Book Blogging 101: Google will shut down Google Reader July 1
The headlines on the March 13th Blog Post of PCWorld read simply:
“Google Reader is dead” {source}
Pause. Take a breath. Okay, freak out.
WTF GOOGLE?
Google will be shutting down on July 1, 2013 Google Reader, claiming:
Oh no! What alternatives to
Google Reader are there?
My Assessment: Google has been uninterested in Google Reader for some time. They haven’t fixed the bugs in the program for a long time. That is why people were transitioning off. I still have a few choice blogs that I’ve been dying to get rid of that keep coming back. I call them my STD blogs. They just won’t go away no matter how many times I hit delete. I do think people, especially Bloggers like us, are still interested in RSS Subscription apps, which is why there are so many alternative RSS Subscription apps to Google Reader.
PCWorld claims it is because of Twitter and Facebook and other “instantaneous news sources”, but I think it was also because Google just wasn’t taking care of the program. They are claiming that they want to focus their attention on a “few products” not the mass amounts that they’ve launched over the years. {source} This is probably a good thing for Google since a lot of their grumpy critics have claimed their products have good intentions, just lack the necessary support and updates. And with Google coming out with things like Glass, I pretty much know where their aim is going to be…
In a few years will there be a Watch? {iWatch?} Or will there be a Glass? {Glass} Most techs are saying that Google is going to trump Apple in the innovation department. For that to happen Google needs to focus on the important things. You might want to scream because you love your Reader, but frankly ladies and gentlemen, when I get my hands on Google Glass I will not be missing Google Reader. Especially since there are so many great alternatives for your RSS subscriptions. AND — wait for it — you can easily import your Feeds from Google Reader.
That is so easy, right?? Boom, button, squish —
look they are all there.
My suggestions, because this wouldn’t be a tips and tricks post without them:
- Feedly – Free. The one I use. It is an extension reader, so you add it to your browser. Has a handy button. Boosh – my feeds. Inspired by my STD blogs. I really like Feedly, it is ascetically pleasing. Everything seems to make sense to me, and they even have handy tips on their blog. Today’s blog post even shows you how to migrate your Google Reader feed to Feedly. Sometimes it does take a bit of time to load, which makes me grumpy. {source}
- Pulse & Flipboard - The “pretty” readers. These are the new types of Readers that mock sites like Pinterest, image heavy that put emphasis on certain feeds and new sources. I use Fliboard on my iPad and interacts better with my Twitter and Facebook feed then my RSS subscriptions. It usually emphasizes my “keywords” which were prompted by Flipboard, instead of what I really want to focus on. For example, it prompted me to put what I’m interested in from a drop down list and because I put politics and fashion, those tend to be the “hot” items that are shown – from sources all over the web. I’m sure with customization I could get it right, but I just haven’t put the effort into it.
- FeedDemon - Free. This one also synchronizes with Google Reader, it has the ability to implement keywords, tags and get notifications when your “hot” keywords are used in posts.
- RSSOwl – Free and you can synchronize too. You can use multiple tabs, to view feeds side by side and it is said to be easily organized. This one reminds me of Outlook.
- FeedBooster – Free and you can import your RSS feeds from Google Reader. FeedBooster has a great search function for weeding out your favorite topics.
Good luck and happy migrating.
Question of the Week:
However, recently I got a strange comment on one of my reviews. The person basically posted their entire review of the book as a comment. They didn’t respond to anything I said in my review, or even acknowledge the fact that they were commenting on someone else’s review.
When I saw it, I immediately set its status to Pending, because I’m not sure how to respond. Do I just reply and thank them for sharing their thoughts on the book? Do I contact them privately? I don’t want to be rude, but I also find it strange to keep someone else’s review in the comments for MY review. Any advice?” – Anonymous
I was trying to remember where I heard it, I think it was around the time a big Plagiarism scandal broke. But a blogger mentioned that someone was doing this, posting an entire review in their comments. The review turned out to be a plagiarized review from another Book Blogger. I would probably just delete that comment. Even if it isn’t plagiarized, why would you want to promote someone’s review, underneath your own?
Book Blogger News:
- Google Reader - Of course that is the big news of the week. Google Reader is shutting down July 1, as stated in the post above.
