Someone mentioned about my avatar this days. That it does not "invite" people to follow. My answer was about interaction. Those that want to listen to my voice and to me as a person do not mind. The avatar is a dual symbol of privacy-openess. I choose how much of me I present in public. A part stays private. Saving your privacy from the public does not mean you are less open.
- ThirdEye
It is not about having a huge number of followers or subscribers. How much attention do we give to all of our networks, to each person? This is hard. And how much impact has it to use a nickname and/or your real name? What do you do, if you are becoming "a brand" without really wanting it.
- ThirdEye
@ThirdEye, these are all good questions. In my mind, the technology of 'Social Media' has given us unlimited publishing capabilities. Problem however, is that our ability to process this or interact over it is limited. That is why new technology emerges that tries to help us deal with the unlimited streams of content. It is a human limitation.
- Alexander van Elsas
And because of this limitation I think we will see more and more people trying to find and focus on things that are really relevant to them. So instead of consuming more, following more, we might see more concentrated, focused interactions. It is in our nature to limit whatever we process
- Alexander van Elsas
@Louis, you are too modest! You are doing it the hard way, no cheating. That is worth a lot of respect and compliments!
- Alexander van Elsas
That's awesome. Wow, both China and India constrained by 30% just so they'd fit on the map.
- Heather
"The size of the letters represents the size of the country or territory (with exception of China and India, which were restrained by 30% to fit the layout)." ☜ That can't be right. Russia, Canada, Brazil, Australia & USA are bigger by area. I guess the size is by population. Which makes sense if you see how small Canada's size is.
- Vijay
Doesn't it make more sense that it is according to the amount of registered domains or homes connected to the internet? => no in fact it is population as Australia too is small (20 millions), smaller than Canada, Spain, France but bigger than New Zealand, for instance. Awesome map!
- novoseek
I agree with novoseek. One other friend on twitter pointed out the same thing. The size more likely represents number of domains registered with .in & .cn
- Vijay
Yep, but I don't really connect with people there. I just read stuff. If I want to talk about something, I share it here.
- Jandy, ConcertMaven of FF
Using more and more FriendFeed, Twitter, Facebook and less Google Reader
- Ralph
Clearly my most used online app, so yes. All the other tools revolve around it in my world. My dad read the newspaper every morning, I read Google Reader all day.
- Bwana ☠
Yes, it's still the best way to track blogs that write about stuff I like.
- arjo
YEah. I used to use Feeddemon but I like having my feeds synced over multiple devices with the least amount of hassle. Google Reader works perfectly for that.
- Bhavishya Kanjhan
I use it, but I don't use it in a social way.
- Alix Whitmire
Of course! I also use FF a lot, but it didn't actually reduce my activity on Greader
- Stanislas Jourdan
Yes, but not directly, I skim entries via my program ( http://ff.im/38Yl8 ), if I am interested I click. So to FF/twitter/gmail/and other urgent feeds
- Yu-Jie Lin
Yes, since 2006. I used Bloglines and Sage (Firefox add-on) before.
- LouCypher
No. I stopped using it a long time ago when I switched to FeedDemon, then I stopped using that too (keeping up with 200+ feeds was just too much). Now, I use Gmail's Web Clips with 14 feeds (including the feed for popular bookmarks on Delicious). If the item is new and the title is interesting enough, I click. Still, I keep saying to myself: "I should go back to FeedDemon someday."
- Yaser Sulaiman
I use it on a daily basis. It is my primary means of keeping up with all the latest news.
- Bob Blunk
I setup google reader with a few local news links, so if I share something it's sent to friendfeed and then twitter. dont use it alot, forget to. I have FF, I let other people find interesting links for me to read.
- Mike Nencetti
Yep. No other readers sync with the iPhone as well. Sure, there's NetNewsWire, but I don't like it.
- Larry Hudson
Yes, but am really searching for an alternative that allows me to have smarter results... some blogs have posts I am not interested in. Today I just started trying out bytagg.
- Sid Burgess
Most people say RSS is dead because Twitter takes over by being real time. The issue with that is that we ourselves cannot be available real time, all the time. RSS helps you cache that information to make it available when you cannot be in the stream.
- Bhavishya Kanjhan
Zee: gloat? With a few dozen comments? Come on, please do be real. I have 89,000 followers on Twitter, 5,000 on facebook, 38,000 on friendfeed. When you get close to those numbers let me know. Then I'll let you gloat.
- Robert Scoble
@Scoble How do you mean "what I get close to those numbers?" - can you clarify
- Zee.
Robert: I don't think he wants to gloat about his numbers. It's about the fact that a lot of people still do use Google Reader or other RSS Readers; they just don't socialise with it as much as they do with Twitter or FF.
- Bhavishya Kanjhan
Yes, but I feel I'm wasting to much time with it. Browsing entire RSS feeds is not really targeted and Google Reader doesn't filter.
- Oliver Bouchard
I use it for my feedreading, but not socially.
- Scott Bulloch
Yes I do, keep it opened in a firefox tab almost all day.
- Vineet Bhatnagar
from Nambu
I'm still waiting to hear what Scoble's crap about "89,000 followers on Twitter, 5000 on facebook and 38,000 on Friendfeed" was about.
- Zee.
naa, he'll respond - at least i hope so. Because I'm really hoping i'm wrong about what i think he was implying there.
- Zee.
yes I do = but I am quickly finding FriendFeed and Twitter replacing some of the feeds I used to subscribe to.
- Tony
Yes! I use Google Reader constantly, in my web browser and on my iPhone. I have RSS feeds set up for my common Twitter searches, too. I also use Yahoo Pipes that I've developed over time to have very targeted RSS feeds. But I don't socialize via Reader.
- Kurt Rosenkranz
Yes, I still use Google Reader, voraciously. It has NOTHING to do with comments/followers. Rather, GReader is a tool for being better informed. Sometimes I use my GReader learnings in the real world - in conversation - where we don't formally have followers and such.
