Category: technology

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RSS – the Simple Guide

RSS is a means by which you can easily keep up with updates to your favorite websites, all in one place.

You will often see the term “RSS Feed” or see this image associated with it…

RSS logo

When you click on that link, you will usually see a scary page of gobbledygook that looks like this (click here). What you are seeing is the RSS Feed, the content of that website crunched together in a certain format that can be read by your new hero – the RSS Reader.

You don’t need to worry about all that scary code. All you need is the address of that feed.

So, how do you use this?

You download an RSS Reader app to your phone, tablet or computer. Sometimes you’ll see them called RSS Aggregators.

If you are on a computer you can also use a website like Feedly.com.

You just copy the address of that RSS feed, hit the “add” button on your reader, paste in the address, and you will now see every single fucking update to that site. And you do this for every website you want to follow. And you can read the articles in the reader, which means it usually strips out all the ads and bullshit.

If you have not used RSS before, something like Feedly is a good way to get introduced to it. I prefer using a standalone RSS app, even on my computer, to avoid tracking and adverts.

Note: almost all blogs have RSS feeds, even if you don’t see the link. That’s because a lot of blog theme designers suck and don’t make them apparent. With most modern RSS readers, you don’t even need the exact feed address. You can just enter something like “https://bobsawesomesite.com” and the reader will find the feed for you.

As a MacOS/iOS user I use Reeder on my devices as my RSS reader. I also like NetNewsWire. Reeder seems to sync well across all my devices. If I follow a site from my phone, it shows up in Reeder on all my devices. Some web browsers have built-in RSS readers, which is cool.

There are similar readers available for PCs and Android. Just search for “RSS Reader” or “RSS aggregator.”

Here are some screen shots of Reeder, on my phone. You can see how many unread posts are on each site that I follow. For example. The Twilight Sessions has one new post.

Reeder app screenshot

If I click on the Twilight Sessions, it shows me the most recent posts. I can tap one and read it from within the Reeder app.

Reeder app screen shot

Now for the fun part.

Why can’t you find an RSS feed for your friend’s Instagram or Facebook account? Because there’s not one. Those social media silos don’t provide RSS because they want you trapped on their sites and apps. It is that simple. So fuck them. If a site does not have an RSS feed, they are not worth your time and fuck them and the horse they rode in on.

 

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Sick Report

Well, it is now January 3 and I am feeling somewhat better. Still have a few days of antibiotics, but I think it will take a while for the snot to go away. We are expecting an “arctic blast” in the coming week, which means we’ll have some real cold nights. So essentially the goal is to stay warm, not overexert myself, and get fully well.

During this illness I’ve been mostly working on some web-related things, like the test Jekyll blog. Also working with two Facebook skateboarding groups to move the groups, gradually, to other platforms. Been reading a lot of articles about things like “re-wilding” the internet. News stories this week have revealed Meta’s plans to insert AI “people” in the “user experience”, thus popping the final nail in the coffin of those platforms. I suspect it’s been going on for a long time. There is no way many of the commenters and accounts I see are those of real human beings.

Having built my first site in 1994, it is weird for me to think that that are now generations of people for whom the internet is apps. It reminds me of the film Logan’s Run (and the book). People raised in a domed city, unaware of/afraid of the outside world. There was a time when one of the main gateways to the Web was the Yahoo! index, which actually curated websites. You’d start down the rabbit hole and find the most amazing things. That part of the web is still there. But it is outside the walls. Time to escape. Time to run.

domed city from the film Logan's Run
The domed city from Logan’s Run.

 

 

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The Greatness of the IndieWeb

I just watched this video about the IndieWeb vs Silos, from 2014. Yes. Ten years ago. It is about 14 minutes long. Worth your time.

The silos have gotten worse in 10 years since this talk. Much worse. Most of the other services mentioned, especially those from Google, were shut down.

But THIS SITE – CONCRETELUNCH.INFO – is still here.

If you had a blog back in the early 2000s I’ll bet it is still there too. Or event the late 2000s. Or even the late 90s.

All the current shit – Facebook, X, Bluesky, blah blah blah – all those silos will die, and the blogs will remain. The IndieWeb is where it’s at.

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Test Blog Update

I’ve made some progress using Jekyll to create a static-page test version of this site. Just making some test pages and trying to see how it will work.

I’ve got a few things to figure out still. For example, the RSS feed is doing some weird stuff, but I found some info that I think will fix it.

One of the disadvantages of the static site generator is that it pretty much lives on one computer. It creates the pages and updates everything, saving to a folder on the computer, which you then upload oldschool-style to your server. So this means I can’t just jump into the post editor from whatever computer with an internet connection I happen to be using.

Like a lot of people, I think I’ve gotten used to the convenience of being able to access and edit documents and projects from nearly anywhere. Google Drive, stuff on iCloud, Dropbox, whatever. It’s all super convenient.

So why am I obsessed with this step back 20 years? I think there is a certain amount of nostalgia involved, for sure. There’s also an element of control. Much less worry about people hacking the static site and stuff like that. I like the community of people I’ve found who are into this kind of thing as well (https://indieweb.org/)

Also, I was in a conversation with an internet-friend the other day on micro.blog about how punk rock it feels to have a blog. I agree, and I have a lot to say about that, and sometime in the next month or so I will likely write a long post about it.

 

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I hate AI

In the Hyperion Cantos, by Dan Simmons, Artificial Intelligences known as the TechnoCore trick humanity into providing the processing power of their own brains to serve the Technocore’s purposes. They do this by providing the technology for space-warping gates, allowing interstellar civilization to exist. When humanity uses the system, their neurons are used. And humanity uses it CONSTANTLY.But I guess it’s cool if we let the world’s AIs steal our creative output, by providing “free” platforms for use to use. Nothing bad could happen.

My favorite SF series, by the way. Wonderfully written – gorgeous.