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Posted By:
flyingrose
405 days ago
Topic Type: News Story (Jump to http://www.readwriteweb.com)
Category: Blogging
"Has Google Reader in fact usurped Bloglines as the number 1 browser-based RSS Reader (which would also probably make them the leading RSS Reader overall)? That seems to be the opinion of a lot of tech people - and certainly Google Reader is a favorite of many early adopter types.
But based on current Hitwise data that Read/WriteWeb has gotten hold of, in fact Bloglines is still the market leader.
Most bloggers Feedburner data shows that "Google Feedfetcher" is ahead of Bloglines. However that isn't a fair comparison, because Feedburner defines "Google Feedfetcher" as being both Google Reader and iGoogle (Google's start page product). So here is data from Hitwise, supplied to us by Bloglines, which compares Bloglines with Google Reader alone..."
3 Comments
Comments
I'm a Bloglines fan. And not using Google Reader is my little way of resisting their dominance and trying to stave off their eventual ownership of all my data. :)
But I kinda think I should subscribe to my own blog(s) in Google Reader since they're certainly using the subscription data to determine overall popularity.
I'm a long-term Bloglines fan too. I tried Google Reader when it first appeared but found the usability somewhat lacking. Since then I've tried other feed readers but have found most of them inferior to Bloglines. There's really nothing that I'm missing with the original Bloglines and it works extremely well for me.
The new Beta version unfortunately has one critical element that will move me to select some other feed reader if it becomes the way Bloglines operates. Now you must mark each feed as Read, rather than it naturally detecting that you have opened it and automatically assigning it to the Read group. I only tried the Beta for an hour or two before rapidly returning to the original. Please Bloglines don't mess with what works perfectly fine. :(
I selected Bloglines as the second RSS reader to test. I tried Google Reader first because Marty mentioned using it can have other benefits (thanks Matt for already mentioning one of them). I immediately ran into an issue ordinary Internet users wouldn't have.
I often log into AdWords accounts to help small advertisers using their Google log-in. Big Google "remembers" the last log-in I use and I ended up subscribing someone else instead of me. That isn't obvious until you do it and then have to go fix it.
Whoever gets there first with the product most usable gets the lion's share of the pie and sometimes all of the pie. (Remember VHS versus the other VCR standard?) So if we want the best we have to spread the word about what the best is.
Few realize the embarrassing moments and issues they may have when they accidentally subscribe someone else to an interest the don't share with their clients (political, religious, personal).
And most don't know about the history Google is recording even when you're not logged in and you're using Firefox 2.0 with no Google toolbar built in. Any searches you make when logged in to someone else's Google account or after you log out there but haven't logged in elsewhere are going to end up in THEIR history.
Google apparently can't think of any reason someone else's history would end up in your account. I log in and give advice to small AdWords advertisers who cannot afford to pay for assistance yet. I am not going to create a new Google email address for every one I ever look at although I may have to consider doing that.
I could sign up for and create a spreadsheet of a hundred sequential hotmail or gmail or yahoo addresses and record the account each one accesses or simply check them off and record them in Roboform.
I haven't bothered to do that so far; however, I have had to clean up histories I have inadvertently contaminated when I got a call or email while working on something else. Even if we "delete" the history that doesn't mean Google isn't keeping it.
I suspect Bloglines isn't here reading our comments so I hope you send them your feedback. It is disappointing when companies "improve" us right out of using their products, isn't it?
Companies would have much better products if they would listen to "power-users" - or better yet, identify who they are and get their input and have them beta-test new versions BEFORE they beta test with the public.