- Mike Reynolds
R.Scoble: What do follower numbers have to say in this matter, or at all ? I thought you had a statement about quantity vs quality some time ago as well ?
- Thomas Bøhm
I use NewsFire, and occasionally Resc Newws! on my PalmOS phone. I guess I haven't joined the "everything's in the cloud" revolution yet.
- Joshua Lee
<whisper> I've never used it. </whisper>
- Derrick
Thomas: follower users tell you how many people use a service and map pretty closely how many people are using a service, if you can see them in aggregate.
- Robert Scoble
Zee: it's not what 80+ people on friendfeed say. It's how many people ACTUALLY use these services. Google Reader just doesn't have the numbers. My follower numbers are a very accurate indicator of that.
- Robert Scoble
R. Scoble: people follow more people on Twitter than on Facebook because Facebook means you share a lot of information, so I'm not sure if those numbers mean much in the way of that.
- Joshua Lee
@Scoble But how do you know how many people use Google Reader?
- Zee.
I don't use google reader, and I use twitter, facebook, and a bit of friendfeed. ;-)
- Joshua Lee
But Robert, I use GReader EVERY DAY, but I'm not really socially connected with anyone on it. GReader's main function can be used without any social integration at all - so how many people follow you or vice versa isn't really relevant. Even leaving aside the issue of whether number of followers is relevant at all - it certainly isn't relevant when the core function of a service isn't connecting with other people, but consuming content.
- Jandy, ConcertMaven of FF
Yes: it is a convenient tracking system and I like the email alerts
- Anita Hunt
Yes. It's an essential daily tool for must-read feeds, as well as for discovery. Social media does not give me the same content as my must-read feeds.
- LogEx
Sometimes feeds generate data for social media.... I share a lot of links via email and occasionally facebook or twitter.
- Joshua Lee
No. Currently it does not cater for my feed reader needs.
- Vidar Andersen
I used to use a similar online newsreader, bloglines I think it is called, but after a while I found having to check a website unweildy - the whole point to RSS is to not have to play with your browser to read information.
- Joshua Lee
If you want to follow blogs directly on their site, at least for Blogger, you pretty much have to do use Google Reader. I know I've had that feedback from my followers.
- Fossil Huntress
Yeah, blogger is a bit of a closed ecosystem. Very ungooglelike.
- Joshua Lee
/me uses his best Ronald Reagan impression "Mr. Brin - tear down this wall"
- Joshua Lee
every day for real work needs. for all the rest, FF, Twitter and Facebook
- Giovanni De Stefano
Yes. Daily. But I overlay it with Feedly - www.feedly.com - which makes it rather prettier.
- Stephen Collins
Clearly Scoble doesn't really want to get too involved with this discussion. Which is disappointing considering he was the motivation for the post in the first place.
- Zee.
Google will eventually add real-time and social networking stuff to Google Reader, and especially with algorithms to suggest the best posts to read, then all will use that most
- Charbax
I use it. But I don't share anything with it. I just use it to keep on top of a few news sites and forums.
- Jan Ole Peek
no, but I'm ashamed to admit it. I used to use bloglines.
- Laura Norvig
I live in Google Reader. It's my life line for discovery, digestion and distribution.
- Mike Fruchter
I do. I could live without FF, Twitter et al but Google Reader is a time/life saver.
- Murray Barton
Not much anymore. I push most of my rss feeds through FF. That way I still get RSS goodness without constantly fighting an unread count.
- Tech Introvert
well clearly according to Scoble, all of you guys saying that you use it are not part of the majority...and Google Reader is actually a very quiet place
- Zee.
Went from Google Reader to NetNewsWire simply because of the syncing ability between the Mac client and the iPhone app.
- Mike Bracco
Zee: sorry, I had to drive Patrick home. There are a variety of ways to see how popular Google Reader is. Look at Quantcast. Alexa. Compete. Compare referee logs with others, etc. I have kept on top of the usage numbers and Google Reader isn't keeping up with growth in other agregator types like Facebook and friendfeed andthe people I compare numbers with see a lot more traffic from...
more...
- Robert Scoble
@Scoble thanks for the clearer and less agro response. I'm really going to dig in and do some research into it because although I definitely believe that Facebook & Co. are growing much faster...as a news source/tool - i still believe it's number 1 and has huge potential for further growth
- Zee.
i do and love its integration into everything
- Zach Scott
I use it a lot. Get and collect most of my "news" there.
- kilbuda
Yes. I've been using it less because of FriendFeed and Reader's content/ attention data lock-in. If Reader: 1) allowed us access to our attention stats, labels etc. through interactive UI or flat file export (Diigo), I'd use it more. 2) added a simple WYSIWYG editor to the comments feature to improve it as a blogging platform, I'd use it more. 3) allowed for Gtalk chat's around articles with chats that could be appended to the articles (think Gmail with appended Gtalk chats), that would be useful as well.
- Jack Frizzell
Yes. Recently I love to use GReader via feedly.com
- yezi
Yes, though a lot less since Friendfeed came along
- jcunwired
I stopped a few months ago...but now I'm back to using Feedly - love the magazine layout, just a cleaner better way to read (for me that is ;)
- Aline Ohannessian
extended firefox with feedly this evening -- thank you all for that recommendation, gReader looks so much better, especially where the folders can be customized with different views: magazine stylesheet enhances the readability of content. [I'm looking into the exposure of private feeds when feedly services are used. Comments? It was surprising how they got to my subscriptions without my password.]
- Adriano
Adriano: Feedly is well done, isn't it? It's the only thing these days keeping me from abandoning FF completely for Chrome.
