I’m a big RSS fan.? Love them, live by them, use them extensively.? I’m a believer.
But, I have a life.? I don’t have a FaceBook account.? I don’t use twitter.? I don’t keep my video diary on YouTube (because, among other reasons, I don’t have one).
I have an RSS feed.? Well, two.? One from this blog, and one that comes out of my Google Reader account.
The one from the blog is pretty simple — it shows what’s been posted here.
The one from Google Reader is a big more interesting, I think, in that it is the things I am bookmarking on the web, in real time.? Most of it is from RSS feeds, but not all.
But I like RSS feeds.? I’m a fan.? I like RSS feeds that bring to me interesting things I didn’t already know.
I liked ReadBurner as soon as it launched.? It sifts through submitted Google Reader feeds from folks like me, and looks for pattern of things that I have recommended (shared) by folks, looking for the good stuff.? Interesting things I might not have already known.
Granted, the bulk of the early adopters, it seemed, were folks like me — nerds.? And that’s OK with me.? But this is not middle America stuff yet.? So, I get their Popular feed and it works for me.
When I heard about FriendFeed, I was intrigued (enough so to make one).? It sounded interesting.? One persons many feeds, shoe horned together into a single RSS feed.? It would, I thought, offer a look at the web through someone else’s eyes — the videos they highlight on YouTube, what the book marked and shared through Google Reader, and so on.? OK, great.? But it had me scratching my head — do I know anyone who does anything interesting, who really leverages all of the many things that something like FriendFeed can leverage?
The answer is no, of course.? Jake doesn’t.? Coop doesn’t.? Lessig doesn’t.? Petreus doesn’t.
So, I’m wondering why there’s a rush on now to add ever more sources into FriendFeed and it’s variants.? It comes across as folks wanted to watch the screens and lives of others, instead of getting out there and doing stuff.? Or that there’s this whole sector of society I have not seen, who just sits in front of a computer all day and plays on the internet like it’s their own private playground.
There is a life apart from the screen.? I’m just not sure folk get that.
Am I missing something?
