Newsletter: In a media landscape dominated by algorithmic feeds that aim to manipulate and extract, sometimes the most radical thing you can do is choose to read what you want, when you want, without anyone watching over your shoulder.
Here’s how to use #RSS.
But the explosion in newsletters is overwhelming as a reader. Instead of one paper with a dozen writers, you’ve got a dozen newsletters scattered across your inbox.
What if you could curate your own custom newspaper? All your favorite writers, no spam, no surveillance.
Although I regularly read about “the death of RSS”, RSS is still alive and well, and I’ve been using it for more than a decade. Here’s how you can too.
1. Choose an RSS reader. I use Inoreader, but there are a bunch of options out there (free and paid, mobile/web/desktop). Switching between them is pretty easy, so you don’t have to agonize over this too much.
2. Add your sites. Try searching for feeds on the newsletters/blogs/websites you read the most (like Citation Needed!) You can even put in YouTube channels, or Mastodon or BlueSky feeds.
If you need ideas, I publish some of my blogroll: https://mollywhite.net/blogroll/
Some websites don’t publish RSS feeds — often paywalled websites or newsletters. Increasingly, RSS readers are incorporating features that allow you to send newsletters to your feed reader via email, and there are also services like Kill the Newsletter that can do this for you.
3. Read! As you use RSS more, you can make different “newspapers” for different purposes.
And don’t forget to support writers — whose subscription reminders may be less noticeable in RSS feeds. Most newsletters allow you to pay for a subscription but disable email delivery, if you (like me) prefer to read in your RSS reader rather than your email client.
RSS offers readers and writers a path away from unreliable, manipulative, and hostile platforms and intermediaries.
Citation Needed has a full-text RSS feed regardless of whether you subscribe, so consider adding it to your feed reader! https://citationneeded.news/rss/
And consider signing up for a pay-what-you-want subscription to help me continue this work. https://www.citationneeded.news/signup/
go to a github discussions page and tack on '.atom' to the end of the url
This was a terrific write-up. I read Cory's piece when it was published, and tried a reader. But it would just launch a web browser, which kind of defeats the point of a quick overview without surveillance. I didn't realize that wasn't the way they all worked, until I read your piece. Now I'm running Capy on my LineageOS phone, and it's working beautifully.
I run some servers, and I'm thinking I should have them publish to (a private) RSS feed instead of sending me email.
@RaymondPierreL3 this reddit thread discusses a few:
https://www.reddit.com/r/rss/comments/167n2lk/whats_the_best_rss_reader_for_ios_thats_not/
Net news reader appears to be open source.
Can confirm.
@molly0xfff a few additions to your great thread.
1) one way I use (though not as much a I would like to) mastodon’s rss feeds is to subscribe to my “bookmarks” feed from my mastodon account in my rss feed. That lets me bookmark anything I find that I want to refer back to later while avoiding the many other posts in my feed less suited for an rss reader
2) I wonder if someone could add a “support your writers” feature to an rss reader that pulls out the support links from your specific feeds
@monospace hmm, just checked my YouTube channel and it’s still surfacing a feed: https://www.youtube.com/feeds/videos.xml?channel_id=UCJcWDNh9E6AoVW4nsMXyVCw
could it be an issue with your reader?
for several years now, Google has been doing their best to hide RSS feeds for Youtube – most of the feed readers usually workaround it by finding the feed for the videos playlist of the channel:
www.youtube.com/playlist?list=<channel-ID-not-channel-name>
easier when you have the reader find it for you than trying to find it yourself 🫤
@cerement
On desktop:
1: Go to the channel page
2: Press Ctrl+u to view the HTML
3: Search for '/feeds/'
4: Copy the URL
I agree it's inconvenient, but at least it works.
@monospace @molly0xfff
@molly0xfff Don't need convincing. What I need is a list of reliable, reputable, preferably free RSS readers.
I do live by the reader I have now btw. Why anyone would not use one is beyond me.
@bloodravenlib @molly0xfff I wrote an article about using an RSS reader for webcomics a few years ago. At the bottom of the article is a list of free readers I'd recommend. (Personally I use Newsblur and Innoreader.)
I wish more sites would support it. I use Feeder on Android and some other fucking thing on my desktop, but it's key to getting my daily news without all the social media bollocks. Just the news from sources I trust without general public commentary/noise. I feel like it is making a comeback however.
I for one wish more news sites offered full-text feeds. Some offer it as a subscription perk, but many barely offer title + URL in RSS form. I mean, that's still *something*, but it sure isn't much.
@molly0xfff in case anyone needs synchronization between devices without enshittification: Nextcloud News let's you read RSS in your browser and there are a bunch of compatible apps.
Just noticed there's also FreshRSS
@molly0xfff indeed, RSS has its values!
@molly0xfff If one wants RSS (or Atom) feeds of sites that don't support feeds, they can be created using RSS Bridge. A very customizable way to create notifications about changes on pages. Something for the technically inclined to perhaps host on their own device or for public consumption
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