Suggested change: limit the number of own hubs a hubber can 'share'

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   Giselle Maineposted 12 years ago

   While I understand that hubbers might occasionally want to share some of their own hubs with their followers, it can be frustrating to see multiple 'old' hubs shared by their owner when looking at the 'feed'.  I'd like to suggest that HubPages limits the ability to do this to a certain number of hubs per day (e.g. 1 or 2 hubs per day).  Or perhaps even disallow it altogether.  Failing that, a change to allow people to set their feed preferences to not view stories where a hubber is sharing their own work, would be helpful.
   
   This is because hubbers sharing their own work is disruptive to the 'feed' and can 'drown out' the announcement of new hubs or the sharing of other people's work.  I think it's fantastic when a hubber 'shares' ANOTHER hubber's work with followers, but I don't think it is necessary for a hubber to share their own hubs with their followers frequently, if at all. Maybe some will disagree - but at least in that case a feed preference setting to enable screening these stories out of the feed might prove a good solution to all parties.
   
   Right now, the only alternative is to click 'hide this story'.  But when I find myself hiding stories from the same hubber all the time it is frankly easier to unfollow that hubber, which I have actually done in one case. Based on the hubber's content, I didn't really want to unfollow - but faced with my feed constantly being mucked up, I felt unfollowing was the best solution.  But I would have preferred that there be some other way around it.

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   1. STAFF

      pauldeedsposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      As we say in the FAQ, "you should only follow people who you have a genuine interest in keeping up with. By following a Hubber you are saying that their activity on HubPages is noteworthy or interesting to you."
      
      If a Hubber's activity (especially sharing of hubs) is polluting your feed, we believe the right response is to unfollow them.  The act of following and unfollowing is a very simple mechanism that helps keep the system in balance.

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         Pcunixposted 12 years agoin reply to this

         Then I guess the only recourse is to send messages to offensive hubbers letting them know you don't like their excessive resharing and will unsubscribe.,
         
         If they see enough of that, they might change their ways.

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         Marisa Wrightposted 12 years agoin reply to this

         Exactly.  If you're following someone who's engaging in spam-type activities like that, they're probably not worth following anyway!
         
         "Followers" used to be called "Fans", which made it clearer that you should only follow people whose work you're interested in.

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         Giselle Maineposted 12 years agoin reply to this

         Paul Deeds, Pcunix and Marisa Wright, I completely agree with you about unfollowing.  However, the situation is made more frustrating if you are genuinely interested in the hubber's CONTENT (but dislike their 'sharing' behavior).  And yes, I take the point that Paul Deeds mentioned saying that we should consider the ACTIVITY of those we are following.  I realize that both content and behavior come together to make the activity of those we follow. 
         
         BUT, on the other hand, if self-sharing of hubs can be considered 'spam-like' or 'overly promotional', why does Hubpages make it so easy to do it? I understand and agree that too many rules and restrictions are frustrating on a site.  But, based on the discussion, how about instead having a pop-up message if someone click on their own hub to 'share with followers', saying  "Frequently sharing your own hubs with followers is not recommended.  Do you want to proceed? Yes/Cancel" 
         
         The reason I suggest the pop-up message is this: Ideally, if a hubber wishes to 'enliven' an older hub, a better way of doing it would be to write a NEW hub which touches on the topic from a different angle.  The old hub can then be LINKED WITHIN THE NEW HUB (e.g. using the 'link' capsule).  This should get more traffic to the older hub.  But right now, there is nothing to discourage hubbers from sharing with own followers, which is an easier route than making a new hub.  BUT, making a new hubs is better revenue-wise (because it has potential to attract readers outside the audience of just the followers).  So it is not just in the writer's interests to write a new hub, but also in Hubpages interests in general to do so.  That is why I think that sharing of own hubs should be officially discouraged in some way (although I can see the point some have made that it needn't be prohibited entirely).  A pop-up  message could be a good way to discourage unnecessary self-sharing while not prohibiting it completely.

