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RSS Is Better Than Twitter

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Re: RSS Is Better Than Twitter

#91

RSS is like articles without comment sections, completely pointless nowadays. If you can't read corrections, conflicting opinions for something, you might just as well go watch TV. The whole point of Twitter is that it's commentary, not a feed of published articles.

Hacker News, and similar sites (including Twitter), do a much better job of supporting commentary than any on-site comment system ever did.

Re: RSS Is Better Than Twitter

#92
post #80

I think part of the issue with RSS is the real pain of dealing with XML. I'm mildly cheering for something like https://jsonfeed.org - which would be a big step towards making a decentralized system more of a reality.

XML has worked just fine for RSS. The reason why RSS isn't as mainstream as it used to be around 2004 has nothing to do with XML, but is a consequence of Google capturing, than abandoning the audience, and of walled-garden social media taking off. Inventing a new JSON-based format in this niche is as helpful for adoption as matrix.org is for federated chat - it will only serve to fragment the space.

Re: RSS Is Better Than Twitter

#93
They're very different.

RSS only let you listen. And it only works if you already know who you want to listen to.

Twitter et al expose you to other content you're not already "following" by letting the people you do follow quickly push things in your eyeline.

But RSS is just a format for sharing data. There's no built-in client for having a conversation, for tracking conversations. You ultimately still need a point of centralisation (like HN) to talkk shit about the stuff you're reading.

All in, article is silly nonsense. Apples are way better than oranges.

Re: RSS Is Better Than Twitter

#94
post #50
post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow I never knew. I would have used it if I knew.

The "rss support" was a folder, filled with links named after the article titles. It was good that it was removed, as it was useless to put it mildly

> The "rss support" was a folder, filled with links named after the article titles.

You're describing the "live bookmarks" feature, which was only one part of the RSS functionality that was removed from Firefox. I never used live bookmarks, but I used the feed discovery and subscription functionality all the time -- only some of which can now be restored with addons.

Re: RSS Is Better Than Twitter

#95
post #69
post #3

I just wish Mozilla introduce subscribing to RSS as a first class feature in Firefox. If they can introduce and integrate Pocket, I think an open technology like RSS deserves a fair chance. But they'd need to invest a little bit to make it easy to subscribe—similar to following on Twitter/Instagram or Liking pages on Facebook—to receive site updates. Having to find and enter byzantine URLs is not the way to go althou…

> I just wish Mozilla introduce subscribing to RSS as a first class feature in Firefox. Fortunately, Thunderbird still has this feature.

I wrote about reading blogs with Thunderbird not long ago:

http://andregarzia.com/2018/11/reading-blogs-with-thunderbir...

I think a similar setup would be good for many people here who wish to read RSS but doesn't want to add another SaaS to their life.

Re: RSS Is Better Than Twitter

#96
post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've implemented displaying of blog posts comments in BazQux Reader ( https://bazqux.com ) years ago. But in general it works well only for niche sites with good communities. Popular sites have too many spam/bullshit in comments. BTW: it's possible to read Twitter in RSS reader too and make it a "slow web".

How are you fetching the comments? RSS has no support for that as far as I know.

RSS has for linking comments feed and for linking page with comments. Atom has or just for comment feeds.

And I'm visiting blog post pages first to check whether they have Disqus comments (which processed separately via Disqus API) and /feed feeds.

Re: RSS Is Better Than Twitter

#97
I love RSS feeds.

You can convert Twitter to RSS: http://twitrss.me

Websites that don't have RSS: https://feedity.com/

Email to RSS: https://zapier.com

Hackernews RSS:http://hnrss.org/newest?points=300

You can even use RSS for finding a job: https://www.indeed.ca/jobs?q=millwright&l=Toronto,+ON&sort=d...

Re: RSS Is Better Than Twitter

#98

Lately, I've been getting back into RSS to stay up to date with industry news. I've noticed a lot of industry blogs still support RSS. On Mac, I've been using Leaf with no real complaints. I've found many blogs happily serve rss content, even if a button isn't explicitly advertised. Some of the url's I'll try: * example.com/rss.xml * example.com/index.rss * example.com/?feed=rss * example.com/feed/ * exmample.com/fee…

I tend to just "View Source" and then search for "rss/feed/atom". There's usually a header in there pointing to one or more feeds.

Re: RSS Is Better Than Twitter

#99
post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I use the Awesome RSS addon [1] to get the icon in the URL bar back. Also RSSPreview [2] to see whether the feed actually contains what I want to subscribe to. The previous integration where you could add the feed to Thunderbird directly from Firefox with a single click was much better, though. [1] https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/awesome-rss/ [2] https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/rssprevie…

Thank you for the two add-on links. I would add Feed Preview [1] to the list. [1] https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/feed-preview/

Thank you for sharing this! I had not encountered an RSS addon with 'subscribe' functionality before. This addon basically restores everything I wish had not been removed from Firefox.

(It's a shame I couldn't have found this on my own. addons.mozilla.org is unbelievably bad for discovering useful addons. It takes a thread like this to turn you on to the good stuff.)

Re: RSS Is Better Than Twitter

#100

I love RSS feeds. You can convert Twitter to RSS: http://twitrss.me Websites that don't have RSS: https://feedity.com/ Email to RSS: https://zapier.com Hackernews RSS: http://hnrss.org/newest?points=300 You can even use RSS for finding a job: https://www.indeed.ca/jobs?q=millwright&l=Toronto,+ON&sort=d...

I work on a project which creates RSS feeds for sites which don't offer their own: Feed Creator - http://createfeed.fivefilters.org/

And one which converts partial feeds into full-text feeds: https://fivefilters.org/content-only/

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