Google Reader: Now With Comments
The Google Reader team just announced the addition of an important new feature to Google's popular feed reader: you can now comment on any item that your friends have shared with you. In order to keep track of these conversations, Google has now also introduced a 'comments view' that will only show an excerpt of the post, but which highlights the comments your friends have made.
Whenever a post in your list of shared items has comments, a little speech bubble will appear on top of your friend's icon. If more than one of your friends has shared the same item, Google will present you with separate conversations under each person who shared it.
The comment feature is also available in the mobile version of Google Reader.
As of now, the comments you make in Google Reader remain in Google's silo and won't be syndicated back to the original blog. It is not clear if Google will give developers access to these comments so that they can create plugins that aggregate these Google Reader comments and display them on the original post or on an aggregation service like FriendFeed. In the announcement, however, the Google Reader team stresses that it wants to give its users the ability to have private conversations.
Google has been relatively slow to add social features to Google Reader and most of the discussions around shared items now happen on other services like FriendFeed and Facebook. It will be interesting to see if users will actually use this new feature in large numbers, but it is definitely an interesting addition to Google Reader. In the announcement, Google specifically mentions that it has "much more planned for this feature," and we can't help but wonder if Google is planning to allow users to comment on any item in Google Reader (similar to the SearchWiki functionality in its search engine).
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Have things changed since Shyftr did this almost one year ago? Is adding comments to a reader, hijacking the conversation? Some people think so. Story appeared on Mashable: http://mashable.com/2008/04/12/shyftr/. Some went on to say, Shyftr crossed the line: http://www.deepjiveinterests.com/2008/04/12/fine-ill-say-it-shyftr-crosses-the-line/
Did they cross the line? Who owns the conversation? Interesting debate.
Too bad Google doesn't bother to keep the discussions where they belong: on the Blog.
This way it get's even harder to keep track of conversations.
Yes, Christian is right. Bloggers cannot possibly be happy about this (just like they don't necessarily like Slashdot / Digg / Facebook and friends who give you traffic but keep the discussion for themselves).
What we need is a standardised method for linking comments to RSS feeds. A new element within the RSS specification that links a particular item to an RSS feed of comments.
That way we could be presented with the option in our RSS readers of viewing and subscribing to the comments, instantly receiving updates quickly and easily.
Next step would be to tackle a standard way of posting comments whilst preserving security so that blogs aren't overrun by spammers.
Hi!
Sometimes we want to reply while reading someone post in our google reader, this is good but it will be better if the comment will go directl to the original post. Some site owner maybe don't read what we comment in google reader.
I wonder when they allow adding comments to your OWN subscriptions that are not shared with anyone.
Same goes with non-shared notes in google reader. Am I the only one who finds it extremely silly that you can add a comment when you add a website to google reader (note in reader -feature, not subscription to a feed), but you cannot add comments to existing items you have?
There is two ways of looking at it this if a person can share his view through comment on Google reader than on original blog post .Other way is the coomment should go to original blog post as blogger can gets view of reader.There should be conversation between blogger and reader it's my view.
There is a difference between a public discussion between readers and writers on a blog, and a private conversation between friends. People also discuss blogs over email. So there is room for both.
i agree with eelco's last point that this is a conversation more between friends at the moment than for public consumption but i also think its good to consolidate the comment platform.
Other way is the coomment should go to original blog post as blogger can gets view of reader.
I am still wondering why they are doing this. Are they doing it to make the searches more relevant and effectively letting the comments be appendices to the webpage? Or are they just making it easier to the Web 2.0 world to have collaboration on the content of the webpage? I have not read anything that clearly explains this just yet. The people at the big G are very smart so I believe that there is method in the madness - just not communicated that well yet.
I get a kick out of all those who are saying that bloggers can't possibly be happy out of this, as it takes the conversations away from the blog, and on the reader. It's even more hilarious to me that people mention Reddit, Digg and Slashdot as contributing to the problem of stealing discussions.
Except you're missing one crucial piece of data: traffic.
Google Reader shared items, Digg, Slashdot, Reddet, Facebook, and so forth all bring traffic to the original site. This means greater exposure of the blogger, which brings more traffic, which brings a larger readership. It's a total win. Sure, discussions are held in multiple locations, but regardless of the location, they're discussing my content. This is a total win/win.
My content has a greater reach and I still get great traffic on my site. I don't see this as harming the blogger at all. I see this as bringing my content to the world through a free service.
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It is really works. Thanks eelco for share information.
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Yes, the Google Reader shared items, Digg, Slashdot, Reddet, Facebook, and so forth all bring traffic to the original site. This means greater exposure of the blogger, which brings more traffic, which brings a larger readership.
Yes, the Google Reader shared items, Digg, Slashdot, Reddet, Facebook, and so forth all bring traffic to the original site.
Wow, I'm glad to finally see this feature added!