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         1. STAFF

            pauldeedsposted 12 years agoin reply to this

            Sure, giving people a warning when sharing their own hubs is not a bad idea.

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               Giselle Maineposted 12 years agoin reply to this

               Hi Paul, thanks so much for your supportive words about this idea! As you can see the idea of a warning stemmed from the discussion that went on in this forum - in the original post I had suggested 2 other ideas but based on what people were saying I could now see why my original ideas were not as good. I'm glad the forum discussion helped bring a new idea to the table.

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                  Cardisaposted 12 years agoin reply to this

                  Why not just ignore the hubs, that's what I do. I totally understand why people keep sharing hubs....I try not to exceed four per day and maybe once every two weeks or so. When your following grows you tend to want to share ole hubs they may not find easily. Also, when the traffic drops you want to try to get it back up by sharing hubs.
                  
                  I find that I mistakenly "SHARE WITH FOLLOWERS" instead of "TWEET" a couple of times.

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                     ktrappposted 12 years agoin reply to this

                     I think the issue isn't necessarily how our own feeds appear. I don't like the fact that when I publish a new hub, knowing that it is sometimes immediately "buried" in the feeds of my followers if they too follow a person that shares excessively. I have actually published new hubs only to have to scroll and scroll on my own feed to find it because after I published it one or two people shared many of their old hubs. If I have to scroll to find it, then other people following these same hubbers that share a lot have to also.
                     
                     Look at it this way Cardisa. I am one of your followers. If you work on a new hub and publish it, I very well may not notice it on my feed if someone else follows your publishing time with 10 shared hubs that often taken up even more visual space since they may have multiple old comments showing too. I am much more interested in seeing and maybe reading your new hub than old shared ones, but I may miss it.
                     
                     At least this is how I see the issue.

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                  Cardisaposted 12 years agoin reply to this

                  You can just ignore the hubs at least that's what I do. At first it just frustrated the hell out me but I just scroll through and ignore them.
                  
                  Personally I try not to exceed four per day and that like once every week or so.

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      Barbara Kayposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      I've been on here long enough to know this, but how do you share an article with other hubbers other than just publishing them anyways?

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      barbergirl28posted 12 years agoin reply to this

      I agree with you on this 100 percent. In fact, I don't mind when other hubbers share a hub occasionally, but sometimes when you see them in your feed 10 times in a row it gets irritating that it is all you really see. Then I miss some of the stuff from the other hubs.
      I think the number of your own hubs you can share in a day should be limited. I believe it goes back in your feed if you comment on it anyway. But I do think sharing old hubs is useful, especially if you went back and revamped the hub or if it is an older hub that some of your newer followers might not have seen.

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         barryrutherfordposted 12 years agoin reply to this

         In that case overuse of promotion you would stop following them if it annoys you so much or send them a note saying that you intend to do so. Unless they reduce their self promotion...

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   Aficionadaposted 12 years ago

   I didn't realize that sharing one's hubs would make them show up in the feed.
   
   I knew that they would show up when someone (including the author) added a comment.  In that situation, I've felt the same as you at times - that is, sort of buried under the weight of so many hubs by one particular hubber.
   
   But I don't actually look at my feed all that often these days, so it doesn't bother me very much now.

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   Uninvited Writerposted 12 years ago

   I notice that when someone comments on a hub it is shown on the feed as them having shared it. I don't think it's a conscious thing on people's part all the time.

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   Hollie Thomasposted 12 years ago

   I'm not even sure what the feed is. I think I really need to get to grips with technical aspects of it all.

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      Uninvited Writerposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      When you click on HubPages at the top of the page you see the feed.

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         Hollie Thomasposted 12 years agoin reply to this

         Thanks UW,  I'm going to check it out. I've just concentrated on writing, not the other stuff. I am very illiterate at the other stuff.

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      Wesman Todd Shawposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      It's that stuff on your "home" screen!!!! :-D

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   Pcunixposted 12 years ago

   I agree with this.
   
