Blogger's Best Friend

Most of you blogger pals are more savvy than me, so probably already have an RSS reader, but those who don't - must get one! I can't even tell you how much time mine saves me! I've talked to a few friends recently who weren't aware these existed, so I thought I would do a quick post to spread the good word.

I use Google Reader. What it is, is a central location you can go to check for new updates on websites and blogs. You enter in all the blog and website addresses (eg. favorite authors, newspapers, etc.) that you want to keep track of then you simply have to go to one place and it immediately tell you who has new posts since you last checked. That way you don't have to go to every single person's blog to check for updates. It's nice because it allows you to organize things in folder - so I keep all my blogs in one, other websites together and I subscribe to some quotes of the day that I keep together. It also has cool little stats and trends it tracks for you. It is so great that more and more people are doing blogs, but it does make it more difficult to keep up with everyone. Using a reader sames soooo much time and makes it a snap to stay on top of dozens of blogs. I feel like I don't miss new posts, and that it allows me post a lot more comments.

I started with NetNewsWire (for Macs) which was a program that downloaded posts to my computer. I didn't like that I wouldn't be able to check updates on a different computer than my own. So I switched to Google Reader because it is web-based and allows me to check for new posts from any computer. Love it! Check it out if you don't already have an RSS reader! Just go to reader.google.com.