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# Self-aggrandRSSment
- URL: https://www.lorcandempsey.net/self-aggrandrssment/
- Published: 2006-01-15T22:06:32.000Z
- Updated: 2020-10-28T20:58:47.000Z
- Author: Lorcan Dempsey
- Tags: Systems

[Geoff Harder](https://www.blogdriverswaltz.com/?ref=lorcandempsey.net) has made a very nice presentation about RSS available \[[pdf](https://www.blogdriverswaltz.com/present/RSS%5FEI2006.pdf?ref=lorcandempsey.net)\]. He refers to NADD (Nerd Attention Deficiency Disorder) and RII (Repetitive Information Injury) 😉 The slides are well done: it is a pity that they are only available in PDF.  
RSS is everywhere, and is consumed both by people (in their aggregators etc) and by applications (as a simple machine to machine tissue).  
Thinking about how people consume feeds, I have around 150 feeds in my aggregator on my work machine – I could easily have a lot more, but there does not seem much point. I really should have a lot less: I don’t read all these ones. In fact, there are many I have not looked at for months. Life is simply too short. I will skim a selection of the full range every now and then. I have about 40 on the family machine, with some overlap with work. I didn’t take to Bloglines. I find the RSS aggregator a very inefficient way of doing things. I agree with Phil Wainewright:

> When I wrote of the [Death of the RSS reader](https://blogs.zdnet.com/SAAS/?p=80&ref=lorcandempsey.net) last week, I little realized just how many people have **given up on following RSS feeds**. Now the [slashdot hordes have had their say](https://slashdot.org/articles/06/01/01/1424220.shtml?tid=126&ref=lorcandempsey.net), it’s all too plain that RSS as currently delivered is fatally flawed. \[[� It’s time to bury RSS | Software as services | ZDNet.com](https://blogs.zdnet.com/SAAS/?p=82&ref=lorcandempsey.net#more-82)\]

He goes on to say why and reference some other discussion.  
Slightly less than half of my subscriptions are directly library related. The others are largely a mixture of technology, business, and academic.  
In terms of where I ‘spend’ my attention (and attention is what so much is now about) I tend to have a few favorites, thirty or so, at any one time, and these change with my interests. Because of this flux, I find it difficult answering questions about which blogs I read or my favorites: they come and go. There are very few staples: one example is [Catalogablog](https://catalogablog.blogspot.com/?ref=lorcandempsey.net). So although I will already have seen some of what gets posted there, there is enough that I have not seen, and it is central enough to my work interests, to make it important to keep watching it. David Bigwood does a very nice job.  
Beyond the staples, favorites gravitate towards reflective voices which write interestingly about topics I should be interested in. Examples of the blogs I am currently reading regularly are [Rough Type](https://www.roughtype.com/?ref=lorcandempsey.net), [Software as services](https://blogs.zdnet.com/SAAS/?ref=lorcandempsey.net), and [Bubblegeneration](https://www.bubblegeneration.com/?ref=lorcandempsey.net). Here is Rough Type (Nicholas Carr) on [open source software](https://www.roughtype.com/archives/2006/01/the%5Famorality%5Fo%5F1.php?ref=lorcandempsey.net), Software as Services (Phil Wainewright) on the ‘[three layers of Web 3.0](https://blogs.zdnet.com/SAAS/?p=68&ref=lorcandempsey.net)‘, and Bubblegeneration (Umair Haique) on the [attention economy](https://www.bubblegeneration.com/2005/11/attention-economy-across-consumer.cfm?ref=lorcandempsey.net).  
And while talking about reflective voices writing interestingly, here is another note about my colleague Stu Weibel’s [blog](https://weibel-lines.typepad.com/?ref=lorcandempsey.net). Stu will be based at the University of Washington for a while, working on the topic of identifiers. We are grateful to the [iSchool](https://www.ischool.washington.edu/?ref=lorcandempsey.net) and Microsoft for supporting this venture. If Stu keeps writing as engagingly as in the entries describing his trip and arrival it might be worth subscribing to his feed 😉  
[Geoff Harder](https://www.blogdriverswaltz.com/?ref=lorcandempsey.net) link via [The Distant Librarian](https://distlib.blogs.com/distlib/2006/01/its%5Fgood%5Fto%5Fgiv.html?ref=lorcandempsey.net).  
Related entries:

- [RSS, Mozilla and mortals](https://blog.oclc.org/lorcand/archives/000755.html?ref=lorcandempsey.net)
- [RSS: really something significant](https://blog.oclc.org/lorcand/archives/000652.html?ref=lorcandempsey.net)
- [Subscribe is the new search](https://blog.oclc.org/lorcand/archives/000712.html?ref=lorcandempsey.net)