Molly White
For anyone looking to adjust their media diet, now’s a great time to consider escaping The Algorithms with RSS. Here are some of the blogs, newsletters, and independent news sites I follow: https://www.mollywhite.net/blogroll/
For feed readers, I use Inoreader, but there are many other good options.
Molly White
This is also a great way to follow newsletters without your email inbox getting jammed up. I mostly subscribe to newsletters, turn the emails off, and then read them in my feed reader.
Most newsletters provide an RSS feed, or there are some RSS readers that will let you send emails to a special email address so they show up in your feed.
WINGS_radio
@molly0xfff I wish I understood this. My gmail keeps filling up. I don't even know what an RSS feed is. Do you have to download an app?
Molly White
@WINGS_radio there are RSS apps, or you can also use a web-based one. here's a good guide: https://derekkedziora.com/blog/rss-guide
Kevin Gamin
@molly0xfff Yes! I use Inoreader, as well, and for the same reasons. I especially prefer RSS to email newsletters as I am more likely to read what in my feed as opposed to what’s in my Inbox.
Let’s also not forget that podcasts are also delivered via RSS reader, so you’re not restricted to just print sources when you subscribe to RSS feeds.
ploum
@molly0xfff : As you seem to follow everything through RSS (like I do), I wonder how you draw the line between a "blog" and a "newsletter"?
Also, as the medium always impacts the message, I’m curious to know if you see any difference in terms of content/tone between blogs and newsletters.
Signed: A 20 years of blogging veteran
Molly White
@ploum it’s a very fuzzy line, and i have some newsletters on my blogroll. mostly just comes down to vibes and cadence
Molly White
@almad inoreader does it, but it’s a paid feature. there are also free services like https://kill-the-newsletter.com/
Almad
@molly0xfff Any tips for RSS readers that can do that?
ploum
@molly0xfff : thanks for the clarification. I will continue to talk about "blogs" and try to not bother too much then ;-)
(some are calling my own blogs a "newsletter" and it disturbs me more than it should)
Molly White
@Rhoseigh @travissouthard oops, fixed
Rhoseigh
@molly0xfff @travissouthard also got a 404 but excited to see the feed!
Molly White
@axleyjc Inoreader has a browser extension that sniffs them out. A lot of readers also have a place where you can pop in the site URL and it’ll find the feed
axleyjc
@molly0xfff I only wish discovering plain, non-propeietary RSS feed URLs wasn't so painful for most podcasts and sites...
Vivaldi fortunately shows an RSS feed icon on pages with discoverable feeds! Firefox removed that feature long ago
ploum
@cerement @molly0xfff : most blog allow you to subscribe by email. Most newsletters have an history and a RSS feed, which blurs the line.
cerement
personally, I go more by “delivery method”:
- if it’s web-based, it’s a blog
- if it’s email-based, it’s either a newsletter (single-source) or a mailing list (multi-source)
Molly White
@chriswei i imagine it varies depending on the app. any reader that tries to recommend feeds to you is collecting *some* data, but you’d have to check the privacy policy to see what they do with it.
mine does try to recommend feeds, but doesn’t sell the data.
Chris W
@molly0xfff Do you know if the rss reader apps collect and monetize your information (feeds followed, stories read, etc.)? It looks like most of them don’t “algorithmize” the feed unless you want them to (and it seems to be more under your control).
Molly White
@chriswei there are also a lot of self-hosted options for RSS readers, so that’s a solid option for someone worried about tracking
Dave Disser
@molly0xfff I need an RSS feed of your RSS feeds.
Mario Sangiorgio
@molly0xfff I've been using RSS for a long time. Recently I decided to use it for everything that has a feed and I'm really happy with the result.
My recent additions include:
- Newsletters
- YouTube channels
- websites like Hacker News and Lobsters
vextaur
Molly White
@ddonnell the caps are to denote it's tongue-in-cheek. #NotAllAlgorithms, etc
Danny Jay Donnell
@molly0xfff it's a mistake to frame algorithms as bad. Even here, there are far too many toots from people I follow for me to ever read them all. An algorithm that filters for high quality toots I'm interested in would add a lot of value.
Molly White
@ktneely oh my god that rules
Kevin Neely :donor:
@molly0xfff Reminding me of a great #zine I picked up recently RSS is (not) Dead By Audra Mcname. Lovely that they put the full version online!
Molly White
@ktneely oh no i think i hugged their site to death
GNU social JP is a social network, courtesy of GNU social JP管理人. It runs on GNU social, version 2.0.2-dev, available under the GNU Affero General Public License.
All GNU social JP content and data are available under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license.