- Christopher A Carr
[off-topic @cacarr : ditto, cf. extensions like Zotero, It's All Text (w/ vim ;-), or even Read It Later]
- Adriano
Yes I do, and I'm also pretty impressed with feedly/firefox, but I use that in addition to slogging through my greader feeds. I'm in the process of re-organizing my feeds so I can "mark all as read" without concern I'm missing something I need to see. "a1_events a2_casts b1_techblogs x9_other" etc.
- Richard pancakhaus Walker
& my shared items get routed to Friendfeed+Facebook & from FF to Twitter... :)
- Roshan Ramachandran
I do use Google Reader but just to read news feeds not sharing or whatever. The number of updates is getting a bit unmanageable now and I end up bulk-marking a lot as read, but it's good to skim through the headlines or less active feeds.
- By_tor
Yes, but must admit my usage of it has dropped off a cliff since I started using Twitter more (mainly because it was easier to digest content on a mobile), but think the noise ratio is greater on Twitter, so may go back to Reader when I get the next iPhone.
- Paul M Evans
I experience the entire internet through google reader - even twitter and friendfeed are read in google reader.
- Ian Tindale
If I share stuff in Feedly it ends up in FriendFeed and Twitter. Someone has to put the good stuff up there to retweet...
- Ruud van Wijngaarden
Absolutely! Google Reader is still the first webpage i hit in the morning to read my "a-list" tagged feeds.
- Niklas Sjostrom
yes i do but since friendfeed came on the scene it gets less and less
- (jeff)isageek
yes but mostly through Feedly, and i do use Friendfeed to replace some stuff too.
- Ⓐ ☠ slayerboy ☠ Ⓐ
Yes.. I would never socialize on it as well, the tool is of course, fantastic..
- Daniel Tal
Yes. I hate to admit it but Google did a great job with Reader. At first I didn't share anything but after some tweaking I got addicted to it. The gadget is great too (when it refreshes of course)
- Carlos Lorenzo
Bloglines seems to be less reliable than Google Reader, but I stick with it because it's much easier to use. Complete navigation with single key strokes. Google Reader forces me to use the mouse. Too fussy. I'd prefer a desktop client, but haven't found one that is as good as Bloglines (on Linux).
- Peter
Yes. I have hundreds of RSS feeds that I read via Reader. I haven't found a better Web-based replacement. I do not use Reader for it's social networking aspects though.
- Glenn J. Ward
It's the only RSS reader I use. I've tried several RSS apps on my phone and a couple on my computer and none are anywhere near as good as the web based Google Reader, either on my phone or on the computer. So I just stick with it.
- Nathan Mylott
Zee - thanks for the link - I followed it and found 'helveitreader' which is nicer still. However, I have issues with the interaction as well as the style. (http://ff.im/3d9Np [http://ff.im/3d9Np] is real)
- Robin Barooah
from IM
Yes. only way to keep track of 250blogs, and its the only remotely Social media style site that isn't blocked by my work IT department. I share stuff not in Greader but on here more so.
- Yant
I use reader, but keep looking for ways to cut myself off from it. I hate feeling that I have to read everything.
- Daniel Zarick
yes. (btw @robin: it's fixed i think. can you please try again?)
- Yusuf Güzel
Yes, but not actively. I use it to aggregate my favorite newsfeeds into one giant RSS feed, which I feed into Wizz RSS reader (Firefox plugin). Wizz automatically checks for updates at specified intervals, so I stay on top of the latest news from all services. I also use it to search mp3/filesharing RSS feeds that I subscribe to, and to bookmark useful posts.
- LANjackal
Used to use it all the time, but I still check on my feeds from time to time through it.
- i80and
I used to use bloglines, but once google added the ability to search only my feeds, they had me hooked.
- Davis Freeberg
Yes, its my central information repository.Where i aggregate all interesting RSS ( from almost 150 different sources) so i never miss a beat. There are certain desktop apps which are better then Google Reader but whats great about it is its online repository which works for every device i use to access it. Though i clearly think there is a hell lot of improvement needed. In its current avatar it can be pretty unmanagable specially if you read a lot and you can't be online 24*7.
- Abhishek
RT @scobleizer is tired of cross posting. Let's talk about this over on Facebook. Someone set up a Twine too.
- Tad
maybe you should use Yahoo! Pipes to filter duplicates, @scobleizer?
- Prolific Programmer
from IM
But that's because Twitter is lame for discussions. Facebook and friendfeed are better to have conversations.
- Robert Scoble
Prolific: doing that in the context of Seesmic Desktop, Nambu, or TweetDeck isn't doable.
- Robert Scoble
cross-posting isn't nearly as bad as retweeting. at least cross-posting is in different systems.
- Andy Bakun
I cc to twitter but I have stopped auto posting to facebook...starts feeling spammy on FB
- Gary Gannon
Andy: hmm, I sort of like RT'ing. I find a lot of cool stuff that way.
- Robert Scoble
I have to agree... this is a big problem with the different solutions and different mechanisms for sharing the information you post. There needs to be a tool that « aggregates» them into one unique post and just lists the places it has appeared...
- Thomas V. Fischer
Gary: I have stopped auto posting into Facebook as well (I only turned it on for a day or two and got a lot of complaints).
- Robert Scoble
I feel the same way some times but I'm sure nothing on your level - most of my friends are clueless to this sort of thing.
- Robert Freeze
I do have a system to filter my Facebook notifications and email the result to my mobile device, @scobleizer; works brilliantly
- Prolific Programmer
from IM
At what point does it become cross posting? Wordpress+Twitter? Wordpress+Twitter+FriendFeed? Wordpress+Twitter+FriendFeed+Facebook?
- Ken Sheppardson
It's difficult because if you're like me when you feel the urge to share you want to reach the most people possible. To do that for me means cross posting. The problem is, while you certainly reach more people you're definitely hitting some people multiple times. I think most people accept that this happens and simply ignore the extra times. Kind of go with the first time they saw it. I do think it used to annoy me more. Now I simply edit it in my brain.
