Graychalk.com | Misplaced Pieces
A Convenience Totally Wasted (On Me)
Posted on Tuesday, April 21, 2009 at 01:56 am
RSS feeds are great for subscribing to sites we like, etc… yes, old news. It’s really convenient (yes, still old news), and I definitely do think it’s so much easier to keep up with site updates.
I can still remember the old days where I’d often have to check a site diligently to see if anything new has been added. Sometimes webmasters would set up a mailing list or group of some sort in order to notify people whenever they’ve updated. Of course, those methods are now pretty much obsolete because everyone would just subscribe to the RSS feeds. Everyone, that is, except for me.
It’s kind of strange. I didn’t realize how bad I am at keeping up with sites via feeds until today when I was checking my Google Reader for the first time in two years. I’ve got gazillions of new items in there waiting for me to read, and it would’ve been a whole lot more if most of the sites I had subscribed to didn’t die. Yet it’s not like I didn’t pay any attention to these sites at all this entire time. I still visited the sites every so often. As it turned out, convenience of RSS feeds or not, I seem to keep up with updates much better by doing it the old-fashioned way: visit the actual site directly.
But realizing my odd habit of not making use of this great convenience has brought up another topic. That is, do people still even visit websites directly anymore? Well, they’d have to at least do so in the beginning in order to make the decision to subscribe to said sites… but I’m wondering how often people really go back to a site after they’ve started subscribing, aside from a comment or two here and there.
Personally, I love visiting a site and I would always prefer reading their updates there. I like clicking around, looking at their menus, perusing their content, or just enjoying their layout setup. Reading everything through an RSS feed kind of takes that enjoyment away from me, greatness and convenience aside.
Hmm. Well, this is likely a prime example of why I’m so not time-efficient when it comes to checking sites I visit. I could probably make my “rounds” in a small fragment of that time via my Google Reader. Sigh. Sometimes I really annoy myself when I don’t make use of something that could make my life easier.
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I currently do not use RSS feeds to keep up-to-date with websites I enjoy visiting. Like you said, it’s convenient, but I guess the traditional way just suits me better.
For one thing, I would be more inclined to comment on an update if I actually at the site, rather then reading it through a feed. That’s just how I view it.
So no, you’re not the only one who still appreciates the old traditional way of just visiting the site directly!
=)
Hi and thanks for commenting, Roxanne. I’m talking to myself most of the time here, so it’s a nice surprise to get another person’s point of view. :)
Your comment on how you’d be more inclined to comment if you’re at the site actually goes hand in hand with some of the things I was thinking about. For me, it’d be really easy to just sit and read all the subscriptions in one go without ever clicking out to comment on anybody’s updates simply because I’m not there and am likely continuing on with reading other updates.
Glad to know I’m not the only one. I was beginning to wonder if I really am that old-fashioned!
Yay, I totally made a post about this a short time ago. I never use my feedreader.
I recently got a blackberry, and now I use it when I’m out somewhere random and bored out of my skull.
But even so, I MUCH prefer visiting the actual site.
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