Comments on: Splogs, Aggregators and RSS

By: James Bow

James Bow — Thu, 15 Dec 2005 04:40:39 +0000

Out of curiosity, Robert, what program do you use for the Blogging NDP site? CaRP? I’m thinking of switching away from what I’m using for the BANPC, since it requires RSS feeds and chokes on atoms.

By: Sean

Sean — Tue, 13 Dec 2005 18:34:30 +0000

“I would also be grateful if you might suggest how I could disable whatever RSS thingee is active with my site that allows people to do this.”

Nick, I generally track your site thru my RSS reader. I’m on dialup so I take a massive bandwidth hit each time I visit your home page — picking off the individual articles that interest me is a much more efficient. If you disable your RSS you’ll lose a lot of traffic from myself, and, I suspect, others as well.

By: jay

jay — Tue, 13 Dec 2005 17:39:33 +0000

Flea, Done. But you do have my email address. I’ll take a look at your site and there is no reason that the RSS can’t be disabled.

By: Flea

Flea — Tue, 13 Dec 2005 17:13:03 +0000

I for one would like you to stop lifting content from my blog for your aggregated site. I would also be grateful if you might suggest how I could disable whatever RSS thingee is active with my site that allows people to do this.

By: Robert McClelland

Robert McClelland — Mon, 12 Dec 2005 20:20:20 +0000

By the way, there’s a very simple code that you can use to make this aggregator only publish excerpts. I used it on the blogging dippers feed and it works perfect.

By: Robert McClelland

Robert McClelland — Mon, 12 Dec 2005 20:17:51 +0000

I think this clown is completely missing the value of these aggregators. They enable blog readers to scan ten times as many blogs to find interesting content as they can even with an rss reader. And with the blogosphere growing at an astonishing rate resulting in watered down conten,t these aggregators become worth their weight in gold; even if some of them don’t function correctly 100% of the time.

Anyway, ignore these twits who are probably Americans that don’t understand how organized a few of us have made the Canadian political blogosphere for its readers.

By: Sean

Sean — Mon, 12 Dec 2005 17:01:59 +0000

“If someone were to grab even selections of the beer blog writing and make money off it but not pay me I would be pissed.”

Exactly. I don’t much care if people rebroadcast my personal ramblings from the Urban Refugee, but I’ll be out for blood if I catch people misuing my images. I make a point of gang registering them all with the U.S. Copyright Office so that the statuatory infringement fines kick in.

I’m looking forward to the day I catch someone with a good bankroll using my images without permission. I figure I can turn that into a Hasselblad H1 with a Phase One 39 megapixel back and some very nice glass hanging off the front.

By: Alan

Alan — Mon, 12 Dec 2005 15:27:57 +0000

I agree and I disagree. In terms of my two blogs, one is amateur (GX40) and one may turn professional in some sense by the end of 2006 (beer blog). If someone were to grab even selections of the beer blog writing and make money off it but not pay me I would be pissed. If someone were to note my idle thoughts, I don’t worry so much. This may not be logical as each site has the same Google ads and the same potential to have more ads and GX40 gets five times the traffic. But I should have control and people should have to ask permission. Otherwise you will see buttons added into the RSS feed soon that will allow the source of the writing to know exactly who is drawing the feed, who republishes and runs ads and sets how I can send spam and other rubbish to just those aggregators but not the others.

By: jay

jay — Mon, 12 Dec 2005 09:19:55 +0000

No question that anyone can serve content any way they want; but if they do and publish a full feed they may see their content “repurposed”.

And, yes, quality content rules; but the ability to access quality content easily has a value. Technorati makes some of it easy. Look up the tag “beer and popcorn”. So does Memeorandum. These add value in a significant way simply by letting people check in easily.

By: Sean

Sean — Mon, 12 Dec 2005 07:40:41 +0000

“The Blog Gods will just have to get over it and learn to excerpt.”

Um, no. I serve my content how I like it. Those who have a problem with it can bite me. Those who can create compelling new content will always be at a premium, whereas those who merely rearrange are a dime-a-dozen.