- Author Juliet Marillier gets grumpy – Supposedly an excited reader got author Juliet Marillier all in a tizzy, so much so that Marillier wrote a post on how not to write a letter to your favorite author. The post has been since removed, but it caused a bit of an uproar because Marillier looked like an asshat. It is said that she apologized, but I don’t even see that anymore. Could be I’m not looking hard enough though. Um…you get fan mail? Oh so sorry, I know that is SUCH a bother. The beauty of this ridiculousness is that Stacia Kane in all her insightful glory wrote a follow-up post that just about made me cry. That woman rocks. {source}
- Fundraisers are in! – Need backers for your project? Who needs silent partners and investment firms? Just do an online fundraisers just like Veronica Mars did. From an 11 year old collecting 5K to self-pub her children’s book, to a hit television show making a movie. This is the new way to go. {source 1} {source 2}
Happy Thursday. Talk Less. Read More. Blog with Integrity.
Have a question? Fill out the form by clicking here. This will go into a spreadsheet to be looked over at a later date and hopefully answered on this blog. This is completely anonymous, you do not have to leave your real name. Urls will not be included in your question unless it pertains to the question.
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Yeah, Google keeps removing service after service, I don’t know about Glass yet… but who knows, right?
I use Feedly as well, and I have it installed both on my phone and my iPad as well as in my browsers. I can now check my favorite blogs while I’m taking the bus to class
Lexxie @ (un)Conventional Bookviews.
The reason I’m excited about Glass:
The iPhone revolutionized the phone. But…it is still a hand held device. With this creation of Glass this takes us away from the hand held device and onto new interactive accessories. I like the idea of the Glasses because of the video and picture and the fact that we look with our head and not our hands…so it gives that hands free technology…I just think it looks more intuitive. It will also revolutionize things. I do think by the time my little girl is a teenager, things like Glass will be the norm. Maybe an attachment to your ear etc. That is why I’m excited for Glass because it breaks it away from the phone. Does that make sense?? LOL
I like Feedly – I’m not huge with RSS subscriptions, but I know I should be. I did use Reader the majority of the time, but when Google started shutting down GFC I smelled it…it was only a matter of time.
Actually, I just realized that it’s also possible to import your whole Google Reader feed to Bloglovin’. I signed up for Bloglovin a long time ago, because it was the only way to follow a blog I wanted to follow – and today for the first time in ages I went to my dashboard. Voilà their first message was the possibility to import feed, and it looks pretty neat.
I have been playing with new feed sites all morning. So far Feedly is the only one that I like and has an actual app. Netvibes works well too, but with no app, I find it harder to use it as I did/do GR.
I agree with your assessment for the comment. I had a few of my reviews being used as comments on other sites. Which i then had to ask the bloggers to remove them. So, more than likely it is a bot or some other spam.
The copy and pasted comments is so bizarre. I guess they are trying new ways for you to “leave the comment” so they can get the page rank from it. It is spam and the best thing to do is delete it.
Thank you for some ideas on where too get your feed now that reader is going away.
I hear that GFC is going, do you know when? It’s not the same as Google reader is it? My other question is that I don’t ever go to an RSS to check up on blogs, I use my GFC when I log into Blogger. I don’t want one more site to go check, I like having it all there when I log in. I also don’t want a ton more emails, so I won’t sign up for email subscriptions. How can I get the RSS set up in an easy way to see it? Like on my home page? Is there a way to set it that way? Guess I’m not as computer savvy as I often hope I’m getting a little better all the time.
Good question. I was wondering about this too.
They have been talking about dropping GFC for a long time. But I have yet to ever hear an official time frame.
This is a good question.. I am very confused about this!
I was wondering this as well… hmmm….
Google Reader is simply a simple way of subscribing to the RSS through Google Reader, so yes it’s likely to go as well.
Simply start subscribing to the RSS with other services.
I was using google reader up till now. I guess I will switch to Feedly now. Really I don’t get why google just keep killing their services, isn’t there a better solution? But hey who knows maybe switching to a new reader isn’t such a bad thing.
I’m still pissed and on the fence about the Google glass but I do appreciate your review and links. Thank you so much for this post.
Has anyone tried Taptu or Old Reader?
I’m disappointed in Juliett Marillier as I love all her books. Ah well. I really don’t utilize any readers, so I guess I’m okay with it going away. Thanks as always for all the great info.
Thanks! I just switched to Feedly. It seems easy to use and I love the simple interface(just realized you can even change the font color.) Almost everything can be customized and it’s super easy to share on posts on Twitter and FB.
Google is really trying my patience. Why can’t they just fix the bugs and be done with it? It was so much easier to use GR because it imported blogs I used GFC to join, too. Very annoyed. Thanks for this post to help us all figure out what to do now.
