21/06/2017

The archive contains older posts which may no longer reflect my current views.

# There's been a bit of talk about blogrolls instigated by Dave Winer (who else) and most recently Richard MacManus who is indiewebifying his personal site.

As you'll know, if you've been reading this for a while, I have taken a different approach and have a directory of people that have interacted with this site via webmentions - both blogs and micro.blog accounts.

Colin Devroe has been considering a blogroll but finds "linking to individual posts with some context provides more value than just a list of URLs."

I can see his point.

Part of the problem with people based following models on social networks is that you follow the whole person so see everything they post whether it is relevant to you or not. There is no filtering system.

Following blogs has the same issue, when you subscribe to a site's RSS feed you get everything unless it is category specific. Category feeds, however, have the problem in reverse - you might miss out on posts you would normally want to read.

But, as Richard says, a blogroll wasn't always just an isolated list of URLs. It was often accompanied by an OPML file allowing you to easily follow each of the blogs within it in your feed reader of choice.

It's then a very personal decision regarding the value gleaned from each subscription as they whether to keep it.

The growth of social and shuttering of Google Reader combined into a perfect storm with many eschewing feed readers, instead choosing to get their updates via Twitter or Facebook. That's fine if you're always on but the more casual social user will miss a lot.

Recently, aligned with the push for the open and indie webs, there seems to have been a resurgence in subscriptions via RSS. It also seems that new feed reader software is being developed and released on a reasonably regular basis.

The passion is returning.

Perhaps it's time for blogrolls and OPML files to make a comeback too.

1 comment: click to read or leave your own Comments

# Bit of a nervous few minutes on the train this morning. A guy dumped a bag on the seat next to me then disappeared. I presumed he'd gone to the toilet (he had) but seemed to be gone for ages. Was just deciding how long before I report it when he came back.

# Forgot to say, happy summer solstice ?

# Liked: Don’t call it a comeback | Twan van Elk...

Twan van Elk agrees it's time for blogrolls to make a comeback and is going to put one together.

Sonant Thoughts - Episode 29: Focused


Our phones can be incredibly productive devices but also massive distractions. We can take steps to ensure they are the former rather than the latter.

It's not perfect but I have made some key decisions to prevent my phone from facilitating me wasting time rather than filling it productively.


Subscribe: via RSS or iTunes

Sonant Thoughts

1 comment: click to read or leave your own Comments

# Just stopped myself from publishing a passive-aggressive subpost - like a subtweet but on a blog.

If I've got something to say I should say it properly and stand behind it.

Practice what you preach!