Justice For Google Reader!
I am burning with the fury of a thousand exploding suns over the termination of Google Reader.
My life is an endless quest to learn more and suck less. And for years I have spent countless hours consuming web content through Google Reader to help me work towards that unending goal. I spend a ton of time using Google Reader… A minimum of an hour a day, and a maximum… Well I’m embarrassed to say. I read a lot. On Google Reader.
So, you can imagine my dismay at this love note Google left in my most cherished application:
A Long Time Coming
Google has clearly been working towards the termination of Google Reader for a long time (and this was confirmed by a former Google Reader product manager). They have been hobbling its capabilities for years, but it never pissed me off enough to leave. I just kept adapting around the added weaknesses.
While I’m on the subject, I want to be clear that I am not one of those people who gets pissy over application redesigns, and feature changes. I’ve spent more than a my fair share of time architecting websites and applications. I know what goes into the evolution, and I know that no redesign makes everyone happy.
RSS>Twitter, Facebook & Google+
MG Siegler tweeted:
To which I replied:
And Drew Olanoff of TechCrunch wrote:
“Thanks to Twitter, Flipboard and Facebook, I have more content than I can shake a stick at. I don’t want to read every single thing that WIRED writes, I want to read the things that people I know think are awesome. Google Reader never did that for me, so it must go” (TechCrunch).
I looked Drew up on LinkedIn, and he’s a community manager. Of course he doesn’t give a shit about learning about things that are unfound. He has no need to. That doesn’t mean that Google Reader needs to kick the bucket.
Some folks compare RSS to drinking from the fire-hose of data. I’ve never felt that way about RSS, but that’s exactly how I feel about social media.
Facebook = A lot of partisan political crap + pictures of people’s kids
Twitter = Unmanageable mess, great for spur of the moment interaction & data mining
Google+ = I can’t believe that Google killed Reader to try to boost this snoozfest
If I have to wait for my friends to learn something cool in order for me to learn it, I fail. A large part of my job is to know stuff before the “normals” do.
The rest of the video is really funny too.
A Crisis of Faith
I use a ton of Google products to manage my information. Most notably Android, Gmail, Drive/Docs, Calendar, Contacts, Search, Voice, Hangouts, Chrome and the aforementioned Reader. The reason I love Android is the Google suite of integrated apps. These are applications that are critical to me as an individual and a professional.
Let me repeat that.
These applications are critical to my business, and my ability to service my clients. When Google kills one of them, they are cutting off a critical piece of how I work. It makes me wonder if they will do the same to other applications that are so central to my daily life that I think of them as extensions of my own mind. And make no mistake, that’s what Google Reader is to me. It’s an extension of my awareness and memory.
A Data Feed For A Data Feed
The Spira Family motto is “We don’t suffer from insanity, we enjoy it.” If we had a second one it would be, “Don’t get mad, get even.”
If my RSS feed is getting the proverbial axe, well so is one of the largest data feeds Google gets from me: Chrome. I’m switching back to Firefox.
I may also look for other places to split from the Google ecosystem. This incident has really hit home how foolish it is to rely so heavily on one technology provider.
Thanks for the wakeup call Google.
Obama & Social Media
Obama joined Foursquare this week! OMG, this is like totally news!
I can’t bring myself to care about the President’s presence in social media. It’s nothing personal, but he isn’t really on Foursquare, Twitter and Facebook, some low level staffer is on Foursquare, Twitter and Facebook as Obama.
If I thought the President’s accounts were really him, I might follow him, but it’s just PR.
Can we stop treating this stuff like it’s news?
My (D)evolving Relationship with Social Networks
Do you still use your social networks the way you did a year ago?
While chatting with my old friend Eliza on Gchat I realized just how lazy I’ve become about my social networking (not blogging).
I find myself unwilling to do anything on a social network that requires more effort than writing about 120 characters, pasting a link, or clicking some version of a like button. If it takes more effort than that the odds are that I’m not doing it.
I rarely post photos.
I won’t:
- Play games
- Like companies
- Spam my friends to get free garbage
- Use Facebook chat
- Reply to “25 things you didn’t know about me”
I’m at a point where I do quick glances at my feeds for less than a minute. If nothing jumps out, I’m gone.
Maybe I’m a bit jaded. Maybe I’d just rather spend my Internet time reading or writing. I’m not sure. All I know is that my social media usage has been changing.
Am I alone in this, or has the social network lost its luster?
How to Maximize Social Networks
Your online social networks are probably a total mess. A scroll down your friends list in Facebook is mostly likely a game of “who’s that again?” The trouble is that these social networks don’t seem like they are going to die anytime soon, and their usefulness is diluted by a lack of purpose.
The solution is to determine a mission for each social network, and stick with it. Here’s how I’ve structured my social networking:
I’ve been on Facebook since it was fairly young; it came to the University at Buffalo early. Over the years I accumulated a few hundred friends. Many of the people on the list were friends of friends and acquaintances.