   It's bearable now because only a few people do it and even some of those only do it when they have made significant updates, but if everybody just started spamming the feed, it would be useless.

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      Wesman Todd Shawposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      .....but if everyone shared everything on their feed all of the time.....
      
      ~maniacal grin~

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   QuestionMasterposted 12 years ago

   I have a feed on Facebook. So I don't see the need to look at the Hubpages feed.

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      Wesman Todd Shawposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      When I get done feeding on my feed - I switch from either Facebook to here, or vica versa.  You are what you feed on, you know....

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   Giselle Maineposted 12 years ago

   Thanks for the discussion everyone has already generated.  There has been some confusion about comments vs sharing of hubs and I'd like to make an important distinction:  Hub comments appearing in the feed is NOT the issue I'm bringing up, and is a different thing altogether from sharing one's own hubs. 
   
   Here is the difference: In the feed, if an author (or someone else) comments on a hub, on the left hand symbol of the feed is a light BLUE 'Comment' symbol - this is not a problem from my point of view (at least, is not problem I was bringing up). In contrast, if an author 'shares' a hub with followers, the left hand symbol of that in the feed is the RED 'Hub' symbol - the same symbol as that used to announce NEW hubs.  Thus, the viewer of the feed has a harder time disintuishing new hubs from recently shared 'old' hubs when looking at the feed.  This is what I meant by owner-shared hubs 'drowning out' new hubs. 
   
   So it is just the fact of owner-shared hubs that I was proposing being limited OR proposing to introduce ability to set feed preferences not to view this.  (In contrast, comments appearing on the feed have the blue 'comment' symbol and do not pose a problem as they do not resemble new hubs in any way).

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      Millionaire Tipsposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      I agree with you Giselle.  I have stopped following anyone who annoyingly shares their own hubs.  I hated doing it, because I genuinely like their hubs, but I don't like getting spammed worse.
      
      There are two other choices I thought of, based on your post.  Maybe if the color was different for shared hubs as compared to new hubs, they might be easier to find.
      
      I also would prefer to be able to filter out shared hubs, so I don't have to look at them at all if I don't want.

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         Pcunixposted 12 years agoin reply to this

         Yes, that's another good idea.  Good ideas so far:
         
         Allow a reason to be added, change the color, and allow notifications to differentiate between new and re-shared hubs.
         
         I have some hubs i have made significant changes to.  I'd like to re-share them, but under the present conditions, I will not because I refuse to spam people who may not care.

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            Giselle Maineposted 12 years agoin reply to this

            Hi Pcunix, thanks - an excellent summation of the helpful ideas that have been obtained so far.

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   paradigmsearchposted 12 years ago

   Ya know... I think I've done only 2 HP shares ever. Leastwise that's all I remember. I should probably do a little more of that. Though I'm reasonably certain that it does absolutely no good whatsoever. I'd like to be wrong on that. Am I?

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      Pcunixposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      I can't answer that because I think I only did a reshare once and that was just to see what it did :-)
      
      I think it has value if you have really updated a hub.  Your followers might like to know if you have added useful information.
      
      Other than that, I consider it spamming.

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      IzzyMposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      I don't think I have ever shared a hub. I noticed some in the feed the other day - wouldn't even notice the feed if I hadn't made another user account and jump between the two - and wondered how it is done?
      
      I think its a good idea to re-stir interest in dormant hubs.

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   paradigmsearchposted 12 years ago

   Well, I just went and shared my one-and-only political hub. I'd like that critter to get buried in conflicting comments and become a never-ending  political debate. Hey, I can dream, can't I?

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    Aficionadaposted 12 years ago

    How does a reshare function?  I.e., what does the Hubber do to cause it to be re-shared?

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       Mark Ewbieposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       You click Share on your page and choose Followers.  It appears on their feed.
       
       If used v. sparingly after a major revamp I think it's just about OK.  Once or twice monthly say.

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          Aficionadaposted 12 years agoin reply to this

          Thanks! ...learn something new every day.........

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    WriteAngledposted 12 years ago

    I took the route of least resistance.
    
