Google RSS Reader finally allows social bookmarking

One of my guilty confessions is that I’ve been doing less linking and sharing of other sites on places like Stumbleupon recently than in the past.

A major reason for that is that I’m generally going through my reading on the train in Google RSS reader, and not actually visiting sites. Combine the slow speed of the onboard wifi with the hassle of coming out of my RSS feed to recommend things on a regular basis, and you might be sympathetic as to why it’s a bit of a hassle.

But no longer – in addition to the places which allow me to import my RSS shared items (Friendfeed, Publish 2 etc), Google’s Matt Cutts revealed today that Google Reader now has a ‘send to’ option for Twitter, Stumbleupon, Digg etc from within the feedreader, and that you can also set it up for sites which aren’t currently listed.

Like him, it’s a feature I’ve wanted since I started using Google for RSS reading, and combined with the improved social tools for sharing and following with other Google RSS readers (And with an 84% share in one example, there’s quite a few!), and RSS is back in the game alongside sharing links on Twitter etc.

(Incidentally, to enable it, just go to settings, and it’s under the ‘Send To’ tab.)

Interesting use of a Twitterfeed to make money

It’s not exactly engagement or interaction, but women’s online publishing and advertising network Glam has been using a widget which allows manual editing of the Twitter feed around an event to ensure the content is suitable for advertisers (From Venturebeat).

The widget is available throughout the Glam network, and to third-party publishers, who receive a cut of any revenue. And soon even publishers outside the network will be able to receive micropayments via Paypal.

It’s a traditional model, but one which appears to have worked, at least for the #Oscars.

But it suffers from the traditional problem of display advertising – in which the amount of eyeballs doesn’t always translate to the amount of people actively clicking on an advert. Although the sponsorship in this case was for a skincare company, which is likely to appeal to a female-targetted content network, would positioning it next to Oscar content give it relevancy or credibility?

And what does it mean for people who use Twitter hashtags without the knowledge that another party may profit from them?

After all, they were originally used to collate information for aggregating information about fires in San Diego, and have since been used for collating conversation around disasters like #Mumbai along with mainstream entertainment and sporting events.

It raises the eternal content question of the internet – should aggregators be able to collect all the revenue without compensating the content creators?

I'll try not to be too harsh on the LastFM Love/Twitter mashup

The LastFM Love Tweet Twitter mashup was obviously a labour of love for Peter Weitzman, and as he says, it was born out of frustration at seeing other systems auto-generate songs being listened to by other Tweeple.

But I’d recommend not using it for two reasons.

1. Autofeeding any information is annoying. And unless you’re sharing the actual audio of songs you like, it’s pointless – which brings me to 2:

2. Blip.fm.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m a huge fan of last.fm and have a pretty big playlist on there. It’s generally my site of choice for listening to streaming music. But if I want to listen to Tweeple’s music, I head to Blip.fm to get an almost random selection of delights and disasters.

After all, blip.fm is like crowdsourcing John Peel. It’s fun when I’m in the mood, but stumbling across obscure German hardcore trance tends to make me run back to my own selections. And if people start bombarding Twitter with autofeeds, I can’t escape.