I keep trying to limit the number of subscriptions in my Bloglines to under 300. Every so often I go through the list and delete feeds. Yet, this morning the total has gone over the limit – I now have 301 subscriptions. What do you do to manage your Bloglines (or any other news aggregator)?
The other problem I have with my subscriptions is the number of posts I save – either by using the Keep new option, or by clipping things. I don’t know why I have this compulsion to save interesting posts – 90% of the time they just stay saved, but I don’t do anything with them.
Here’s some of what I’ve saved:
Understanding family relationship problems (I really like a lot of what Steve Pavlina has to say.)
An equal language – from another blog called Ruminations.
Could you live without money? – from How to Save the World. First found this blog in explodedlibrary‘s blogroll. Always interesting and thought provoking. I don’t think I could live without money, though. Or maybe I could, but the idea is far too scary to contemplate for too long. (So why have I continued to keep this post? Since August ’05!)
Not exactly cowboys, not exactly gay – I really liked this review of Brokeback Mountain. And I like (the name of) the blog it’s on, too – Pavlov’s Cat!
The ultimate game – Fiona, your idea of using games to represent libraries and to teach people how to use them really intrigues me! I keep imagining EverQuest as the neverending quest for knowledge…
I can’t remember life pre-Bloglines!
Categories: Bloglines
6 Comments
Dang, I have the eaxct same problems! The only remedy for me is to be more critical of what “important” really means.
Think about it; if bloglines exploded tomorrow and all posts and feeds were gone, what would you go out there to find that were essential to your online living? I reckon in most cases you’d be fine.
“Importance” is a very subjective and perceptive concept, often linked to how you feel about the importance of your own understanding of things. I’ve had to learn the hard way that I should be comfertable not knowing everything there is to know. 🙂
LOL the game post 😛
I made a deliberate decision to cut way way back on subscriptions a while back, reasoning outlined here.
I used to subscribe to How to Save the World too… and had so much saved stuff that it made it hard to read! I also removed high-volume feeds that I never read all the way through – treehugger, slashdot, boing boing etc. If I want them, I’ll go to the site.
I go through every couple of weeks and reread the saved stuff… if it’s still relevant I’ll move it to del.icio.us, if not I’ll remove it.
Steve Pavlina’s article made a lot of sense. Thanks for posting the link. I’ll be visiting his blog regularly from now on.
CW, I don’t even try to keep up with everything in my bloglines feed. I treat it as a very useful bookmark, showing me what’s updated and what’s not. I clean up my feeds once a while, esp. when the blog no longer interests me. Most times I leave them there. I’m pretty selective in the feeds I subscribe in the first place, so while I don’t read them, I anticipate how I might need them later and it’s proved to be true.
Hi alex, thanks for your comment 🙂 You know, you are absolutely correct about the fact that life online would be fine even if Bloglines ceased to exist. And when I look at my feeds, most of them are there only because they are interesting for whatever reason, not because they are important. I’m still learning that it’s okay for me to not know everything, after all I know how to find out when I need to 😉
Howdy Fiona – thanks for the link, some of those comments are interesting too and have given me food for thought (for the article I’m writing on blogs as device for developing a professional identity). You are right about not turning it into a chore!
Pleasure, Cherry 🙂
Ivan, I think that I’ve been using Bloglines to collect librarians’ blogs in particular – it’s a very convenient way of seeing what’s new and what’s being discussed. As for the other blogs, I think I need to tidy them up more regularly!