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I recently tweeted a link to this post on Independent Fashion Bloggers about dealing with the demise of Google Friend Connect.
If you hadn’t heard, Google announced a few days ago in their blog that they’re cancelling Google Friend Connect for ALL NON-BLOGGER SITES on March 1, 2012. They haven’t announced whether they’ll just transition the feed from GFC to everyone’s Google Readers, but my opinion is that they probably won’t bother. Why do I make such an outrageous claim? Because their suggestion, to the hundreds of thousands of non-Blogger blogs, is to create a Google+ page and start managing everything there.
In short, phasing out GFC is simply a way to force us to use Google+. Reason? Because in an already saturated market for social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook, I get the feeling that Google+ looks to most people like more work, more faffing, more trouble. And we already feel like we spend too much time online. What do you think? Will you pour hundreds of hours of work into Google+? Do you use it? Is it worth it to do so if no one else seems to be using it?
I don’t know about you, but I don’t like having things shoved down my throat. Also, on a pure business level, it’s a waste of our resources to pour hours into understanding and building a following on a new (complicated) platform for our blogs if no one else is going to use it with us.
I know many of you have blogspot blogs, but I don’t. Not anymore. And 550 of you are following via GFC. I really don’t want to lose my followers, and I bet you don’t either. I love you guys! You’re my raison d’etre! And I’m not the only one: my pal Melissa has just worked her butt off getting new followers of her solo blog, BitterSweet Designs. And she’s on WordPress like me, so will be affected by the decision. She made a good point when we were talking about this: if it’s being taken down because it’s unsuccessful, why not offer us non-Bloggers the option of paying for use, like with linky parties? (I want to know how it’s unsuccessful, given that nearly every blog follower uses it…?)
So I wondered how you want to proceed – would you rather switch over to my RSS feed by using the button over there on the right? Or do you use a different, blog specific service like BlogLovin’? Or Networked Blogs for you Facebook fans?
I’ve signed up to BlogLovin’ and over the next couple of months, I’ll be adding all my blogs from my reader into BlogLovin‘. I’d like to ask you to consider looking into it and adding my blog through it or use the RSS button on the right. You have a couple of choices: You could either slowly go around and add your favourite blogs to your BlogLovin’, and when March hits and a whole bunch of us get royally screwed by GFC, you’ll have your favourites already lined up in a shiny, new reader. Or you could sign up for the RSS feed and un-follow me via GFC. That way my feed only comes to your reader once.
I’m tempted to tell you to just go with BlogLovin’. What tipped me over the edge with BlogLovin’ is that they have both Android and iPhone apps so you can read your feed from your mobile phone. Awesome! But I suppose Google Reader has a perfectly good mobile app to, which I use every day. And directing my feed through Feedburner has been a wise decision as it integrates perfectly into Google Reader.
If you have any thoughts or suggestions about how to deal with this for non-Blogger blogs, please share them here! We want to continue to serve you and your opinions will affect our decisions. What do you think of Google’s changes?
© J C Excell, 2011
This is where I prove once and for all I really haven’t got a clue! I have google+ but have no idea what to do with it, 2 peeps are my friend, yippy, and then it showed up a whole bunch of other peeps (from my gmail) at which point the shear number freaked me out and I clicked the x in the corner.
I think I follow a few RSS feeds, is that via google reader? but when I look at blogs I just see the updates on the dashboard of blogger, I still haven’t bothered to use the reader thingy.
So, basically, I haven’t got a clue, I really do think there are too many options, which makes me want to ignore them all the more! Still haven’t sent a tweet and I’ve had it now for a few weeks, goodness what mess I will get into trying to sort out anything on google+.
Ummm, do I get any points for being totally clueless?!
Are you my twin sister? I feel the same way.
Thanks Jenna for the heads up!!! I finally launched an FB page today and I signed up for BlogLovin’ too! I hope you don’t mind I blogged about this too and I directed my readers to your page for more information. Have a great day!
I follow you and every other blog I read on my Google Reader. I guess that’s RSS feed? I have no clue what GFC is all about, so I never set it up when I started reading blogs. It’s interesting Google is forcing the use of Google +…Seems kinda silly… I’ve thought about joining, but like you mentioned above I don’t want one more thing I have to keep up with on the internet. Sounds like this is going to be a big ol’ pain, sorry you have to deal with it!
Thanks for this Jenna. I saw Melissa’s post today and came to you to read more. I am now following you on Bloglovin’! 🙂
Help the thick bugger over here please Jenna! Does this mean that because I use blogspot that if someone wants to follow me next spring they’ll need to sign up to another social networking site? Then all the lovely bloggy people I already know will disappear off my Googlereader unless I follow through RSS? If so this sucks.
I’m truly not techie enough to move my blog and I don’t in all honesty understand how to cushion the effect of this on my google reader or on my own blog followers 🙁
Interestingly the quote from Google I read on http://heartifb.com/2011/11/28/google-cancels-google-friend-connect-what-that-means-for-you/ is different to the quote that was in the Metro the other day. I follow you through my Blogger Dashboard, but I don’t know how that shows up on the sites I follow (as it just seems to work on there being a feed of some sort coming in) Wouldn’t it be nice if all the blog companies just played nicely together!
For the thick bugger above me ( 😉 ) it won’t affect you as you have a Blogger account.
I’ve been a BlogLovin lover for almost a year now. I’m crazy about it! And that’s how I follow you, so I NEVER miss a post 😀
I already follow all my blogs through rss, so I’ll be continuing with you after the whatsit goes off. 😀