- Sheryl
The neat thing about Facebook is because I haven't posted much there I haven't gotten people to unsubscribe the way that I have over in Twitter (many of the A listers have dropped me because I posted too often there -- I think that's also behind why I didn't get added to Twitter's recommended follower list, other than I talk about friendfeed so often there).
- Robert Scoble
I'm going to have to say that I prefer you to add something less perfunctory than "Discuss:" If you're posting from here to Twitter you could add a "Let's discuss this" quite easily. As to the question cross-posting has it's merits because there is only a partial (in my case small) overlap between the different sets of people.
- WorldofHiglet
Sheryl: it's interesting, though. I do want to have a system that says "show me this person only on Twitter." Actually this is sort of what I'm doing with Seesmic Desktop: I'm building lists that suck certain people into the list so I can follow certain people well without seeing their duplication.
- Robert Scoble
I love that every time I share an item on my google reader, it is posted to my friend feed and my facebook.. Why I love this is because I have completely different circles on FB and FF.
- Sabika
WorldofHIglet: I tried to add "please" but I did not have enough characters. Twitter forces me to stick with 140 characters or less.
- Robert Scoble
Except you posted this to Twitter from FriendFeed! But yes, it can be annoying. We want to get content out there,yet not be spammy. So how do we do it.
- Bob Morris (polizeros)
Sabika: Google Reader I can understand going to both of these places. Twitter less so.
- Robert Scoble
could the folks a friend feed or seemic think of a way to integrate or merge the cross posts...perhaps sinc them somehow.
- Robert Freeze
Bob: I think that TweetDeck and Seesmic Desktop are how we solve it. I'm "white listing" people into lists now to escape the duplication.
- Robert Scoble
First, how many people get ALL of your feeds? Item duplication is only a problem for those who are subscribed to multiple feeds from a person. Of the three services you mention, I isolate Facebook from most (not all) of my FriendFeed/Twitter content, and FriendFeed's block of the ff.im URL serves to reduce double posts of some items.
- John E. Bredehoft
You aren't on Twitter's recommended follow because you post FF links like a madman lol :/ Nah I dunno if you always have.
- Colin
Posting from here to FF truncates the message - the discussion will be here anyway so you haven't lost anything. But anyway, that's just me and my manners talking.
- WorldofHiglet
Another problem. Bots like TwitterFeed can result in double postings. (Hi Chris Pirillo on FaceBook.)
- Bob Morris (polizeros)
I completely agree but there are people who do not use all services, to send them content we use multiple sources. Not everyone is like us, using all the services.
- Veetrag
Colin: I think that's true, but it demonstrated that those recommended follower lists can be used as punishment. Oh, and does it help Twitter's content? Techcrunch has gotten very boring ever since it was added to that list. Yeah, I know Arrington now has his own Tweet account, separate of TechCrunch, but think about why that is. He doesn't want to have his business punished for saying something that Twitter doesn't like.
- Robert Scoble
Retweeting may be a cool way to find stuff, but when everyone is retweeting, it's just pollution. FF's "like" functionality is much better.
- Andy Bakun
Veetrag: that's why the Seesmic Desktop/Tweetdeck approach is probably going to be the only way to solve it.
- Robert Scoble
Andy: people get tired of me saying Friendfeed is better, but it is, so I agree with you. :-)
- Robert Scoble
It's funny, because I haven't been on Facebook until Tweetdeck and Seesmic Desktop added Facebook functionality so I didn't see just how many people are duplicating their content between all services.
- Robert Scoble
FriendFeed is kind of ugly and painful to read, honestly for the kind of thread this is. Cross-posting (repeating in several arenas) is ok, but I dislike when people Tweet a link to a FriendFeed which has a link to some blog post somewhere -- it's like people are starved for us to hit every landing pad they have for a single item. That's painful and annoying.
- Gib
Ryo: I agree. Lockergnome has gotten very noisy.
- Robert Scoble
Does it seem like cross-post duplication litter is like the analog of FW: FW: FW: of the aged world of email? I've stayed away from cross-posting for the most part. But I just decided to focus on the network plugged directly into FF, so my use case is different than a good many.
- Micah Wittman
Gib: use a browser that lets you increase font size. Also, click on the time stamp to open up this dicussion into its own window.
- Robert Scoble
Gib. once it gets long it makes commenting hard to do and still keep up
- Robert Freeze
The Lockergnome coupon posts are tooo much to handle
- Gary Gannon
The recommended follow list is a mess, wrong in 1000 ways, the good thing is normal people don't worry about it, because they'll never make it.
- Colin
Robert Freeze: open friendfeed up into its own Window and then commenting and keeping up is a lot easier on a hot conversation like this one.
- Robert Scoble
There is nothing more noisy than FB IMO. If I get asked to take one more quiz.....
- David
David: I don't see quizzes in Facebook's status stream.
- Robert Scoble
Robert: Yes, I'm using Safari and blow up the font size. Doesn't make it less ugly -- just bigger! :-)
- Gib
cool thanks Robert - i'll open a new window
- Robert Freeze
My little Macbook can barely handle Seesmic Desktop for some reason, it freezes in the middle of typing a tweet one or two times.
- Colin
Robert, I think you've finally reached the point where too many people follow you: just one entry like this produces as much traffic as all the people I used to follow on Twitter. ;-)
- Ken Sheppardson
This is the midnight hour thread that Scoble starts, I love it. Nothing more interesting in the world is going on at this time!
- Colin
Eminem's FF page would be filled with "fsck the free world" and such
- Prolific Programmer
from IM
Ken: what's even cooler is I'm following every single person on this thread.
- Robert Scoble
your the man Robert... this thread proves that friend feed is way better than twitter.
- Robert Freeze
Prolific: yeah, but you think my items move fast? Wait until Eminem gets here. Then you'll see tens of thousands of people join in one item.