    The email associated to my HP account is one I use for non-essential matters and check every 2-3 months, mainly just to clear down the inbox by mass deletion after a rapid scan through the message headers.
    
    I never log in to HP via the home page, but go straight into my account, which has the information that interests me.
    
    This way, I remain in blissful ignorance of the various ways in which HP tries to spam me. When I feel like reading hubs, I pull up the list of people I follow and home in on titles of interest.
    
    Of course this means I will probably remain ignorant of vital information on important changes here. However, if HP is unwilling to allow us to separate out mission-critical information from social networking dross, I choose to remain ignorant of everything.

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       Mark Ewbieposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       Bother.  I'm going to have to spam you on the forums.  Hvae you read my latest.  No, not the latest - that's crap. It's the one before I think, or maybe a bit earlier.  Whatever. It's really average.
       
       Go for it.  I'd put a link in but then you-know-who will say I'm self publicising.
       
       Ironic really.  Considering the Share option.
       
       Point made. Toodle-pip!

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          WriteAngledposted 12 years agoin reply to this

          Mark, the point I'm trying to make is that yes, I do follow people I want to read. However, I see this more as making a bookmark list, which I can access as and when I have the time and inclination to go on a hub reading fest.
          
          I do not want my email bunged up with messages from HP which are telling me that of those I follow, X has published 3 new hubs, Y one hub and Z 40 hubs, or trying to thrust down my unwilling throat blogs hammering on about (a) interviews with hubbers I have never heard of and who do not interest me in the slightest, (b) hubs they deem "hot", which are of no relevance to my interest, especially when they concern drain cleaners, and (c) loathsome podcasts (I like readable words not long video/audio tracts of someone stuttering away in an offensive whine at 10% of my normal reading speed).

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             Marisa Wrightposted 12 years agoin reply to this

             WriteaAngled, you do know that you can modify your notifications on your profile page?
             
             Currently I have mine set so I only get the newsletter and important notifications from HubPages.  I find it's the only way to survive when I'm busy!  Sounds like you need to do the same.
             
             Go into "Profile" and choose "Email settings".

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                brittanytoddposted 12 years agoin reply to this

                Marissa's right.  You can also change your feed settings to not display "shared" hubs.

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    Wesman Todd Shawposted 12 years ago

    I hit share on this from my "feed" or "stream" because that's just how evil that I really am.

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       Mark Ewbieposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       Excellent.  I'm going to share it as well.  Ace.
       
       edit: This is how Occupy Wall Street started. Watch out Jason.

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          FloraBreenRobisonposted 12 years agoin reply to this

          

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          ktrappposted 12 years agoin reply to this

          Haha!

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    barryrutherfordposted 12 years ago

    Some of the earlier most popular hubs that I posted three years ago I have shared with my followers in recent times again because for one I have a few hundred new followers since The original  Hub was published.  I would hate that right to be taken away
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    p.s. It is quite possible that having so many hubs and given my profile page can only contain(display) so many it would be possible that followers never saw some of my best Hubs

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       Pcunixposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       I suppose that's true, but I'll leave it up to them to find the stuff if they want to.

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       Giselle Maineposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       Barry, I can see where you are coming from and you have a good point.  Upon reading what you and some others have said I agree that it could be just too many rules to not be able to 'share' at all  - but in that case I like the idea of a 'warning message', for example that still lets people share, but gives a warning. 
       
       An improved way to get people interested in older hubs is instead to write a new hub on a different angle of the same topic and have a link to the old hub in it, instead of sharing the old hub with followers. This new hub has the potential to generate more revenue through getting an audience outside of just the followers (See the sub-thread here about 5 posts down from the top).

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          barryrutherfordposted 12 years agoin reply to this

          i take your point but My Hubs like  on the Death Penalty I have  flogged to Death
          (pun intended)with several similar hubs linked to the main core HUB.  Even now these are three to four years old but remain popular.  They are still 'evergreen' because it's a topic that is.  Still when I started out I would have never known that...

