I think this is major.
Posted on | November 26, 2005 | 5 Comments
Chris Anderson, Editor-in-Chief of the once-again relevant Wired magazine, writes on his blog that he very rarely engages in mainstream media directly, instead utilizing RSS and the blogosphere as a set of editors to point him to what is relevant.
Obviously, Chris is an early adopter, but he’s also the lead guy at a major mainstream publication. That he relies on the collective intelligence of the blogosphere to keep him appropriately informed I think suggests a crucial trend.
Chris also notes that he has 150 feeds that he follows. I’m at 149, after having been as high as 170. He and I both use Bloglines, which, frankly, isn’t equipped for such numbers. But with all the RSS readers out there, none of them have successfully addressed Feed Overload. I think this is a potentially huge opportunity.
I’ve stuck with Bloglines because it’s dumb-simple interface doesn’t get in the way of reading, unlike all the other web-based tools I’ve tried.
Comments
5 Responses to “I think this is major.”
Leave a Reply
Hello
Archives
- February 2012 (1)
- January 2012 (9)
- December 2011 (7)
- September 2011 (1)
- June 2011 (4)
- May 2011 (8)
- April 2011 (5)
- March 2011 (1)
- February 2011 (2)
- January 2011 (3)
- December 2010 (4)
- October 2010 (2)
- September 2010 (1)
- July 2010 (1)
- June 2010 (2)
- May 2010 (7)
- April 2010 (4)
- March 2010 (4)
- February 2010 (16)
- January 2010 (35)
- December 2009 (4)
- October 2009 (1)
- September 2009 (4)
- August 2009 (4)
- July 2009 (7)
- June 2009 (7)
- May 2009 (3)
- April 2009 (2)
- March 2009 (5)
- February 2009 (6)
- January 2009 (7)
- December 2008 (5)
- November 2008 (7)
- October 2008 (5)
- September 2008 (8)
- August 2008 (5)
- July 2008 (15)
- June 2008 (8)
- May 2008 (7)
- April 2008 (4)
- March 2008 (14)
- February 2008 (6)
- January 2008 (8)
- December 2007 (14)
- November 2007 (3)
- October 2007 (9)
- September 2007 (6)
- August 2007 (8)
- July 2007 (11)
- June 2007 (8)
- May 2007 (8)
- April 2007 (9)
- March 2007 (12)
- February 2007 (10)
- January 2007 (9)
- December 2006 (8)
- November 2006 (17)
- October 2006 (9)
- September 2006 (12)
- August 2006 (8)
- July 2006 (12)
- June 2006 (12)
- May 2006 (8)
- April 2006 (18)
- March 2006 (12)
- February 2006 (14)
- January 2006 (9)
- December 2005 (19)
- November 2005 (10)
- October 2005 (10)
- September 2005 (18)
- August 2005 (21)
- July 2005 (12)
- June 2005 (9)
- May 2005 (16)
- April 2005 (11)
- March 2005 (12)
- February 2005 (7)
- January 2005 (8)
- December 2004 (15)
- November 2004 (12)
- October 2004 (13)
- September 2004 (3)
- August 2004 (13)
- July 2004 (9)
- June 2004 (11)
- May 2004 (6)
- April 2004 (9)
- March 2004 (8)
- February 2004 (7)
- January 2004 (9)
- December 2003 (7)
- November 2003 (6)
- October 2003 (19)
- September 2003 (12)
- August 2003 (16)
- July 2003 (10)
- June 2003 (6)
- May 2003 (7)
- April 2003 (7)
- March 2003 (4)
November 26th, 2005 @ 10:55 am
I wonder if this is a wise strategy for someone like Chris – he’s in a position where being dialed-in to source material directly is a competitive advantage, because it means Wired hits a topic faster than the blogs he follows. I find that when I pay too much attention to my feed reader, I hear about particular topics a lot to the detriment of others. Major ideas pass me by because I’m not subscribed to the “right” feeds to begin with. There may be value in a serendipity news service – interesting things (judged by readership or activity, del.icio.us-style) that you have previously shown no interest in (judged by your social network’s activity) are passed your way daily, to influence lateral thinking.
Speaking of feed readers, give Reblog a whirl sometime. I’ve been slowly tuning the interface to work best with lots of feeds. I’ve crossed the 200+ mark not too long ago.
November 26th, 2005 @ 3:15 pm
Micahel,
Needless to say, blogs are not my only source of information. I also–gasp–talk to people. And all the really important insights and information come that way. Blogs give me context and background info, but the really new ideas come from the “dark matter” of conversation with folks who are doing interesting things.
Chris
November 26th, 2005 @ 5:35 pm
Ha, I have 239.
I have for quite some time gotten all news I need to have from blogs.
November 28th, 2005 @ 12:19 pm
Good observation. There is definitely a huge opportunity with regard to solving the “feed overload” problem.
A couple months ago I was reading around 150 feeds and found it completely unmanageable with Bloglines. I was wasting a huge amount of time reading multiple posts about the same topic.
Unfortunately, I couldn’t find anything better than Bloglines, so I went through all my feeds, re-categorized them, stripped out the cruft and ended up with 92 feeds.
I have vowed not to go over 100 until something better comes along. I’m sure someone’s working on a technology for cross-service collaborative filtering of blog posts. I guess that’s kind of what digg.com does, right? But isn’t digg just for technology news?
March 22nd, 2006 @ 4:22 pm
In Teloe beyond the foamy-necked Way and the stubby debt reduction solution are cities all of amber and chalcedony.