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by baby 4839 days ago
It was a change of life for me too. But a bad one. Instead of checking my favorite websites separately I started checking a hundred websites.

I would eat information. I would get a new post every 30 seconds. I would spend my days just sitting at my desk and archiving what didn't seem of interest and read the rest.

After a few month I started realizing I wasn't enjoying what was written anymore. I wasn't enjoying visiting a website, its design, its UI (And I know the saying, we're not supposed to learn a new UI every time we browse a new website, but I like seeing a websites renovating its design, I like reading an article in its real environment )...

I decided to ditch it. I didn't need the technology. Nobody needed the technology. I didn't mind opening multiple tabs to check different websites.

I use bookmarks, multi row toolbar and tree style tab on Firefox and it's all I need for my big consumption. And I'm a power user. So imagine the normal users, why would they care about Google Reader?

2 comments

It doesn't help you. But that doesn't mean it's not useful.

I subscribe to about fifteen developer blogs that update only two or three times a year. Huge waste of time to visit their websites, but whenever anything important happens, I'll know.

I subscribe to the New York Times' main feed. I don't read most of the articles, but I'll flip through all of the headlines for ones that I want to look at. Much faster than the main site.

I'll Option-R right before I leave the house, so if I'm stuck without internet for a while (the cell phone connection is very spotty on a commute I make) I can still read the news and the blogs I'm interested in.

It doesn't fit your use case, but that doesn't mean no one needs RSS.

>I subscribe to about fifteen developer blogs that update only two or three times a year. Huge waste of time to visit their websites, but whenever anything important happens, I'll know.

This is the EXACT use case I desperately need it for.

I had this problem early on, but I started doing regular pruning. I only have 2-3 sources that update daily now, and the rest are weekly or monthly. I can consume a day's worth of feeds in about 10 minutes.