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       Millionaire Tipsposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       My issue isn't with the sharing - I can see its purpose.  If you have a really old hub, you can share it with your followers.  I think one share a day is fine.  But when someone shares more than one hub, and clog up the feed with it, then it becomes a problem.

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    Arlene V. Pomaposted 12 years ago

    I see "reruns" all of the time, so how could you control this?  It's pretty bad when the Hubs presented are months or even years old.  I tend to continue reading past these Hubs, but if the Hubber doesn't have anything new published and prefers to use stale stuff most of the time, I don't follow them.  If your Hubs don't bring the response you wanted first time out, do you keep offering them up?  I would use that share key sparingly or not at all.

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    Don Bobbittposted 12 years ago

    How about, having Share with followers only work if the Hub is older than 6-months, say?  And then only 1 share in 24-hours?
    
    I mean, really, we Hubbers, as a whole,  are pretty Lazy readers when it comes to the older content of another Hubber.
    
    I have shared an old Poem and had really good comments from some of my followers, who have even mentioned that they had never looked back that far into my Stuff. And these were Level-5,6,7 commenters.
    
    So, Yes, I believe some people are abusing the share function, but at the same t\ime I feel it has a place being there for some of us.

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    FloraBreenRobisonposted 12 years ago

    One of the people I follow writes movies hubs and has to update them every few months to add new movies. When he does this he  shares the new version with us. I love this kind of shared hub. But I know what you mean about sharing several recent hubs shared by the author who wrote them with no change to the hub. I think the idea of limiting the number of hubs you are allowed to share  would be a great option, but I don't see how it could be enforced...

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    Aficionadaposted 12 years ago

    How many Hubbers actually do this (multiple sharing)?  I was not even aware of the Share function until this thread.  When I looked at my feed, I saw one share.
    
    I agree that if it is a problem, there should be some solution; but if it is only a few Hubbers doing this, there seem to be some very simple other ways to work around the problem.  For example, stop following the Hubber, but periodically check their Hubtivity to see what new Hubs they have written.
    
    The OP suggested something like a way to suppress Reshare notifications in the feed.  I can see some value in reworking what shows up in each person's feed to make it more personalized, because the things that bother me may not bother anyone else and vice versa.

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       FloraBreenRobisonposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       This is quite true. I am bothered by some things no one else thinks twice about while I am not bothered by other things that other people can't stand.

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    cheryloneposted 12 years ago

    I am still learning the process, but I thought I was supposed to share my hubs with my followers.  If that is not the case, then perhaps a quick notice to all new hubbers could be done to warn us about using that button.  I appologize to anyone I may have offended or overwhelmed with extra hubs.

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       FloraBreenRobisonposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       No, it is okay. This thread is about people who share several hubs a day that were not just written. Say, you share four  hubs  on the same day  which you wrote two weeks ago. That is what Giselle is talking about.

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          cheryloneposted 12 years agoin reply to this

          Thank you for answering this for me, I thought I was doing something wrong.

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             Giselle Maineposted 12 years agoin reply to this

             Thanks Flora for helping Cherylone.  Cherylone, I had hoped to get back to you personally earlier and then I saw Flora had already responded to your situation admirably.  I had still meant to say something & forgot sorry! I've just responded to another hubber with a similar post to yours (see PaulaHenry1 below).  Anyhow, like Flora said, the issue is when people do it repeatedly with OLD hubs - people accidentally sharing NEW hubs isn't as much of the problem (although the feed shares them automatically for you anyway).  Don't worry.

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                Cardisaposted 12 years agoin reply to this

                There is one person whom I follow that probably share all his/her hubs everyday. It's annoying. I started to ignore them then I saw this forum and it came right back to haunt me. I am seriously thinking of un-following them...really.
                
                At first I was saying just ignore them but I have to agree with you Giselle.

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       IzzyMposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       You don't need to. Every new hub you publish is automatically shared with your followers, without you having to do anything.
       