- Robert Scoble
Robert: sssshhhh, keep it quiet for a while longer. Let's enjoy this short period in time before the masses arrive.
- Robert Scoble
I guess I'm asking how I decrease the noise on FB. A little off topic but....
- David
Robert: he doesn't need to type. You can do live video here, too, and watch the text chat.
- Robert Scoble
Robert: FYI, You can do the list thing on tweetdeck too. I have lists on both seesmic and tweetdeck. :) It does help, but honestly you miss some. I know because my lists are MUCH smaller than yours and I still miss and wind up with multiple posting. I really think at some point the size of the stream is just simply too large to do it all right. I worry about ticking off several hundred....
more...
- Sheryl
he'll just invent other aliases to do his typing for him :)
- Prolific Programmer
from IM
is FF planning on letting us share friend lists?
- Gary Gannon
David: hmm, I am using Seesmic Desktop with Facebook and I don't have much noise there (in the status updates). Of course I was very lucky. I filled up my 5,000 friends with pretty quiet people.
- Robert Scoble
Robert: I have 5,400 people waiting to be my friend over there. That's why I ignored Facebook for the past year and took to friendfeed (no limits here).
- Robert Scoble
By the way, the conversations are BY FAR better here than on Twitter or Facebook.
- Robert Scoble
I guess I don't have enough friends on facebook to worry.
- Robert Freeze
My real life friends all noticed the day I installed the Twitter application -- they all started saying, "Wow you're on FB a lot!" because all the texts to Twitter went into FaceBook. Now I have friends who have joined Twitter because everyone else is and I have to say I enjoy seeing their Tweets less because I see it all on FaceBook and vice-versa.
- Gib
Robert: Ah! But private messaging on FB rocks! :)
- Sheryl
Sheryl: it rocks more here in friendfeed.
- Robert Scoble
If everyone used the same service this wouldn't be an issue. Will things ever settle or are we bound to a constantly evaluating new services?
- Ryan Stanley
I don't have many friends on FB either but the ones I do have are always taking quizzes and playing games and I see that in my feed. I like FF much better.
- David
Gib, the Cleaner FriendFeed userstyle is an option. See my latest comment on it http://friendfeed.com/friendf... - if you're familiar with CSS you can make you're own adjustments. It will work on Safari with GreaseKit installed http://8-p.info/greasekit/ - just shout out if you need tips setting it up.
- Micah Wittman
settling is not any fun - it's the innovation that gets me excited.
- Robert Freeze
Ryan: I seriously doubt everyone will switch to using one service. If anything something like Tweetdeck, Peoplebrowsr, or Seesmic Desktop will make it all look like one service to their users.
- Robert Scoble
That's what I'm waiting for. One app that does it all!
- David
The app's dev team would have to constantly studying everyone tom dick and harry's latest API changelog. And that doesn't even address all the third party modules for the app.
- Ryan Stanley
David: the problem is that all three services are innovating too, and I doubt that all those innovations will be shared immediately by services like Tweetdeck, Peoplebrowsr, or Seesmic Desktop. Heck, how many of those support friendfeed so far?
- Robert Scoble
FriendFeed to Facebook status-update is definitely lame. FriendFeed to FriendFeed-application post on Facebook seems fine to me. You can hide someone's FriendFeed-application posts on Facebook if you don't want to see them, but the only way to hide status updates is to hide that person altogether.
- Edward Coffey
Eventbox pulls a lot of goodies in. I just don't dig it too much for some reason.
- Gib
At some point all integral tech settles, and then becomes eligible for mass adoption.
- Ryan Stanley
Robert: I have never had a private message on FriendFeed other than Ken! :)
- Sheryl
I agree cross-posting is lame. But Robert, I've seen your intake rig: you're hard-core. You are all the places that my fragmented audience would be. It's no wonder you see stuff so many times.
- Rob Michael (Atmos Trio)
David: Loic promised friendfeed support in a future version of Seesmic Desktop. It's the poor child of the three because it has the fewest users, so it's easily ignored by these app developers.
- Robert Scoble
I tried starting a FriendFeed iphone app twice last week, but ended up working on Twitter ones again instead.
- Colin
Sheryl: DM's rock here because we can go back and forth "live" just like we are here. On Facebook? Um No. On Twitter? Um No.
- Robert Scoble
The constant evaluation of different services is kind of frustrating. I keep thinking I'll find a good use for twitter and I sort of get close and then it fails for me again. Friendfeed just seems to be better in so many ways. And Facebook seems great for very personal connections but, casual internet conversations, Friendfeed really seems like the answer.
- Steve McLelland
It's only this way because people have not realized it's potential...I use to think Friend Feed was a twitter want-a-be... boy was I wrong
- Robert Freeze
Colin: you should do a friendfeed one that adds some cool feature like location. Kick Twinkle's ass.
- Robert Scoble
I'm not a fan of cross posting. I define what I am to use each service for and try to keep the content unique to each one, Tumblr for iPhone pics, FB for friends and Family stuff, Twitter for my geek stuff, BK for pics of location, etc etc etc...
- Andrew Acomb
Robert: and you haven't even discovered friendfeed's search, or its groups.
- Robert Scoble
Colin: no, that's an iPhone app for Twitter that also tracks location.
- Robert Scoble
Never heard of it, I downloaded "MotherFeed", and tried, "BuddyFeed"
- Colin
What about the new WebOS for Palm. Will there be a FF app for that???
- David
kind of funny that the poor child with the fewest users has the most robust convos
- Gary Gannon
In your opinion Robert, what is lacking most on the iphone for FriendFeed? Real-time commenting?
- Colin
funny that all the other service are copying FF
- Andrew Acomb
Robert - yah I have and I love it - If I was not married I would be seducing it now.
- Robert Freeze
Gary: friendfeed is growing very fast. It might not be the poor step child for long.
