How I Manage Blog Reading
Posted on May 30, 2008 by LJ Earnest
Categories: Techniques
I do a moderate amount of blog reading, and I thought I would share my system of reading.
Software
Firefox. This browser, the pioneer of multiple tabs, is extensible through add-ons.
Google Reader. I like the interface on this reader, and the ability to star things for later reference.
Read It Later. This Firefox extension makes it easy to save an article as a bookmark, then read them later.
FEBE. This utility allows me to sync my bookmarks between work and home. I can then keep my reading list handy.
The Schedule
Throughout the week, I will go through Google reader and star article titles that look interesting. I generally go through my A List daily, other categories once a week. Articles from feeds on Probation (either newly added or considered for deletion) get done about once a month.
On Sundays, I process all starred items. Using keyboard shortcuts, I look at the article a little more closely, and if it seems like something interesting I will open it in a new tab. When I am done with the list, I have many open tabs, and I close Google Reader, and save the open tabs under the Daily Reading bookmark. This is my reading for the next week.
Using FEBE on a schedule, I back up both home and work bookmarks to a folder on my thumb drive.
I try to read 20 articles a day. This usually clears out the week’s backlog of articles. I hit the Read It Later button 20 times to open the articles in browser tabs, and read through. I then delete the bookmarks out of the folder.
I like this method better than working in Google Reader, simply because many feeds have only summaries of articles (a pet peeve of mine, and a serious limitation I consider when subscribing). Plus by limiting how many articles I read per day, I don’t get sucked into many wasted hours in front of my computer.
Photo by callumscott2
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Comments (2)
simply because many feeds have only summaries of articles (a pet peeve of mine, and a serious limitation I consider when subscribing)
I agree! that is also a pet peeve of mine. I believe it’s also a time waster. Instead of being able to scan it in the reader you have to go somewhere else to read the entry. Thanks for giving me the idea of limiting my feeds based on this “feature”.
[...] Knowing that “how-to” websites are distracting, I tell myself I can look at one page, and anything that looks interesting on a site gets clicked into a new tab, at which point those single articles will get flagged for future reading (in my specific terms, right-clicking the link to open in a new tab in Firefox, then flag them on my ReadItLater list (see Managing My Blog Reading). [...]