       To everyone, the share button at the bottom of hubs is mainly for other people to share your hubs, if they like what you have written.
       
       This topic has been discussed many times on the forums before most of you joined.
       
       Do not send your hubs to Stumbleupon or any other sites listed there either, unless you are an active member of those sites and frequently promote other sites.
       
       Otherwise it is looked upon as self-promotion, which is spam, and a big no-no, and will get you banned in short order.

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       Marisa Wrightposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       Cheryl, as Izzy says, you don't share your Hubs with your followers - once they have signed up to follow you, they are automatically notified every time you write a new one. Using the Share button as well means they get notified twice and would get understandably annoyed!

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          Lisa HWposted 12 years agoin reply to this

          I've never re-shared anything, but I didn't know that "share" button isn't to share with followers, and I didn't know that Hubs are automatically shared.  Oops.    I've just always thought using that after writing a new Hub was what we're "supposed to do".  Some of them I don't share if I dislike them., or if I'm in one of my "recluse modes".  I think if I've seen this discussed elsewhere in the forums (and I must have), I was probably assuming the issue was sharing with social sites.  Oh well....  Live and learn.  In any case, new-ish people shoudn't feel bad for not knowing how to use (or not use) the "share" button.  I've been here four years. 

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    Paragliderposted 12 years ago

    Interesting discussion. I think resharing a seasonal hub when the season comes around is OK, or resharing one that has become topical because of some real turn of events in the news. Or, if you have added substantial new material. But simply recycling oldies does get annoying.

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       rebekahELLEposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       +
       
       
       I get the daily email, but life gets busy. I don't always open it. I don't mind seeing hubs shared on the feed. If someone gets carried away, they may not be aware that too much sharing is spammy. To me it's just a matter of scrolling, like on any feed. When something interests me, I click.

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    ktrappposted 12 years ago

    I think we all agree that there are times when sharing is perfectly fine, like:
    
    ~Sharing one's hubs when there are significant updates
    
    ~Sharing one's hubs of a seasonal nature
    
    ~Sharing one's hubs about a topic that is once again relevant (i.e. currently in the news)
    
    ~Sharing one or two past-written hubs for whatever reason
    
    What I don't care for is when a hubber shares multiple old hubs at once in one day. This usually seems to be done when the hubber has not written anything new.
    
    The problem with the practice of sharing multiple old hubs at once is two-fold:
    
    1.) It does in fact "take over" my own personal home page feed making it difficult to spot newly published hubs. As Paul suggested this problem can be solved by "unfollowing" the offending hubber. This isn't a great solution because I do enjoy some of their hubs in the first place.
    
    2.) The much greater problem which we cannot control and which requires systematic sharing limits to be put in place by HubPages is the following situation:
    
    When I write a new hub it appears on the feed of all my 240 or so followers. I like for those 240 followers to notice my new hub's existence and if the topic is interesting, hopefully for those followers to read it and maybe even leave some feedback or to comment.
    
    But, if my 240 followers are also following hubbers that excessively share their own old hubs, then my followers' feeds are also "over taken" by these shared hubs and my new hub is buried in the feed and probably won't get noticed. This is a very real situation. I have worked days on a hub, publish it, and within minutes notice that it is "buried" by many (maybe up to 10) shared hubs. If it is lost on my feed then it is also lost on the my follower's feed that also follows the offending hubber.
    
    Since I cannot ask my followers who may also be following a hubber that shares their own old hubs excessively to stop following that hubber, there is nothing I can do to solve the problem.
    
    As I see it, the bigger problem with excessive sharing is that my newly published hubs are instantly lost on the home page feeds of my followers if they too are following hubbers that share excessively. And this is very likely since some of these offending hubbers have hundreds or perhaps over a thousand followers.
    
    This is why the rather simple fix of "unfollowing" the offending hubber, as Paul suggests, doesn't solve much. It will clean up my home feed but that's about it.
    
    And this is why HubPages should consider putting in limits on the number of hubs that can be shared within one day.

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       Mark Ewbieposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       I agree completely with this.  One a day tops.

