Google Reader is one of those tools that I like, understand, but don’t really use. At least not until now.
I’ve been using FeedDemon longer than I can remember; certainly long before most normal people had ever heard of RSS feeds. And that’s the root of the problem with RSS: Most people have never heard of it, many of those who have don’t want to use it, and many of those who do find it more than a little frustrating.
The result of this is that until yesterday, the ‘average person’ had little or no use of Google Reader, but their new killer feature will most likely start to change that:
“Feeds make it easy to follow updates to all kinds of webpages, from blogs to news sites to Craigslist queries, but unfortunately not all pages on the web have feeds. Today we’re rolling out a change in Google Reader that lets you create a custom feed to track changes on pages that don’t have their own feed.“
In other words you can receive alerts when any web page has been updated. So whether you’re interested in new drivers for your graphics card, whether your local Pizza Hut will finally deliver to your address, what your competition might be up to or even want to make sure that your website hasn’t been tampered with, Google Reader might prove to be a very useful tool.
And the more you use it, the more you’ll rely on it. The more you rely on it, the more you’ll use it. It’s an inspired move by the Goooooogle folk.
