v.raicovi.net:quotes

You may have noticed my new quote blog. Check it out. Instead of trying to generate a decent amount of quality content like I do here, I will solely be re-posting the words of others that I like. Enjoy!

http://vrquotes.blogspot.com

Need an RSS feed?

Here's quick fix for those sites that don't have an RSS feed. There were a few sites that I check in on frequently, that don't have a feed for one reason or another. If you've been reading about how I'm hooked on Google Reader(here and here), you know that browsing outside of Reader just doesn't cut it.

Enter Feed43. Feed43 can take an html page and with a little help from you, can create an RSS feed for you. Check it out!

Google Reader Rocks...

From your 29 subscriptions, over the last 30 days you read 2,506 items, starred 23 items, shared 76 items, and emailed 20 items.

The more I use Google Reader, the more I love it. I'm now reading over 350 articles online, every day. Take that Newsday! The great part is that I'm spending less time on the computer.

Prior to reader, I would get drawn into things that, deep down inside, I had no interest in. Since most of the RSS feeds come down as a title and a blurb, I can quickly scan items to see if they're of interest to me and be a bit more discerning with what I read.

As the quote above states, I now am pulling my news from 29 sources! This is us from a handful, just over two weeks ago. I'm finding that I check twice a day, usually around lunch time and just before I go to bed. As my trend data builds, I'll grab some screen shots and share an OPML file of my feeds, in case you're interested in what I'm reading or if you'd like to use my feeds as a starting point.

Either way, Google Reader rocks and I highly recommend it.

Google Reader vs. Digg...

I've become a pretty heavy user of Google Reader the last few weeks. It's a great tool for people that spend a lot of time on the web and a reading from either an enormous amount of sites or incredibly varied sites. Prior to using Reader, I would visit a dozen or so sites daily, with Digg being the site I used for tagging stories for recall later on. I can honestly say that I have cut my total news reading & browsing time in almost half. Why not more you ask? Well, I've been exploring new things to read a result of living in Google Reader.

As I've been writing more consistently the last few weeks to this site, you may have noticed that I was posting my shared reader stories and my recent Diggs in the right-hand column. As of this morning, I've taken down the Diggs and I'm going to try an experiment this week. I'm going to try using Digg through Google reader. Why? Well, while Digg exposes some great reads, it really is controlled by a select group of 'Diggers', whose submissions always seem to make the front page. I had started to Dabble in the 'Upcoming Stories' section, but there's just too much crap there. What I've now noticed by visiting Google Reader first, is that I've now read most of the news making the front page, before even going to Digg.

Does this mean I'm going to stop visiting Digg? No. The entertainment from the comment system is too good to walk away from right now. One thing that Reader lacks right now is a social aspect, but knowing of Google, it may already be in the works.

I'll report back later on how my experiment goes, but in the meantime, I highly recommend Reader.