- Robert Scoble
David: I sure hope Palm will figure out how to get friendfeed support. It has Facebook support built into its contact list, though.
- Robert Scoble
I can't wait for the Pre (not to get off topic again)
- David
It would really help if FriendFeed could find a way to identify reposts across different services and group them together under a drop down item (or something like that). Didn't the old version of FriendFeed do that?
- Paul Jacobson
Paul: the new one does too, but it doesn't always catch the reposts.
- Robert Scoble
Robert: isn't that a big reason to cross post? FB support but no FF support in the case of a smart phone OS.
- David
Robert: You can do live video in FriendFeed? How?
- Shawn Hickman
Shawn: I use Kyte.tv. It kicks off a discussion in friendfeed. Everyone can watch live and comment on both Kyte or friendfeed.
- Robert Scoble
Robert: Thanks, I am going to be checking that out:)
- Shawn Hickman
Stuart: I'm not. I was noticing that a very large percentage of the people I read on all these services ARE cross posting.
- Robert Scoble
That's a major reason I stopped following Lockergnome, just got annoying
- Andrew Acomb
Robert, perhaps you should do a post on your blog about how to avoid cross posting.
- Robert Freeze
I started cross posting just because I thought it was cool that I could. But now I see the point.
- David
I have started to just post to FF which then sends it out to Twitter. I guess that is cross posting.
- Shawn Hickman
Robert: you can't avoid it. Unfortunately.
- Robert Scoble
Scobes: I annoyed myself on Friday. Stopped pushing my FF to facebook. I'll just be loud in person.
- Kevin Murray
perhaps a cross posting best practices...
- Robert Freeze
I just cross posted this manually over on Facebook. It'll be interesting to see if anyone comes over from Facebook. I've found that engagement is a lot lower there than it is on Twitter.
- Robert Scoble
Stuart, that is what I like most about FF. It's a great hub for your things
- Shawn Hickman
my project tomorrow is to write it all down and figure out how to best prevent this... The issue I have is I want what I post in twitter to go out on Facebook... but I don't want everything I put on Facebook to go to twitter... both end up here... I am sure a solution is right under my nose but I just started using FriendFeed seriously two days ago so I am still learning all it's capabilities. Any suggestions? And Scoble, did you still want to chat?
- Sid Burgess
sorry to ask something off topic but is there a way to do a date range search on FF?
- Gary Gannon
One question I kept asking myself was whether I wanted to follow someone on twitter whom I was already subscribed to on FF. I've decided no.
- Ahsan Ali aka. Slick
didnt hate it till i started using seesmic desktop more :) now i want to stop feeding twitter into facebook
- sean percival
While this is annoying for those who use multiple services, I think we're some time away before it becomes a problem for most folks. On the list of things to fix about these services, this is low priority. Smart filtering tools will sort this out, helped by more centralized control for users on where things go out.
- Brad_King
Agree - personally, I no longer "auto post" twitter and Facebook. As to friendfeed, I am watching it but not really using it as "central"
- Mick Yates
the reason why i can't avoid cross posting is that i know people who follows twitter+ff+fb, but also people who is only on fb, or twitter, and i'd like all of them to be able to read what i'm talking about...
- Ivy /composmentis
Micah: Installed SIMBL & GreaseKit but haven't seen anything to make FriendFeed less ugly. Do I need a script?
- Gib
Gary: I don't know how to do a date-range limited search in friendfeed. There's a lot of stuff still missing in the search features here.
- Robert Scoble
I like how it showed up from Scoble and Loic in the sub-result
- Colin
Andrew, thanks, I just Tweeted that Google search.
- Robert Scoble
I never, ever crosspost to FB. For a number of reasons, not the least of which is that my mother doesn't need to read all the geek stuff I post :) I wish folks would stop sending Twitter to FB, too
- Karoli
what's what's what's to to to discuss discuss discuss ? ? ?
- Ted Russ
Just realized that my comments were being sent to twitter as well. Oops, just turned that off:)
- Shawn Hickman
It's about time you realized that. I always disliked those Friendfeed -> Twitter reposts.
- Morton Fox
Ted: nothing nothing nothing, go go go on on on with with with your your your lives lives lives.
- Robert Scoble
Morton: THOSE I am not going to stop.
- Robert Scoble
Morton: but I scientifically am engineering each one to start a conversation now. :-)
- Robert Scoble
I do enjoy sending my "likes" to twitter though
- Shawn Hickman
Chacun a son gout! I find twitter is a good place to park a thought in public. I know people who read my twitter posts who will never join facebook and vice versa. Many's the time when a twitter post has sparked off a really good conversation in facebook.
- Nic Price
Robert: sorry about the delay coming back.. I was reading the bazzilion comments here!!! Man, this place is much different than twitter or Facebook... very fast paced.
- Sid Burgess
Sid: it's only occassionally like this here. Most of the time items don't get any engagement.
- Robert Scoble
while it goes with the territory i understand cross posting for many is necessary since it is reaching different audiences. it's the nature of the infrastructures. however, friendfeed's detection of similar content and providing a nested link may be on to something. grouping up related topics by the same poster across platforms may help filter much of the redundancy. having them nested...
more...
- sɹǝɥʇɐǝɟʞɔɐןq
There's no hard and fast rule for reposting, it depends on your twitter audience and what you want to achieve. It's an option, after all.
- Ahsan Ali aka. Slick
Back to the topic... what about a greasemonkey script to cut out duplicates? It wont be helpful for everyone but it eliminates the issue of the platforms adapting and solves the issue at the end user.
- Sid Burgess
Gib, grab the userscript here: http://userstyles.org/styles... but make sure you use the "Load as user script" button (can't be a user style, need to be a user script for GreaseKit). It's a distinctive look, I actually prefer the native FF design most of the time, but the comment highlighting alone is worth the price of admission. Anyway, you can customize it from there.
