup an RSS reader (or knows what one is).
- weland 13y ago
  But setting up an RSS reader is no different from installing any application. For crying out loud, that means going to an app store for much of the RSS-reading Internet or clicking next, next and finish for the rest of it. I know I sound like an elitist schmuck when I say it, but I'm increasingly starting to think all this ease-of-use thing is getting a bit out of hand. If there are people are willing to sacrifice performance (Google Reader's UI was slower than Liferea's first versions, and that's something!), privacy and reliability (an installed RSS reader does always work, as opposed to a public, remote service, ran by an advertising company) just because clicking "Install" is hard for them, I honestly wish all these bad, evil companies they're outraged about mine the shit out of them, from their eye color to the size of their underwear. I get legitimate cases (e.g. you're behind company firewall and you're on your work computer so you can't install anything), but installing a program really shouldn't be a difficult task otherwise.
  - edanm 13y ago
    While I get the sentiment, I'm thankful that you don't run the world. Most computer users forget that they have years and years of experience with computers, because they actually played with computers for their own fun for years. So the things that seem drop-dead simple for them are drop-dead simple if you have years of experience. I'm certainly thankful my doctor has never told me "you know, if you can't be bothered to understand biology, I'll just let the diseases kill you", when he has 7+ years of knowledge that I don't.

onion2k 13y ago

It'd be very interesting for a major player like Wordpress.com or Feedburner to release some statistics on the number of view their feeds actually get now compared to, say, 5 years ago. I suspect your "stronger than ever" is not backed up by the evidence.

chippy 13y ago

People forget about the social element of Google Reader. It never took off - the ability to follow your friends and see what they are reading - to share articles with contacts etc. I'd have liked more leveraging of the social graph with that app - they missed an opportunity

alxndr 13y ago
I believe that's a central feature of NewsBlur now. I use InoReader primarily because it de-emphasizes the social element; it's something I don't feel the need to use. It does still have an option to view "trending" content across (presumably) all users' subscriptions, it's just not in your face if you don't want it.

greggman 13y ago

Millions of non-geeks subscribe to podcasts. Those podcasts are delivered, (notification of new podcast), through RSS. The user doesn't have to know they are using RSS. They just download install any podcast app from the app store or the play store and search for podcasts inside the app. The fact that RSS is what makes it work is irrelevant to them but it does make it work. I suspect it also powers things like Flipboard and Zite (no idea of people still use those).

jerf 13y ago

"that void has been quickly filled already by Twitter, Facebook and other self-sufficing, closed and mind numbing services that have nothing to do with the fluid open nature of RSS." RSS was there before Facebook and Twitter. RSS will be there after Facebook and Twitter. One of the neat things about RSS is that I don't have to care whether it's the Most Popular Thing. I just need a reader, and someone publishing it. No "boil the ocean" required. I used RSS back when the number of publishers could be counted in the dozens. It was still a useful technology! If you're then inclined to argue "but what if everyone stops publishing it?", a "boil the ocean" of its own, my response is that I'll worry about that when it happens. That would take a lot of people to stop publishing it, and... in modern times, it's so easy to publish RSS, and you own it, not like your Twitter or Facebook integration, so I don't expect the value proposition to go sour for everyone for a long time. (And I don't really have to worry about all the readers going belly up, there's enough open-source desktop readers if nothing else. To say nothing of the open source server-delpoyable ones.)

untog 13y ago
just need a reader, and someone publishing it. But publishing it takes effort, and if usage isn't high enough people might stop.
- jerf 13y ago
  It takes effort proportional to the number of content creation methods, though, not proportional to the amount of content. On an amortized basis the effort is tiny, and the gain is often greater than the cost. Even if you want to argue the gain is tiny itself. And, frankly, that's already a dubious claim and getting more dubious. An RSS subscriber is very "stickied", and thus very valuable in a lot of ways. I mean that even beyond mere money. A lot of the other putatively "better" approaches are a great deal less powerful, again, because you don't own it, the "better" service does. Witness the way Facebook decides whether or not your "subscribers" get to see your posts, making them a great deal less valuable than an RSS-subscribed reader. I expect this to play out over and over, and for RSS to retain its position of indicating "I am a serious subscriber" for a good long time. Facebook et al can offer you a better short-term outcome, but as such things scale up, the incentives pretty inevitably turn towards trying to capture the value of your subscriber base themselves. RSS disintermediates that fairly successfully. And since nothing particularly stops you from offering that on the side... why not?