I ditched the algorithm for RSS

I love RSS. I use RSS daily. I use link-aggregation websites like HN to find interesting authors and subscribe to any RSS feeds that they have. Highlights from my reader sync automatically into my Obsidian vault. It's great.

But I know I, and everyone else posting in this thread, are in the minority. It's clear that most people prefer algorithmic drip in a walled garden. There's a reason everyone flocks to those platforms when RSS superseded them. I don't think I need to re-hash why those platforms are bad for the health of the internet and society as a whole.

So what can be done at a structural level to fight this? What can be done to incentivize people to leave these algorithmic drip feeds to reverse this trend?

Build tools to make it easy for people to assemble their own chronological feeds that have quality UI / UX. IMHO the algorithmic feed's principle benefit is how easy it is for a user to curate something close to both what they want, and what they didn't know they want. We too often view things in terms of technical implementations and such, and lose focus on the core problems the user is actually having. Algorithmic feeds are great, because:

    - User installs app, opens it
    - User begins scrolling
    - Within a few minutes they have an endless feed of mostly interesting content

That is REALLY hard to do without an algorithmic feed, and there are a lot of problems when they subscribe. Not insurmountable, just easily underestimated. The motto I keep repeating to myself when I fall into a doomerism about the inevitability of the algorithm, I just say "Its time to build" and hope I can find something on the other side, if I keep digging. The principle weapon against the algorithm is, I think, not needing an infinite pool of profit. I.e. Facebook could build great apps that weren't algorithmic, but it is highly likely they would make much less money. So not only won't they, they literally _aren't realistically allowed to do it_. Its a crazy thing to think through.

I don't think that's something that RSS (or any other alternative) can fix. I don't think RSS is as toxic as algorithmic feeds, but they are still cut from the same hyper-connected cloth. If you want to fight the algorithmic drip, promote people to connect with others in their community on a small scale.

Even if you have to use the internet to do it, making time to talk (with your vocal cords) to a friend on a regular basis can be much better than mindlessly scrolling or reading endless news feeds.

What might be even better are various other social activities away from a computer. It doesn't have to be highly social either. Just being in a park or library with other people silently reading or feeding ducks can be a highly positive semi-social experience. Just silently enjoying a common experience draws way more connection than the various "social" media apps out there.

I think the walled garden is a flawed metaphor.

I would argue for Twitter over a spotty collection of RSS feeds just because there's ironically more of a democratic aspect -- anyone can start tweeting about whatever. They can go viral and disappear, they can gradually build an audience, etc. They can interact with followers or reply guys or stay aloof; they can recommend content and become a mini content aggregator in their own right. People can be anonymous or they can use their real world cachet to build a following.

Accomplishing the same thing via publishing an RSS feed is a daunting task -- you need to build an RSS feed somewhere, you can't interact with others or be easily boosted by bigger accounts to start to gain a following.

The "walled" aspect of this is basically the limitations of what the platform will allow, which especially under the Musk regime is a good balance of only very light touches of moderation.

People talk about the feed and the algorithm, but no two people have the same feed; the accounts you choose to follow will determine what your feed looks like, together with some generally popular content.

In my experience beyond some basic filtering you should gaze over headlines then dig 2-3 interesting items out of a few thousand manually.

After you-ve hoarded a decent amount of feeds You should find 2-3 new ones on average per day and unsub 1-2.

Two good articles per day/session is enough if they are good enough. If it isnt you dont have enough feeds.

Find long form blogs that publish 1 time every few months. The reader will just be empty which is a useful thing to have that doesnt consume time

A lot of people don’t like the pay to play aspects of Twitter. EM also boosts his own tweets which is the ultimate pay to play.

If you’re talking about the “following” feed that is also an “algorithm” albeit a simple one. But with injected ads it seems strictly worse than RSS.

> Highlights from my reader sync automatically into my Obsidian vault. It's great.

Which RSS reader do you use?

I bet it’s Readwise…

- i tried it, and it’s okay… however personally i much prefer a more private rss reader, where i don’t share all my personal data with yet another commercial company. Also, it’s quite expensive.

RSS is great for this. The vast majority of my 200+ feed subscriptions are for rarely updated blogs or YouTube channels.

1. Mandate that all platforms must have a reverse chronological feed as the default. Alternative "algorithmic" feeds must be explicitly opted in to (preferably with age verification).

2. Regulate out of existence the business model where time spent on site converts to revenue, and force people to directly pay for stuff. Levels of indirection in "payment" for services turn the free market into (even more of) a joke (Noam Chomsky already highlighted this when advertising was cohort based in print- and TV media long before the targeted advertising of today).

Would immediately increase the signal-to-noise ratio by many orders of magnitude.

Readwise Reader. Yes, as another commenter stated it costs money, but it has many other features that I find useful such as good text-to-speech, integrations with other apps like Obsidian, and a good export feature if I want to switch to another feed app.

Make it easier, probably. Even in the glory days of RSS I just never put in the effort to make it work for me. (sort of like how Twitter fans always told me I had to "curate" my feed better to make it less of a cesspool, but I actually just didn't care about randos yeeting random junk into the void).

Curating your feed requires a LOT of upfront investment, and then a nonzero amount of maintenance.

My only response to this is that I don't like the even-more-pay-to-play aspects of RSS. To even up an RSS feed requires a commitment that is an effective bar for 99% of individuals that would be interested in participating in public discourse.

The "for you" feed is less transparent in its nature than the "following" feed, but is still extremely customized. I do see content from accounts that I don't follow, but the vast majority is from accounts that I do follow (or that I can reasonably believe were liked by accounts I follow, though that interaction is more hidden now).

I do wish there was a simpler way of "unliking" or "downprioritizing" a post or an account short of blocking/muting. You can do the "see less of this content" but it feels too subtle; I don't know what the actual effect of this is.