The power of the RSS reader

Personally, I have different labels. I have a high volume label that I nuke with impunity, then another label with low volume feeds that I treat more like Marco describes in tfa.

This lets me keep up with all of those low volume feeds, but also skim the daily news when I have time.

I also prune my feeds pretty aggressively.

This is probably a much fiddlier setup than most people will want, but really so is any RSS reader.

Re: The power of the RSS reader

#5

Post by eridius » Tue, Mar 26, 2013, 6:08 PM UTC

mathOne, all your comments seem to be [dead].

Re: The power of the RSS reader

#6

Post by jcurbo » Tue, Mar 26, 2013, 6:11 PM UTC

This exactly matches my use case for RSS. High volume daily websites - like HN - I read directly. I went through a phase where I tried to read HN via RSS (in Google Reader) and for me it wasn't better than just hitting HN directly.

But for the kind of sites Marco mentions (which I read most of, actually) that update on a semi-daily or weekly basis, RSS readers are perfect because I don't want to go and visit those pages individually just to see they don't have any updates. Typically those sites are narrowly-focused personal/organizational blogs in areas I am interested in.

Re: The power of the RSS reader

#7

Post by monsur » Tue, Mar 26, 2013, 6:16 PM UTC

This is precisely why I like Fever as an RSS reader. Fever lets you separate feeds into low-volume kindling and high-volume sparks. Kindling are the feeds you want to keep up with regularly, while items that are mentioned across Sparks bubble up to the top (Its like having your own personal Hacker News).

Re: The power of the RSS reader

#8

Post by sbarre » Tue, Mar 26, 2013, 6:16 PM UTC

joebadmo wrote: post #4

Personally, I have different labels. I have a high volume label that I nuke with impunity, then another label with low volume feeds that I treat more like Marco describes in tfa. This lets me keep up with all of those low volume feeds, but also skim the daily news when I have time. I also prune my feeds pretty aggressively. This is probably a much fiddlier setup than most people will want, but really so is any RSS re…

Yeah he lost me when he started saying that I'm doing it wrong just because I subscribe to high-volume feeds..

Years ago I came across someone's excellent strategy for organizing Google Reader under two top-level groups:

  * Must Read
  * Can Miss

Under those 2 labels I have other classifications, but those are the two main groups that all my feeds fall under.

The low-volume or high-importance feeds go into "Must Read" and the rest goes into "Can Miss".. Can Miss is for skimming, for catching up on the last few days of high-volume feeds or just for finding something to read through when I'm bored..

I regularly hit "Mark all as Read" on the "Can Miss" group, and I don't feel bad about it for a second, nor do I feel like I am somehow using RSS incorrectly.

But the "Must Read" label contains feeds that I really want to make sure I read all of, or don't miss anything from.. Like infrequently updated blogs, security update RSS feeds, some serial web comics or web shorts, etc.. In the last several years I don't think I've even once hit "Mark all as Read" in that label.

So while I agree that if your current approach to RSS is leading you to ignore most of what ends up in your reader, you might need a different approach, but that approach doesn't have to be "don't use RSS".

Re: The power of the RSS reader

#9

Post by jrkelly » Tue, Mar 26, 2013, 6:22 PM UTC

jcurbo wrote: post #6

This exactly matches my use case for RSS. High volume daily websites - like HN - I read directly. I went through a phase where I tried to read HN via RSS (in Google Reader) and for me it wasn't better than just hitting HN directly. But for the kind of sites Marco mentions (which I read most of, actually) that update on a semi-daily or weekly basis, RSS readers are perfect because I don't want to go and visit those pa…

Could not agree more, this is the exact use case for the 'power users' of RSS. And he is right that without RSS I don't know how these low-posting-frequency sites would keep their readership. If I had to give up one, I'd give up twitter or hackernews long before that low-frequency RSS feed. Those posts are gold and for niche subjects (I'm into bio) there is no where else they are aggregated.

Re: The power of the RSS reader

#10

Post by gtCameron » Tue, Mar 26, 2013, 6:22 PM UTC

Ironically, I use IFTTT to read the RSS and push sites like what he is describing into Instapaper. You lose the by-site organization of it, but if you don't overdo it you end up with a nice small selection of things to read every day when you fire up Instapaper.