Feed me

In response to comments on the previous post, which was just a rant of mine with no particular merit, but anyway:

KathyF, yes the personality of the blog is definitely appreciated more if you browse the site rather than the boring RSS interface. And I agree with you about the ads, though it’s really only fair to click on an ad if one is actually interested. I couldn’t do the kind of blog I do here however, if I had to go to 100+ sites one at a time.

Debby and Mrs. A, you may not know what I was referring to because you don’t so far as I know manage a blog. Many to most web sites have Really Simple Syndication (RSS) feeds. Many of us read web sites only through the feeds because we get everything in one place and the feeds cut out all the sidebars and repetitious blog stuff. Feeds usually consist of just the posts.

The problem I was ranting about arises when the blogger chooses to publish a feed with just excerpts of their posts. We who rely on RSS glance at the excerpt and make an instant decision about whether it’s worth clicking and going to the web browser to read the entire post. It seldom is.

Because, simply put, most bloggers are not good enough writers to set the hook in the excerpt. They would be better off if they think they have something to say, to publish the whole post not just the excerpt. Make it easier for your feed readers and they are more likely to be interested in what you have to say — and much, much more likely to write about what you say and link to your blog.