Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Here's Why Google Reader Really Got the Axe

wired.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 43 posts

Re: Here's Why Google Reader Really Got the Axe

#11

Post by ProblemFactory »

> “Users with smartphones and tablets are consuming news in bits and bites throughout the course of the day — replacing the old standard behaviors of news consumption over breakfast along with a leisurely read at the end of the day.”

This is precisely why Google Reader is a valuable tool. I subscribe to the belief that if an article is not worth reading 2 weeks later, it's not worth reading at all.

Facebook, Twitter, HN and Reddit require checking multiple times per day to make sure you don't miss good posts. Google Reader lets me review blog posts once a week, and prioritise reading by the source, not freshness of the content.

Re: Here's Why Google Reader Really Got the Axe

#13

Post by sjs1234 »

jinushaun wrote: post #7

How is Reader passive versus Twitter and G+? It's completely active because you have to sift through hundreds of items and you have to decide what's important and interesting enough to share. That's a lot of work by the user. Passive news consumption is not Reader, but Twitter-like services where "interesting" articles are pushed to you. Twitter also doesn't have an unread count, so you only see what's shared recentl…

It is 'passive' from google's point of view. You are neither producing marketing signals, nor frequent marketing opportunities. It is all utility to the user and lost opportunity to G+.

Re: Here's Why Google Reader Really Got the Axe

#14

Post by mindcrime »

jacques_chester wrote: post #10
jinushaun wrote: post #7

How is Reader passive versus Twitter and G+? It's completely active because you have to sift through hundreds of items and you have to decide what's important and interesting enough to share. That's a lot of work by the user. Passive news consumption is not Reader, but Twitter-like services where "interesting" articles are pushed to you. Twitter also doesn't have an unread count, so you only see what's shared recentl…

Welcome to the mid 1990s, when the sexy new "Push technology" was going to kill the fusty old "Pull technology". Pointcast was an Internet darling and people thought HTTP was due to be taken to the knacker's any day. That being said, bad ideas from the 1990s internet have a bad habit of being reinvented as multi-zillion dollar startups. I guess I need to start reading old copies of Wired for inspiration.

That being said, bad ideas from the 1990s internet have a bad habit of being reinvented as multi-zillion dollar startups. I guess I need to start reading old copies of Wired for inspiration.

Funny you would say that. I (among a lot of other people) have certainly noticed how cyclical this industry is; and I also think that it's very easy for a technology to fail, not because there's anything wrong with it, but just because it's "too early".

And as it happens, I have this bad habit of saving old magazines - so I actually do have a rather large collection of old issues of things like Wired, Red Herring, Business 2.0, Infoworld, ComputerWorld, Information Week, etc. packed away in a closet somewhere. I actually am thinking about digging a box of those out one day, and spending a few hours just poring over old issues, trawling for ideas and inspiration.

In fact, now that you mentioned this and reminded me of thread of thought, I think I might just do that this weekend.

Re: Here's Why Google Reader Really Got the Axe

#15

Post by chaz »

RSS peaked in 2006 and has been dying since. I suspect it was from the rise of social networks. Though not a replacement feature-wise, social networks have been competing for time and attention from users since day 1, and RSS readers lost. Google Reader was too late to a declining trend, and it was just a matter of time before it was going to get killed off anyway.

http://www.google.com/trends/explore?q=rss#q=rss&cmpt=q

Re: Here's Why Google Reader Really Got the Axe

#16

Post by jacques_chester »

mindcrime wrote: post #14
jacques_chester wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Welcome to the mid 1990s, when the sexy new "Push technology" was going to kill the fusty old "Pull technology". Pointcast was an Internet darling and people thought HTTP was due to be taken to the knacker's any day. That being said, bad ideas from the 1990s internet have a bad habit of being reinvented as multi-zillion dollar startups. I guess I need to start reading old copies of Wired for inspiration.

That being said, bad ideas from the 1990s internet have a bad habit of being reinvented as multi-zillion dollar startups. I guess I need to start reading old copies of Wired for inspiration. Funny you would say that. I (among a lot of other people) have certainly noticed how cyclical this industry is; and I also think that it's very easy for a technology to fail, not because there's anything wrong with it, but just b…

Let me know if you need to hire people who remember the 90s. I am ready to wear pastel coloured t-shirts, too-loose trousers and wander around the office saying "GBQ" instead of "traction".

Re: Here's Why Google Reader Really Got the Axe

#18

Post by gridmaths »

jinushaun wrote: post #7

How is Reader passive versus Twitter and G+? It's completely active because you have to sift through hundreds of items and you have to decide what's important and interesting enough to share. That's a lot of work by the user. Passive news consumption is not Reader, but Twitter-like services where "interesting" articles are pushed to you. Twitter also doesn't have an unread count, so you only see what's shared recentl…

If I could take rss feeds from the N web sites I like to get new from, and pipe/merge/filter that into a live twitter stream.

that would be kind of useful.

If I could share that with my cabal, and use the clicks or upvotes to optimize the stream, that would be nice.

hmm..

Re: Here's Why Google Reader Really Got the Axe

#19

Post by Mithaldu »

chaz wrote: post #15

RSS peaked in 2006 and has been dying since. I suspect it was from the rise of social networks. Though not a replacement feature-wise, social networks have been competing for time and attention from users since day 1, and RSS readers lost. Google Reader was too late to a declining trend, and it was just a matter of time before it was going to get killed off anyway. http://www.google.com/trends/explore?q=rss#q=rss&cmp…

Using Google Trends to try to divine how "alive" something is is fruitless, as the graphs you get are displaying the percentage of all internet searches that that use that term. Since the internet is constantly growing and new terms are being added all the time, it is impossible to say whether a declining graph on google trends means that absolute number of searches are going down or up.

Re: Here's Why Google Reader Really Got the Axe

#20

Post by jmduke »

ProblemFactory wrote: post #11

> “Users with smartphones and tablets are consuming news in bits and bites throughout the course of the day — replacing the old standard behaviors of news consumption over breakfast along with a leisurely read at the end of the day.” This is precisely why Google Reader is a valuable tool. I subscribe to the belief that if an article is not worth reading 2 weeks later, it's not worth reading at all. Facebook, Twitter,…

> I subscribe to the belief that if an article is not worth reading 2 weeks later, it's not worth reading at all.

I realized that I had been spending upwards of two hours a day reading non-programming articles (the liked of Wired, TechCrunch, ATD, etc.) and then also spending the evening wondering where all my time had gone.

I started shunning all those articles (I keep reading HN and programming articles in general because I think they're much more valuable to my future) and started spending two hours in the evening reading books (currently trudging through The Brothers Karamazov) instead. After two weeks, it feels like I'm giving my brain a nice chicken caesar salad instead of a Big Mac.

Post reply on HN