Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2019/11/25/what-happened-to-the-web-in-20.html
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The rise of the App is probably at least as big an influence. How many sites have their own app, that really does nothing more than expose their listicles?
When the web was young – probably pre 2001 if I think about it – I would visit a fist full of websites first thing in the morning, others later in the day, sort of my “reading the news.” I still read the content from a couple dozen sites (BoingBoing being one) through an RSS feed reader (Feedly). The feeds that go in there evolve: some die, some get egregious amounts of advertising and I abandon, others I find and add.
There are still sites I visit directly: The Mary Sue is very list oriented, but I like to get their articles in a bolus once a day rather than scattered throughout a day’s worth of feed reader. LTHForum.com may have have passed its peak, but it’s still the finest Chicago-oriented foodie site covering both restaurants and cooking (and other things).
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How to stop the new overlords scorching the digital Earth but for its most profitable parts?
There are a lot of answers, but step one is:
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I think the demise of Google Reader also had a role.
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I think that Google Reader’s demise is part of the Google giving up the Social Network gaming.
I would include, on Facebook account, the Walled Garden system they started to get on.
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Despite Google’s terrible decision about Reader, the survival of RSS is one of the only things that prevented the Web from becoming even more balkanised into ad-saturated social media fiefdoms than it is. Open standards are a key part of the way forward, and we have to continue supporting companies that preserve them, enhance their value, and popularise their use (this is why I pay to use Feedly).
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No, Google Reader was discarded so Google could focus on the social network Google+.
Google didn’t give up on social until years later.
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And now we’ll see domain name prices skyrocket, forcing anyone without deep pockets out.
Of course I could also point to the fact that it took me eight attempts to click on the [Comments] button on this page before various dark pattern ads finally stopped rearranging and taking control away from the page.
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Are RSS usage numbers really anything but a rounding error? I set up my wife with Feedly, but I don’t expect any non-techie or non-techie live-in family member is going to actually figure it out.
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From your link:
selling PIR to the private equity firm Ethos Capital
I read that as “Ethos? Capital!”
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One more word, along with “Freedom” and “Patriot” that instantly flags a business as a scam.
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Probably not much more, which is a good thing. If it started getting real numbers most sites would see RSS as a threat and shut down their feeds or block 3rd-party efforts to create feeds. Still, I’m going support it, because being part of that rounding error is better than the alternative, and because we should all support open standards.
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There’s no stopping them They have hoarded most of our money, and they want the rest. All we can do is decide how long we want to stick around for the ride before pivoting to the life of a Luddite. I’m feeling close. The tentacles of unchecked Capitalism are reaching Hentai levels of invasiveness, in my opinion. No holes are barred these days.
That, or make our own internet. With hookers. And blackjack.
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Strange service, the only winning move is not to join.
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Nothing is stoppable. Any time you find yourself thinking, “how can I stop this?” it’s a warning sign that you’re on the wrong side of ______. Adapt to the new reality, rather than resist it. Find a niche and evolve into it. Colonize the whole thing. We can be their Ophiocordyceps unilateralis.
I would like to advertise there!
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It seems like enough have gone down this route, but the end effect was for me to stop reading those sites.
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Ya down with RSS? Yeah, you know me!
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RSS with a reader shouldn’t be hard at all. Web site provides a link, you click it or import the URL, done.
Recent sore points for me have been: Facebook killed it, I wrote my own RSS generator, they killed that with a change to code authorizations. Twitter used to support RSS, they killed it, I wrote my own generator and it still works. Instagram doesn’t seem to have ever had RSS, but if they did they don’t now. Too hard to build an RSS generator, or I got lazy, so I use a third-party generator.
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