- Micah Wittman
also, I find the conversations take on different tones depending on which service/site they're happening on - depending on levels of familiarity etc.
- Nic Price
sorry, another question: Is there a keyboard shortcut for commenting? I am too lazy to want to have to scroll up every time I see someone say something I want to "opinionate" on. :) Where is my easy button? ;)
- Sid Burgess
perhaps i'm biased but i've never invested much on greasemonkey since -as far as i understand it- it only affects locally, client-side & does not reflect what others would typically see. it's more of a local solution to a more widely distributed problem.
- sɹǝɥʇɐǝɟʞɔɐןq
cutting out the duplicates wouldn't work because the posts may trigger different conversations in each place - merging them together might make nonsense of the flow
- Nic Price
sɹǝɥʇɐǝɟʞɔɐןq: But isn't that Robert's issue? I guess that begs the question, if someone cross posts in the forest and Robert Scoble never saw it, did it actually happen? I like the user end solution because if it bothers you, in 15 seconds you could (theoretically) make it go away. If you don't mind, you don't install the script. I have a few scripts that I enjoy using so I am biased toward them.
- Sid Burgess
Yes, cutting dups with a client-side script would be difficult because of realtime updates bubbling posts up to the top.
- Micah Wittman
sid: i suppose what i'm arguing for is more of a universal solution that does not require installing yet another script. it's something that other users may come across that could havea more elegant solution. don't get me wrong, i'm all for mods, hacks, and scripts but i think that problems like that can be better solved in broader strokes -more utility for more users with the least effort.
- sɹǝɥʇɐǝɟʞɔɐןq
just realised I followed Robert's link here from twitter!
- Nic Price
It doesn't deal with dups, but here's a user script you can use to filter out (hide) @-replies and/or posts with a list of stop words you can define http://friendfeed.com/friendf...
- Micah Wittman
Nic Price: I'm not talking about cutting out duplicates, just grouping them together so they don't clutter up the stream like a Twitter conversation. FriendFeed could take the first instance of the content item to enter the stream and designate it as the lead item. All the subsequent posts could be added to it under a drop down arrow. You can comment on any of them but at least group them together, tidy the stream.
- Paul Jacobson
Micah: Thanks for the scripts! Ahhh, my easy button works!
- Sid Burgess
Maybe this is only an issue for power users. I can't see casual followers on any single system being hit with the realization what they've read is showing up in all the places they read. They just aren't as nuts about all this as we are and maybe that's a good thing.
- Jack Humphrey
Blackfeathers: I completely understand what you are hoping for... I just don't believe it will ever happen unless all social media platforms start using one single unified stream or code (like html is for the internet)
- Sid Burgess
sid: perhaps this whole ghoulash of stuff will eventually boil down into more internet standards that will some day work. granted companies by nature will have proprietary technologies and core competencies, but a level of workability across platforms may be necessary. the momentum has gradually started with efforts towards openid, facebook connect, and the like. it may be the beginning...
more...
- sɹǝɥʇɐǝɟʞɔɐןq
Paul Jacobson: agreed, the grouping of conversations sounds good. I guess there's also the issue about permissions and conversations happening in public vs private.
- Nic Price
I setup as "main entrance" of posting FF where import also RSS from blog, public Delicious, and Shared from GReader, then via yahoo pipe I setup an rss for import ((My FF stream) + (My FFlikes)) into Facebook notes... then i read on TW, FF and GReader, but post only on FF... seems perfect except for the pain of notes import on Facebook that is awful and buggy :(
- CantorJF
Someone once told me - it's not who follows you, it's who you follow. Hence, I follow different people on my regularly visited platforms so I don't have a cross posting problem. ;)
- Mona Nomura
I am going to have to reread your comment again in the morning when I can process it better... it sounds interesting. I have often wondered about setting up a "mother pipe of all yahoo pipes" which would allow me to post content into a field on a form. The content would then go do it's thing and not duplicate and the replies or feedback from the post would come back to a simple thread (like this one) and the process could start all over.
- Sid Burgess
It seems that it would be immensely valuable to so many people who use social media as tool for their business.
- Sid Burgess
@Mona Nomura: what if a person you follow on twitter, and you don't follow on ff, starts on ff a conversation about something posted on twitter?
- Ivy /composmentis
Nic Price: I am sure the gurus behind the scenes can figure all that stuff out.
- Paul Jacobson
Ivy /composmentis - my head just exploded.
- Mona Nomura
just thinking out loud. an open source laconica-style interface with threaded discussions seems like one possible way. each user can be on separate services. but unlike info silos, everybody can get up to speed in a single-threaded discussion -similar to blind carbon copy emails. if anything happens it might involve an infrastructure change in transparency. at the granular level, much of the temporal mechanics can be learned & carry over from tcp/ip defragmenting of packets...
- sɹǝɥʇɐǝɟʞɔɐןq
Blackfeathers: so in essence you are saying I can have my cake and eat it?
- Sid Burgess
Yup...see the same thing, and don't like that I inadvertently spam my followers/friends.
- Carlton Hackett
sid: just seeing a possible outcome. it can be like a light at the end of a very long tunnel. users would have to change over time and realize what's going on. 'twitter++' could require funneling & processing the twitter stream (as friendfeed and other services are doing but with more sophistication). this would mute out its own direct usefulness as a single entity for a next higher...
more...
- sɹǝɥʇɐǝɟʞɔɐןq
Totally agree: Especially the thing that some people do: Syncing their Twitter feed to Facebook. To me, Twitter is for conversations, Facebook for status messages and more general "What am I doing".
- Oyvind Solstad
I used to keep my FB seperate from Twitter and FF. Now I see all of my FF posts on my FB. But no one is to blame but myself for clicking on that "link" button. I may ''unlink" if such a thing exists.
