Ability to Disable RSS Feed on Profile Page

1. 87

   Will Apseposted 12 years ago

   For people who never use RSS feeds for any reason, I reckon it would be worth giving them the option of disabling the feature.
   
   RSS feeds make it too easy for content to be stolen.

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2. 72

   Cagsilposted 12 years ago

   Stolen content? Explain.
   
   Last time I checked, an RSS Feed doesn't allow any such thing. It does allow people to subscribe to what you publish. RSS Feeds only produce very little of a hubs information, so I don't see how it could be stolen content.

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3. 87

   Will Apseposted 12 years ago

   You want to steal good content? Subscribe to the RSS feeds of writers in the desired area. Pick out what you want.
   
   Frankly, I don't even want fragments of my pages appearing anywhere else.

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   1. 72

      Cagsilposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      Will, you're a little short-sighted on the usage of RSS Feeds. Mostly RSS Feeds are for backlinking and nothing more. Thinking that someone is going to steal your articles is just paranoia, especially from an RSS Feed.

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      1. 87

         Will Apseposted 12 years agoin reply to this

         'Mostly RSS Feeds are for backlinking.'
         
         This means that most RSS feeds are for subverting the integrity of Google search?
         
         Well, how could that be a problem?

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         1. 72

            Cagsilposted 12 years agoin reply to this

            Untrue. It has nothing to do with subverting the integrity of Google search. It has to do with backlinking to other locations. Backlinks are part of natural SEO.
            
            If a person wants to link to your hub from some location, it creates a backlink. If they want to subscribe to your writing, so they can be updated with things that you write about then the RSS Feed fulfills that purpose.
            It's not a problem. It's helpful.

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            1. 87

               Will Apseposted 12 years agoin reply to this

               'Backlinks are part of natural SEO.'
               
               Genuine backlinks, freely given, are a great boost for a page. The kind of SEO you are talking about is dinosaur SEO. Google is determined to send the dinosaurs off to the bone pits.
               
               I don't want to to buried by a feature I don't need and will never use.

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               1. 72

                  Cagsilposted 12 years agoin reply to this

                  And someone subscribing to your RSS Feed is done so freely of their own choice.....meaning that it creates a genuine backlink. What are you missing? Or don't understand?
                  BS.
                  It's NOT YOU USING IT. DUH!

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                  1. 87

                     Will Apseposted 12 years agoin reply to this

                     Anyone can click that RSS button. I am not silly enough to submit my RSS feeds to dubious aggregators but I can't control who does.
                     
                     Also, what is it about SEO fiends that makes them so offensive?

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                     1. 72

                        Cagsilposted 12 years agoin reply to this

                        What makes you think that someone would submit your RSS Feed anywhere? Again, paranoia.
                        
                        It is about people subscribing to your RSS Feed and then posting a widget on their blog/website, so they can be updated. Thus, creating a backlink.

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4. 95

   melbelposted 12 years ago

   I guess an RSS feed is a good way for someone to programmatically pull content. It's a neat and clean list of recent content that's regularly updated. If I were to steal content, that's what I would consider writing a script around. Not that I condone stealing of content.
   
   That said, there are tons of ways to do it, feeds are just a drop in the bucket.

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5. 82

   Mark Ewbieposted 12 years ago

   I believe you can pick up an RSS feed and drop it straight into a blog.  It's called autoblogging.  There are tons of shameless adverts for this on the web.
   
   Grab other people's content from RSS feeds, automatically modify it to get round copied content problems, and post it to your blog.
   
   Set up once and forget.  Add in a backlink generator and maybe some other 'great' techniques.
   
   What chance does an amateur writer have against this kind of thing?
   
   Speaking for myself - it disgusts me.

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   1. 87

      Will Apseposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      The harder Google goes after scraped content, the more likely RSS users are likely to suffer in the SERPs.

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6. 87

   Will Apseposted 12 years ago

   RSS feeds were designed for syndicating articles. In an age when Google has said it never wants to come across two copies of any page (or else!) you have to wonder if they are really worth having.

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   1. 61

      Lisa HWposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      A similar thought has occurred to me about Google and the "no-two-copies" thing when I've seen my own Hubs on search pages, with stuff like "best HubPages" and "best of HubPages" that (automatic or otherwise) posts tons of ad-surrounded links to "zillions" of Hubs (all different authors, and not necessarily with a lot of lines with them, but duplicate nonetheless). 
      
      AND, if Google doesn't dislike that aspect of it, what about the fact that a person gets three versions of the same Hub (but if he clicks on two of them he's not getting straight to a decent looking Hub first, but is instead brought to one of those ad-loaded sites, which he has to first see (and be aggravated by) and then click to get to what he thought he was going to get to in the first place).
      
      I mean, if Google doesn't dislike it from the duplicate-content standpoint, what about the crap-looking content and/or aggravate-the-searcher standpoint????  Or what about the "three-of-the-same-things-on-the-search-page standpoint??  Or how about the "doorway-page" thing, or the "manipulating-the-search-engines" thing?  And is there a "low-quality link" thing (yet)??  Or, how about the "interupting-the-chances-of-getting-a-view (and maybe an ad click on the Hub) thing??
      
      Why are the sites (and blogs, sometimes put together by Hubbers, themselves) still up, and are they just fine????    (Or are these "wonderful", albeit crap-looking, sites getting us traffic for which we should all be eternally grateful???)

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      1. 87

         Will Apseposted 12 years agoin reply to this

         Hard to disagree with any of this. Low quality links. Duplicates. Who needs it?

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7. 69

   waynetposted 12 years ago

   People will steal content regardless of having an RSS feed disabled or not, there are other means to gather up content online using scripts and so on...

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   1. 87

      Will Apseposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      I see no reason to make it any easier than it otherwise is. Why would anyone?
      
      For those who want to shunt their content around the net, regardless of the damage it does, fine. I just want my RSS feeds disabled. You can do what you like with yours.

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8. 90

   Howard S.posted 12 years ago

   @Cagsil and @Waynet (at least, but not exclusively): What is the proper use of RSS? My only experience with it was through the RSS capsules. Jason--I believe it was, and in another recent thread where it was not the main topic--said that most people don't really know how to use RSS capsules/feeds properly.
   
   I've been going through my hubs and checking "do not display" on any existing RSS capsules to avoid hurting the hubs. Once I know the "correct" way to use RSS, I may turn some of them back on, perhaps with editing. Instead of using RSS capsules to point to my own eclectic collection of hubs, I had been trying to keep my RSS feed relevant to the topic, e.g. this in a hub on cancer: //topics/health/cancer/2177/hot?rss

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9. 69

   waynetposted 12 years ago

   The proper use of RSS feeds has always been to show some related content or to provide a way to share a feed on a sites content that others can subscribe to, but the problem is that RSS feeds can be classified as duplicate content too which can also be not good.
   
   I'm still undecided about the use of RSS feeds as there are lots of other  factors that can reduce a pages rank or traffic through the search engines.

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10. 69

    Teddletonmrposted 12 years ago

    For what it is worth, I have removed all RSS feeds from many of my hubs and the traffic to them has fallen like a stone. 60-70% each week.

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