Thursday, November 03, 2011

Refugees from the wreck of Google Reader ...

Forbes ...

The Google Reader Redesign is an Ugly, Lonely User Experience - Ed Kain - Forbes

... On the overall changes as well as the unhelpful response from Google to its user base I give the new Google Reader a big, fat “E” for Evil. I guess the company’s slogan really was just a slogan. What fools we were to think it might have been anything more than that...

Kain is write about "sharebros". I never heard of it, and I was a mad sharer.

The Atlantic Wire

The Sharebros Are Building a Google Reader Replacement - Technology - The Atlantic Wire

Good article about Hivemined, despite the "sharebros".

More from the wire ...

Google Reader Backlash: A Fuss Over Nothing? - Rebecca J. Rosen - Technology - The Atlantic

... In a few ways, mostly aesthetic, Google Reader does seem better...

But for people who used Google Reader's sharing features, the upgrade is a big loss, for all intents and purposes ruining that aspect of Reader. The old sharing methods have been totally supplanted with Google+ tools, which, quality aside, are too different to satisfy the same needs. I'm going to dive into the nitty-gritty here, so consider yourself warned....

... The location of buttons, while annoying, does not ruin Google Reader's sharing utility.

... What does is having to read everything on Google+. First, it takes the experience out of Reader completely, making reading RSS feeds and reading your friends' gleanings from their RSS feeds two different activities. Second, it means that no longer can you read your friends' finds without also reading the other stuff they've posted on Google+...

... Finally, the worst part of reading shared items in Google+ is the stream. In Google Reader, you could easily come back to a post when a new comment appeared, or even put of reading certain streams until the weekend or until you left work. Now, once an item moves down the stream, the only way to get back to it is to scroll down. This will be the end of the Google Reader conversations that were the heart of Google Reader sharing...

There's a Facebook site for we shattered refugees. There I found a ranting Hitler parody that's particularly appropriate. I like the last line. Me too.

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