- Carol E
Go to: http://www.facebook.com/editapp... ; From there you can edit settings to where your posts are no longer published on your FB wall, seen only by you, etc. Good luck!
- Carol E
I wish the aggregation services like FriendFeed were smart enough to recognize when someone is using ping (or whatever tool) to spam their stuff to every service out there when they post something and just show it to you ONCE. I really hate the cross-posting that occurs, too. It just creates so much noise. I generally unfollow/unfriend people across ALL services when they do the...
more...
- Christopher A. Wichura
The other problem with cross-posting, is any responses are now in separate places in separate threads of conversation.
- Christopher A. Wichura
It's interesting seeing how advanced the discussion is here. I know plenty of intelligent and net-aware people who don't even know what FF or Twitter really are yet. It's gotta be client solutions, since plenty of people already have their own mental view of what each service is for. RT is valuable, because it expands ideas across different social circles (preferably, with a comment why too). I'd love to see laconi.ca API take over as a base, but doubt it will.
- Shane Curcuru
I also hate cross-posting within Friendfeed itself, I just hate to see the same URL shared by lots of other friends. There has to be someway to globalize the links and show only the views of my friends from that.
- Jayavasanthan J
Yes I am tending to agree, its a bit strange to see the same things. The amount of original content at any one time is really not that high.
- Robert
Well, I agree. Thanks to Friendfeed though, my accounts are behaving like cross posting. Everything I do on Facebook, Digg, Youtube, Last.fm gets relaid back to FF and FF relays it back to Twitter. If I do something on Twitter, it comes to FF as well...
- Manuel Mas
Some things should be cross posted: Freedom isn't free... Honor our veterans by taking a moment to Join the Memorial Day group on facebook http://bit.ly/zngxm
- Bob Stewart
Cross posting can be annoying but as there are now so many posting platforms it seems inevitable, it is simply some peoples response to having so many similar but not identical systems. Either an ettiquette needs to be established or some way to better interconnect things like Twitter, FF, Facebook is needed
- Robert Davies
There are too many of these stupid things. Facebook's a winner and loser; it'll win "personal," lose "public" content. Twitter's a loser, too limited in uses, e.g. no real discussions. Friendfeed (or similar) will win.
- Maxwell Kennerly
this is getting annoying indeed... Ive started to use FF more than twitter now. Is there a FF blackberry app?
- Nigel Walsh
Nigel, have you tried fftogo? Not full featured, but works on ANY mobile.
- John E. Bredehoft
from fftogo
While I dislike cross posting myself I'm highly guilty of doing it. I blame the disconnected decentralized websites and mediums causing needs to do it. There is no single decentralized network message bus/format. Someone needs to sit down and write an RFC so things will continue to work years after the initial companies FAIL and we can just move on to better problems to solve instead of doing the same ones over and over.
- rob friedman
We need a sort of Digg system that presents material based on an aggregated contact list from our different networks. It should recognize duplicate submissions and I suppose it could also rank content using exponential weighting based on the degrees of separation between viewer and submitter. If this already exists, please point me to it.
- Benjamin Winters
Each service I use has a specific purpose - I don't cross post anything :)
- Chris Saad
If each service had a specific purpose, then all these websites would stop trying to be everyone's everything online, adding new features or design tweaks that copy another site each week.
- rob friedman
@Rob those sites don't get it and will not survive. I use twitter for microblogging, I use wordpress for blogging, I use flickr for photos and video. Everything gets aggregated into FriendFeed so that people can subscribe to a singe stream. What else do I need?
- Chris Saad
Cross posting comes off like some form of Tourette's or short-term memory loss. You might understand the problem but it's still annoying.
- AJ Kohn
@chris, Well what you need is subjective. WordPress is a blog, and is trying to become a (self)hosted twitter for everyone. Flickr is just a hyper networked gallery installation. FriendFeed is a feed aggregation website, too many similar FOSS to list, special because it does HTTP long polling to the web browser client making updates seem "real" time to the user. Twitter is short, easy has feeds and works via SMS. All want to have a real time conversation or content archived on the web.
- rob friedman
I think that an other way to put the question is this: the content I create in the web is scattered everywhere and often is out of my control. In the old days of NNTP, my postings in the news where searchable and all the communication directed to me was in my inbox. Today things are disperse and aggregators, like FF create problems as they solve other problems. I think I would like to...
more...
- Michele Costabile
I still try to post different content, and post content relevant to the readership, you know Mashable is posting different stuffs on Facebook, Twitter (the only time crosspost with their website) and Friendfeed (some content may be similar).
- polou/indigo_bow
Cross-posting from Twitter to Friendfeed started to bug me a few weeks ago when I realized most of my tweets where of no interest to people in Friendfeed. I just realized that I can save a custom search from Twitter and use it to filter the messages that get cross-posted using a hashtag (like Selective Twitter for Facebook does). The point is: more granular control of cross-posting.
- Andrés David Aparicio
Seriously, folks got together on OAuth. Can they get together on a GUID (Globally Unique Identifier) on messages? At least then client developers (and UI alike) could develop methods of shrinking duplicate original content.
- Jason Nunnelley
the feedalizr app removes or hides duplicates from your stream so you dont see the same Twitter and Friendfeed posts more than once www.feedalizr.com
- Rafiq Phillips
WolframAplpha has been making some serious waves lately. I first heard of it at Internet World 2009, then started seeing some blogs posting about it. It's not yet public, but looking at these first. It looks rather exciting. :)
- Miguel dos Santos
"Slumdog Millionaire" child actress Rubina Ali’s instant success has made her dad so greedy that he has decided to put her on sale. In a bid to cash in on Rubina’s international stardom, father Rafiq Qureshi has put her up for adoption, demanding nearly 200,000 pounds. He offered the deal to News of the World’s undercover fake sheik. "Yes, we are considering Rubina’s future
- search4i