.JPG "Say Goodbye to Google Reader")
The shutoff date is July 2013.
According to CNET there are five good alternative readers and if you have your genealogy blog feeds on Google Reader it's time to start switching. Here's CNET's list of five (and happy to see my favourite, Pulse, is on there)
1. Feedly
2. Taptu
3. Pulse
4. Flipboard
5. Google Currents
As for me, I'm going to have to transition the 316 blogs I now follow via Google Reader. I'm not having much luck getting Feedly to work on my laptop and don't want to bring them into Pulse so am not sure at this point what method I'm going to use. I wanted to use Feedly for my blog news as it has an automatic transfer function from Google Reader. But so far it will not connect for me on my Firefox browser and I really dislike Safari and Chrome. Decisions, decisions...!
See Google Reader is dying, but we have five worthy alternatives for a detailed comparison of these five alternate readers.
Some other sites suggested by other similar articles include NewsBlur, NetVibes, and TheOldReader. TheOldReader was constructed to look and feel exactly like Google Reader before they made some changes that upset some people.
ReplyDeleteNow might not be the time to make the switch. Server speed is slow on most of the alternatives, for obvious reasons. Google gave us three months, it might make sense to wait a few days.
I too prefer the Firefox browser, and use the Sage Reader, which is an add on to Firefox. There is an import / export option with Sage. I have never tried this but assume it will transfer your reads from Google reader?
ReplyDeleteTry the Sage Reader, which is an add on for the Firefox browser. It has an import/export option, that should transfer your reads from Google.
ReplyDeleteI don't see any need to move quickly. Google Reader is going to be there until 1st July. That allows time for alternative solutions to be worked out by providers. Moving now, before that happens, is unlikely to be a wise move.
ReplyDeleteI use Google Reader all the time via an app on my iPad. Just about all the RSS apps on the iPad rely on Google Reader. But I expect an alternative solution to be worked out. Feedly, for example, is planning a Google Reader like alternative.
Anyway I'll wait and see what happens, and work out what to do nearer July.
Thanks for the suggestions of alternative readers. I was starting to get panicky about how to choose and I value your suggestions as well as your readers opinions. Personally, I love google reader and am quite sad they have decided to shut it down. I love seeing it on my blogger dashboard!
ReplyDeleteThere is a petition circulating to encourage them to reconsider. Here is the link for those of you who are interested: https://www.change.org/petitions/google-keep-google-reader-running
Almost 60,000 people signed it since I last checked.
Smadar - I finally got Feedly to work on Firefox and have transferred all my 361 genealogy blog feeds over to it. This buys me time to think about if I want to leave them there or use something else. No need to panic, July is still a long way off
ReplyDeleteI use Pulse for other news feeds and don't want to put my genealogy blog feeds on it.
I'm going to check out the Sage Reader suggested by Dave (thanks Dave!)
Thanks Lorine. I just uploaded to feedly as well to check it out. What I don't like is that they don't have the bundle widget function. I was looking around and found that they had it. It's called embed. Because of the high demand, they took it off and are planning to bring it back this summer as a paid feature.
ReplyDeleteI agree, there is no need to rush, we can test out the different options and decide!
I have not tried Pulse yet, but I have not really found a good alternative. Feedly did not provide a good way for me to organize my blogs that I am following via Blogger's Reading List. Apparently Google Reader had them categorized as "Blogs I'm Following" or something like that. I decided to re-organize them in Feedly to "Genealogy" and Non-Genealogy," but I have to edit each blog subscription and change the category that way. Also, Feedly defaults every subscription to "Unread Only" in the view. You have to change that one-by-one.
ReplyDeleteThen I tried Netvibes, which I liked at first, but then it seems that the free version only lets you read postings so far back in time. Perhaps the paid version has older posts. Also, Netvibes didn't seem to be picking up new posts in my feed for several of the blogs I imported. It also re-arranged the imported blogs into three alphabetical lists. I could not re-arrange them into one alphabetical list unless I moved each one around manually. Perhaps the paid version has more automatic sorting. Before trying Netvibes and Feedly, I actually tried Old Reader, which was fine, except that it didn't pick up several feeds for me, including a3Genealogy. Netvibes didn't pick up the feed for a3Genealogy either (and several others). Needless to say, I am having an OCD breakdown right now.