RSS feeds
I’ve been watching a discussion take place online the last few days, and now I feel the need to put my 2 cents in. It started with Marc Canter saying that almost nobody reads blogs anymore because of RSS feeds. Then Evan disagreed, and today I noticed Tim Lutero getting into the act by saying that feeds don’t replace personal weblogs and some blogs are better read in the browser.
I think Tim’s about right. Certainly some blogs are better when you take in the whole thing and not just the RSS feed. In fact, I think most blogs are better that way, because you can see more than just the posts, you get the comments, you get to see who this person lists in their blogroll, you get to see all the “extras” that this person deems important, maybe a webcam shot, or links to their favorite non-blog sites, etc. There’s a lot you miss by only reading in the aggregator. On the other hand, at work, and on my laptop, my time is limited and being able to pull RSS feeds is a very nice option to have. When I’m home on my desktop and time is not an issue, I don’t really use the feeds all that often. I prefer to surf to all the sites and enjoy everything about them.
The important thing is having options. Read the content the way that makes the most sense for you, and the way you want to. It’s all about options, and options are good!
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