Nobody cares about your bookmarks (Damnit)

What is it with people dumping their bookmark feeds into their rss? Sure there’s a lot of good theoretical reasons to have social bookmarks, and rss feeds thereof. Some people even really like Del.icio.us. Similarly, one of the holy Grail’s of enterprise social media is to feed off of a whole network’s bookmarks (and especially the tags) as a way to amass and track a sort of “collective intelligence” of the swarm. but…

I know you think your browser history is thrilling and everything but, why, why in your main blog feed? If these links aren’t even worth enough of your time to craft a simple blog post to explain why they’re important, and if you’re not flagging these specifically for me, why then am I being subjected to these bookmarks?*

It’s just link barf people. please stop?

Or, if you feel you must social bookmark, just have the courtesy to make it a separate feed (and see how many readers you get).

*worst offenders are those who just dump in links and tags with no commentary whatsoever. If you’re one who actually makes use of the description field to add some brief editorial then I let you off with a milder scolding. If there was such a thing, a properly designed human-readable bookmark feed would include only the bookmarker’s description of the link, and not display the URL the tags, title and other stuff that’s just noise.

This entry was posted in Archive, Uncategorized. Bookmark the permalink.

20 Responses to Nobody cares about your bookmarks (Damnit)

  1. I totally agree. 2 thumbs up ๐Ÿ™‚ Valuable links should be posted to Ma.gnolia or Deliciou.us : full stop.

  2. I totally agree. 2 thumbs up ๐Ÿ™‚ Valuable links should be posted to Ma.gnolia or Deliciou.us : full stop.

  3. Tom, I don’t fully agree, and in fact I am guilty as charged. I used to feel the same way until I actually started finding a lot of interesting things in other people’s links (http://www.ebizq.net/blogs/column2/archives/2006/05/posts_of_links.php). I agree that the links are not much good without commentary, and I try to put something in the notes field that indicates why I found any particular link interesting (and hence why a reader of my blog might find it interesting), and tag the links by category. If someone doesn’t like the the links entries, it’s pretty easy to just skip by, as with any other blog post that you’re not interested in.

    In response to Jean-Christophe’s comment: my links are on del.icio.us, they just get auto-posted to my blog nightly.

  4. Tom, I don’t fully agree, and in fact I am guilty as charged. I used to feel the same way until I actually started finding a lot of interesting things in other people’s links (http://www.ebizq.net/blogs/column2/archives/2006/05/posts_of_links.php). I agree that the links are not much good without commentary, and I try to put something in the notes field that indicates why I found any particular link interesting (and hence why a reader of my blog might find it interesting), and tag the links by category. If someone doesn’t like the the links entries, it’s pretty easy to just skip by, as with any other blog post that you’re not interested in.

    In response to Jean-Christophe’s comment: my links are on del.icio.us, they just get auto-posted to my blog nightly.

  5. Okay I created a mockup. Worst and best examples of link sharing I can think of from an Information Design perspective:

    http://tinyurl.com/26jm6y

  6. Okay I created a mockup. Worst and best examples of link sharing I can think of from an Information Design perspective:

    http://tinyurl.com/26jm6y

  7. Jay Goldman says:

    Thank you Tom! Thank you, thank you, thank you. All due respect to Sandy, but I’d like to institute a fine for bloggers who post their links in their feed. Make a separate feed for them so the people who want them can grab them. For the rest of us, we want to hear what you have to say, not where you’ve been. If you find a link you want to share, make a post about it.

  8. Ryan Coleman says:

    Amen Tom.

    I’ve actually started unsubscribing from blogs who are the worst culprits. If you want to do it, fine. Just give me an option to subscribe just to your “pure” feed – cause it’s all I care about.

  9. Ryan Coleman says:

    Amen Tom.

    I’ve actually started unsubscribing from blogs who are the worst culprits. If you want to do it, fine. Just give me an option to subscribe just to your “pure” feed – cause it’s all I care about.

  10. Okay, how’s this for a compromise: I’ve created a feed that excludes the “links” posts, since they’re in a unique category. Both subscription options are offered in my sidebar, and I’ve added an explanatory post.

    Tom, Jay and Ryan, since I’m sure that you consume all of your blog reading via feeds, this should work for you. Assuming that you even read my blog ๐Ÿ™‚

  11. Okay, how’s this for a compromise: I’ve created a feed that excludes the “links” posts, since they’re in a unique category. Both subscription options are offered in my sidebar, and I’ve added an explanatory post.

    Tom, Jay and Ryan, since I’m sure that you consume all of your blog reading via feeds, this should work for you. Assuming that you even read my blog ๐Ÿ™‚

  12. Pingback: Off Topic :: 2007 :: March

  13. Of course, everybody is at liberty to include what they want in their feed. But including links without thoughts reduces the overall value of your feed to me and many others. Make it a separate feed as a courtesy, I agree totally with your suggestion Tom.

  14. Of course, everybody is at liberty to include what they want in their feed. But including links without thoughts reduces the overall value of your feed to me and many others. Make it a separate feed as a courtesy, I agree totally with your suggestion Tom.

  15. bunnyhero says:

    i don’t mind it so much, but i often find it frustrating to see a link and a comment/description, and no way to comment on that! i’d rather see a separate blog post about notable links that i can contribute to.

  16. bunnyhero says:

    i don’t mind it so much, but i often find it frustrating to see a link and a comment/description, and no way to comment on that! i’d rather see a separate blog post about notable links that i can contribute to.

  17. Tom …. Hear hear!!! Its actually worse that you suggest … some top name bloggers are using this technique as an excuse for not blogging.

    Just because Delicios, and Magnolia provide the capability doesn’t mean people should use it.

    Now let me see your post on Twitter!

  18. Tom …. Hear hear!!! Its actually worse that you suggest … some top name bloggers are using this technique as an excuse for not blogging.

    Just because Delicios, and Magnolia provide the capability doesn’t mean people should use it.

    Now let me see your post on Twitter!

  19. Pingback: ThomasPurves.com » iDubyaโ€™s are Enterprising Searchers and other things learned on MSoftโ€™s Bar Tab

  20. Jay Goldman says:

    Thank you Tom! Thank you, thank you, thank you. All due respect to Sandy, but I'd like to institute a fine for bloggers who post their links in their feed. Make a separate feed for them so the people who want them can grab them. For the rest of us, we want to hear what you have to say, not where you've been. If you find a link you want to share, make a post about it.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *