Blog Reading and YOU
Everyone who “surfs the net” (when will that metaphor go away?) has a routine of how they do it… some people first check email, facebook and twitter are next, then they hit up the blog circuit to catch up on everyone’s deepest darkest thoughts. Others have eBay auctions that get checked first and foremost, and still others log into AOL and live in that world. I’d like to talk about how people read blogs though, and possibly help some of you who might not be utilizing technology to its fullest.
There are two basic styles of blog reading. The oldschool and simple way is to save each blog as a bookmark and visit each individually to check and see if there has been any activity since you last checked. I did this for a long time. This is not bad.
The other way is to utilize a service that will bring all of the new activity of the blogs that you like to you. Instead of individually checking and hoping for an update from your nephew’s trip to Zambia, your cousin Suzie’s house restoration blog, and your favorite tech blog, you will only need to go to ONE place to find if anything is new. Such a service is called a Feed Reader (as in, “news feed,” also sometimes called a RSS Reader) and can either be a website that you visit, a program you run on your computer, or it can be integrated into your web browser. Different people have different tastes and reasons for liking each type, so find the one that suits you best, but here are some recommendations:
Google Reader is a web-based and very smart way to have new blog posts delivered to you, but at a pace that you choose. If you are a Gmail user, Reader will be especially handy, but the nice thing is that you control when you see new blog articles… that is, you see the new blog entries when you choose to visit your Reader homepage (or you can add a Reader widget to your iGoogle page).
On a Mac computer, I recommend Apple’s Mail program for keeping up with blogs. In the bottom left-hand corner of the Mail program you can click the “+” sign and select “Add RSS Feeds” and the blogs you add will show up as new mailboxes on the left. Very handy.
On a PC, Feed Demon seems to be the most simple and widely-used RSS Reader. Sorry for the bummer of a name.
Lastly, if you’re interested in integrating RSS Feed reading into your Firefox experience, check out this link for six of the best Firefox extensions for RSS reading.
So, all in all, the benefit here is that you don’t have to travel from one end of the interweb to the other just to stay up to date with your favorite blogs. I use Google Reader very happily because I like being able to decide when I want to read blogs, unlike email, which I like to be notified as soon as I have received a new one. Do what’s best for you, and please, when you make a choice, add my blog to your list of favorites!
Does anyone use a different/better way to read blogs?
Jim Krill (December 17, 2009, 7:08 am).
You’re such a nerd. I love it.
Grant Volk (December 17, 2009, 12:51 pm).
There’s nothing wrong with being a nerd. I subscribe to friends’ blogs via RSS in the Mac Mail program. I get them delivered to my inbox, as if every entry is an email sent right to me. For sites that get updated too frequently for me to want an email for every post, I make them bookmarks in my toolbar in Safari (Firefox does this, too). That way, whenever I’ve got my browser open I can see a little number next to the title of the site [like "Failblog (6)" for six new postings on that site], and check them all whenever I have a few more minutes to spare. I used to check certain blogs all the time looking for updates, but RSS has changed the way I keep up with blogs. No turning back now.