Now I only use Facebook for actual friends:
- People I interact with
- Significant others of my friends
- Friends from prior eras of life
If I don’t actually know you, you and I aren’t friends in life or on Facebook.
It’s a business networking tool, and it becomes more useful as you add more connections.
I use it to maintain business contacts. If we’ve met professionally and exchanged business cards, I’m hunting you down on LinkedIn.
I use it to learn new things, share, and converse with people I know, and people I don’t.
Anyone can follow me, so long as you aren’t a spammer (I smote spammers on principal).
Follow me @dbspira
I’ll follow you if you are funny or interesting, double points if you’re both.
The Bottom-line
It may seem like a funny idea, but defining my objective for each social networking site helped me get more value out of them.
When I go on Facebook, I see the status updates of people I know and care about.
When I login to LinkedIn I know that each connection is professional.
Twitter is my outlet for quick thoughts, and interesting finds. When I scroll through my incoming feed it’s entertaining because I’m only following interesting tweeters.
Must Use Social Applications
Recently I’ve been asked by many people who work in communications what social sites they should be using. I decided to put together a short list of must-use sites. The only way to truly understand any of these sites is to actually use them. If you don’t use them, you don’t understand them. End of story.
Love it or hate it, this is one of the places where the action is. If you are looking to interact with people online, this is a great place to do it. If you’re a professional communicator or a web professional, you need to understand Facebook, how it’s used and why it’s so damn popular.
It’s ugly, clunky and I find it annoying. That being said, professionally it’s fairly ubiquitous. If you are looking to network, or think you might be in the future, LinkedIn is the site to use. This is in large part because all of the professionals who aren’t on Facebook are on LinkedIn.
LinkedIn is also useful for determining ways to meet people you don’t know but want to because it shows you how to network through your existing connections.
If you haven’t tried Twitter yet, you probably believe the stereotype that it’s just a ton of people announcing the mundane BS of their lives.
The truth about Twitter is that it is whatever you make it. There are many brilliant people who tweet very interesting things. It’s a great place to share ideas, learn new things, meet people from around the world, and pose questions to a large volume of people. It’s all about who you follow, and what you tweet. If you follow boring people, and tweet boring stuff then Twitter is going to be boring.
WordPress (Blogging)
If you have any passion for writing, blogging is a very fulfilling activity. The power to publish your ideas to the world is something that was impossible for all but the a small number of people for centuries.
If you write for a living, the ability to write about any topic of your choosing, in any style is especially liberating.
You don’t have to use WordPress, Tumblr and Blogger are suitable alternatives. That being said, I greatly prefer WordPress. The point is that there is a lot you can learn about yourself, through blogging. It also helps to understand the mentality of bloggers in general.
Wrap Up
There are plenty of other social sites that are worth using, these are the four must-use sites at the moment.
If you take anything away from this, it should be:
If you don’t actually use these social sites on a regular basis for a prolonged period of time, you do not understand them. It doesn’t matter how many articles you’ve read on social media, if you don’t live it, you don’t get it.
Making a Better Facebook and/or Twitter On No Budget
Typical conversation:
Guy (it’s always a guy): “Oh you make websites? Well, I’m looking to make a website that only targets college students and businesses. It’s going to be awesome. It needs to be sleek, easy to use, and exclusive. It’s also got to let people make profiles and like share stuff. I think we could really make a fortune with it. Do you think you can do it? I will totally cut you in on the profits.”
Me: “Really? That sounds interesting. Can you think of any existing websites that already do what you are looking to accomplish?”
Guy: “Think like Facebook or Twitter… but different… and better!”
Me: “Ok. How are you going to draw a user-base?”
Guy: “Well, we need to make it exclusive. Only people with a .edu email are going to be able to use it at first. I have no doubt that it will spread like crazy in colleges. Trust me.”
Me: “Of course. I’m sure you’re right. What’s your budget look like?”
Guy: “Oh, money isn’t a problem.”
Me: “So how will you pay for it?”
Guy: “I told you, you and your people can have a share of the profits. We’re going to be rich. This can’t fail.”
Me: “I wish you the best of luck.”
Maybe someone can out-social Facebook & Twitter. I do believe it is possible to make a successful social network.
However, it ain’t cheap, especially if you don’t know how to code your own site.
A popular idea that I run into is, “It’s going to be like Facebook, but only for people who love movies / music / cats / whatever.”
When working on an idea like this, you really need to ask yourself, “Why would a user use your new, site as opposed to just going on Facebook or Twitter?” If your answer isn’t really compelling, it’s not going to work.
Apple and Google can *probably* will a successful social network into existence, but it’s difficult for them. Google is struggling to crack the social nut, and they are Google. You aren’t.
Until you have a magical idea, stop asking people to help you build a better Facebook. Facebook is already built, and it’s so large it should have it’s own seat at the United Nations. Everyone and their mother, and their mother’s mother is on Facebook.
Good luck trying to compete with that.
We Have Tweet Button
If you read something you like, Tweet it to the world.
I’ve added a Tweet Button to the end of my posts to make the job easier.
Thanks for reading, and thanks for tweeting.
