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I think that "market demands" is a bit of a misnomer. RSS was (and remains) too tech-y for the mainstream.

If browser vendors had made it easy for mainstream users, would there have been as much "market demand"?

Between killing off Google Reader and failing to support RSS/Atom, Google handed social media to Facebook et al.

[glenstein]

Exactly, those changes which I believe were done at the time to create space for Google Plus (which I think in an alternative reality with some different choices and different execution could very well have been a relevant entrant into the social media space).

It involved driving a steak through the heart of Google reader. Perhaps the most widely used RSS reader on the planet, and ripple effects that led to the de-emphasis of RSS across the internet. Starting the historical timeline after those choices in summarizing it as an absence of market demand overlooks the fact that intentional choices were made on this front to roll it back rather than to emphasize it and make it accessible.

[charcircuit]

The writing was already on the wall by the time Google Reader shutdown.

>usage of Google Reader has declined

https://googlereader.blogspot.com/2013/03/powering-down-goog...

[glenstein]

I would respectfully disagree in the following sense: I think the choice to shut down Google Reader and deprioritize RSS across the Google ecosystem (including the browser) did more to impact the trajectory of RSS than whatever was already in motion prior to the Reader shutdown.

And the same is true in the other direction, I want RSS to be a success but that would hinge on affirmative choices by major actors in the space choosing to sustain it.