Surviving Without Google Reader
RSS is dead, long live RSS
According to Google, I am a dying statistic.
âusage of Google Reader has declinedâ
My daily routine for the past four or five years has involved checking-in with Google Reader every morning and every evening to catch up on sites that I either donât visit (ex. Daring Fireball), or donât frequent enough to keep up with their onslaught of posts (ex. The Verge). To me, RSS is one of the, if not the, best Internet technologies invented. It gives me the freedom to procure my own âtop listâ of sites and read them like an Internet-newspaper digest whenever I please. So imagine my dismay when I see:
If you havenât heard, Google Reader will be âSunsettedâ on July 1st. To Googleâs credit I was able to take away a copy of my OPML subscriptions list, but as I discovered, thereâs few places to go.
Google simultaneously saved and killed the RSS reader market
Initially, I looked at services like Googleâs Currents, and Flipboard; and hated them. My issue with these services is I may as well just be using the content providers websites, as Google Reader has solidly bred me into the camp where I just want a list of headlines from every source ordered chronologically which I can J and K through. I also tried Feedly and signed up for Diggâs Reader, but Feedly left me feeling overwhelmed with features I didnât understand and werenât documented, and Digg still havenât rolled out their Reader due to what looks like issues with the service.
There are services like Sean Inmanâs Fever and Tiny Tiny RSS, but both are self-hosted and my current webspace provider doesnât allow me to use all the features they require, though running one of them on a RaspberryPi may prove an interesting summer project.
Giving up
Sadly, I did concede in the end and couldnât persevere to find a good solution. I uninstalled the Google Reader app from my phone and removed it from the default tabs on Chrome. My information glut has begun.
My only viable alternative for now has been to install Hacker News and Reddit apps, which I try to keep on top of at least 2-3 times a day, but sadly, much like it used to pre-Reader, news and information can just pass me by. (Luckily the big stuff like all the current Snowden malarky stays on the frontpages for long enough for me to pick up on.)
Asideâor âWhereâs my feed.xml file?â
On the topic of RSS but slightly aside from the main point; yes I am lacking an RSS feed for this site. Rest assured Iâm hacking away at a solution and should be committing it to the Git repo Soonâ˘.