I am not sure I like the Glass thing.
I just switched to Feedly last night. It’s going to take some getting used to but I think I’ll like it.
I’ve never used Google Reader. I’ve used the Feedler Pro app for over a year now, and I love it. There is also a Feedler app that is free, but I like the extra perks of pro.
I heard about the news yesterday everywhere. It’s not a surprise. Google dumps products that aren’t making them money. It’s a habit of theirs. They’re looking to break out into the hardware market so they can make some cash, but what they’re doing, IMO, is destroying their brand.
If they are going to dump a product that is hugely popular – one article I read mentioned they reached out to Google to get the number of reader subscribers but got no answer – just because it’s not helping them financially, it shows they don’t care about their users. They push their G+ and their Google Business Apps (some of which they are also dumping), and care not at all for their image.
I’m just waiting for them to see their Blogger blogs as a cash cow and start charging for the storage space for the pics and databases.
They’re going the Microsoft I don’t give a crap route and for me they’ve gone from a quality company to just another business I want as little to do with as possible.
Sorry for the comment vomit rant. I know I’ll cheer when their stock drops over the next decade as product after product fails and the image they’ve created for themselves is in the dumps.
Glad you jumped on this topic and brought it to the book blogging community!
I’m a bit pissed that a bunch of blogger stuff via google is shutting down. Though Google dashboard for blogs were starting to piss my off anyway, so I guess I’ll start a new solution.
Oh, thank you for the alternatives! I don’t use google reader myself, but I logged into look at my subscribers this morning, and absolutely freaked when I realized it was going down! I was looking everywhere for something, but I just…do you know how to check RSS subscribers without GR? I don’t have feedburner either, so I guess I may be out of luck. Any info you could give would really help me out. (:
Also, I got one of those spammy comments too. o.O
Great post, Rachel! (:
Can anyone recommend other alternatives for someone who doesn’t want to use an app and doesn’t want to add anything to their browser? From the list it seems like FeedBooster would be my only option.
…the form just ate my comment. Oh well. Let me write a condensed version then.
I honestly don’t understand the fuss – I follow some blogs via GFC, and those show up on my blogger home page – I’m pretty sure that’s different from Google Reader?
I’ve also tried to get my head around using RSS feeds to keep up with a site, and I just don’t understand the benefit of it – I can make a regular bookmark folder of websites I like, and click through from there to check things – RSS seems like a much more confusing version of that. I just… don’t get it.
But anyway, I hope it works out for people who use Google Reader a lot.
Yes, that is different from Google Reader. The point of a Feed Reader is to keep everything organized.
Thanks for the suggested alternatives Rachel! From what I’ve been reading since the news broke, Feedly seems to be the way to go. I think that’s the one I’ll replace Google Reader with but I don’t really like the look of it all that much…I suppose I’ll get used to it though like anything else. I may just have to try them ALL out (the free ones I mean) and see which I like best >.<
I also played around with my Flipbook app last night and I like that one also. You can combine every single stream of information out there. Very useful.
Flipboard — not book.
I wonder if this will effect the GFC thing I use on the Blogger homepage?
Then again, with how Google’s services are going, I wonder if Blogger will be the thing we see announced for getting the ax the next time one of these situations comes up and effects the blogesphere? A rather scary thought.\
Well, time to find a new way to track things, just in case.
It shouldn’t. But, if Google discontinues GFC in the future. Which a lot of people suspect, then it will. The thing is Google is trying to push G+ to overtake Facebook, and this is there way of doing it. They want to consolidate.
Why does Google keep giving up on things they’ve created? I hadn’t heard of Feedly yet, but thanks for suggesting it. I’ll have to look into it.
I am soooo confused. Is google reader the same thing as the reader in blogger? Here is an example of what it looks like (this is what I use) http://support.google.com/blogger/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=99761
Thanks!
No that is your GFC follows. Reader will be the RSS Reader that you would get when you sign into Google.
I’m still looking for a Google Reader replacement. The closest one I’ve found (so far) is Bloglines. I used BL prior to using GR, until it died a short death. Then got revived. So I’m trying it out again. (And when I saw that BL is the closest thing to GR, I’m referring to the UI.) I will check out a few of the other ones you mentioned (RSSOwl and FeedBooster).
Thanks so much! I don’t know a lot about this so the info you provided was very helpful to me. I don’t use a reader every day but it’s handy when I need it. I’m trying feedly and Bloglovin and I added a link to your post on my blog.