[wp-hackers] 2-3 plugins

Jon Abad jonabad at gmail.com
Sun Nov 13 22:34:38 GMT 2005


I chose to offer "subscribe to comments" in addition to the built-in RSS 
feeds because subscribing to comments via RSS just isn't a good 
experience yet. The support isn't there on the aggregator side to handle 
it in a sane manner and RSS aggregator penetration isn't that high.

I think the purpose should be to make it easier for both authors and 
readers to participate in a conversation. Authors are already given the 
option of being subscribed to the comments via email for any of their 
posts, they are not forced to subscribe to the comments feed.

WordPress doesn't choose sides in these squabbles of format, ie. RSS v. 
Atom, so why should it choose which method a reader uses to subscribe to 
comments for a post?

Jon

Amit Gupta wrote:

> Scott Merrill <skippy at skippy.net <mailto:skippy at skippy.net>> wrote:
> |  I disagree that this should be a default plugin.  Notification of
> |  updates for posts and comments should really be occuring with RSS and
> |  Atom feeds (whenever we get back Atom for comments, hint hint).  For
> |  those people who categorically reject embracing the new technology, the
> |  plugins exist (as do services like Bloglet (www.bloglet.com 
> <http://www.bloglet.com>)).  Bundling
> |  subscribe-to-comments (or my own subscribe2 plugin for new post
> |  notifications) would be a step back from the utility of syndication.
>
> yes, I agree with you, but the problem most non-techies have with RSS 
> is that they
> have to download & install a seperate software for aggregating the 
> feeds or signup
> for one more service like Bloglines to stay in touch.
>
> Now people might argue that these guys can simply use LiveBookmarks 
> for FireFox or
> Opera but there's no denying the fact that IE still has the major 
> share(more than 80%
> last I read). Another arguement can be that they can use 
> Thunderbird as their email
> client but then there are a lot of users of Outlook/Outlook Express 
> who simply wouldn't
> want to change their preferred email client just b'coz of this. As I 
> remember, there is
> an addon for Outlook as well to syndicate feeds but that's not free & 
> the point again
> is that of downloading & installing a new software.
>
> Another arguement that goes against syndication of feeds(as far as 
> non-techies are
> concerned) is that they add up as a clutter in the aggregator. I mean, 
> say they subscribe
> to 100 or so posts on different blogs, now this will keep increasing. 
> On the otherhand
> with email notification, its just subscribe & forget as far as the end 
> user is concerned.
> They just get an email when there's a comment on a post they 
> subscribed to, no matter
> how old that post is(if you were thinking about deleting old feeds 
> from the aggregator).
>
> I thought that technology was about making lives easy & improving 
> usability, not to make
> lives more complicated!!
>
> I'd welcome any comments on my thoughts above!! :)
> ------------
> Amit Gupta
> http://igeek.info/  ||  http://blog.igeek.info/
> http://blog.igeek.info/wp-plugins/igsyntax-hiliter
>  
>
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