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       Marisa Wrightposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       I've never thought about doing any of those things before - but thinking about it now, I have to say I don't agree with you 100%.   I agree that it's legitimate to share Hubs which have had a significant update, or where an old topic is in the news again. 
       
       However can you imagine if everyone re-shared their Christmas Hubs every time Christmas rocked around - then all our new Hubs would definitely be swamped!
       
       And to say it's OK to share "for whatever reason" is opening the floodgates, really - let's face it, how often is it really relevant to share an old Hub with every single one of your followers?

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          Pcunixposted 12 years agoin reply to this

          Ayup. 
          
          So far, I have resisted every temptation to reshare anything for exactly that reason.

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          ktrappposted 12 years agoin reply to this

          Actually, I really don't like any of those reasons for sharing but I can see where they're ok sometimes. The rest of my original post went on to talk about how sharing in multiple quantities is what seems to be causing the problem for people. If there was a limit of let's say no more than one share a day then at least flooding followers' feeds wouldn't be an issue.
          
          By the "whatever reason" I was thinking about something that occurred to me once. I published a hub, but almost immediately unpublished as I realized there were some problems with some links in it. The notification of my new hub also was taken off the feed. I made some corrections, but when I republished it, it did not appear on the feed. The only way to let my followers know of my knew hub was to share it. So I was thinking of extenuating circumstances like that when I wrote "whatever reason."
          
          So I don't think the ability to share one's own hubs should be totally removed, but it should be limited a lot! I think one per day is plenty myself, although I think I only shared my own hub that one time ever. This will eliminate the ability of people to mass share their own hubs which seems to be the crux of the complaint.
          
          Honestly, I don't see the real benefit to sharing anyway. Hubbers wanting to make money need to be writing to attract search engine traffic. If the hub hasn't taken off in searches I doubt getting a little attention from fellow hubbers by sharing is going to do much good at all.

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             homesteadboundposted 12 years agoin reply to this

             Good points, as I know i have been guilty. The problem will be remedied as far as I am concerned.

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                Giselle Maineposted 12 years agoin reply to this

                Hi, thanks for your contributions to the discussion, homesteadbound.  It seems that like you, a lot of people were sinply not aware of the ramifications of sharing hubs.  So in addition to those who don't want re-sharing and those that do want it, there is an important 3rd category of those such as yourself who didn't fully understand what happened when 'share with followers' is done.  I think that Hubpages maybe should make that a bit clearer to help out those like you who have simply been trying to do a good job of networking appropriately with their followers. A lot of hubbers have reported 'feeling bad' about re-sharing issue and they needn't because they really didn't know. Like I said, it sounds like this lack of knowledge of self-sharing is a separate issue in itself.  This forum is starting to bring a lot of things to light that I didn't know either, and we're seeing a lot of different viewpoints, which is also exciting.

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                   homesteadboundposted 12 years agoin reply to this

                   I know that I have offended you and I am sorry. I would not do so on purpose.

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                      Giselle Maineposted 12 years agoin reply to this

                      No, *I* am sorry that I thought you were doing the re-sharing on purpose & that you knew that it would cause all of these hub announcements on the feeds! I should have realized it wasn't intentional.  I am sorry I assumed the worst of you, Homesteadbound. I hope you can forgive me.
                      
                      Lots of hubbers were doing this re-sharing activity (probably also without realizing, I now see) and with the large number doing this my feed was getting so mucked up that I couldn't easily see new hubs. I started unfollowing these people but then I was really sad because I missed their content. I figured that if I was in this situation, others might be also and that perhaps HubPages needed to change something with the re-sharing settings.  Thus this forum thread was born!
                      
                      Needless to say I am refollowing you now.  Sorry I didn't think that you might not have realized the ramifications of re-sharing own hubs.  (And as many others pointed out, even WITH the knowledge of what happens, there are a range of different viewpoints of whether it is OK and when, anyway - check out some of ktrapp's ideas in this forums for some of the pros and cons of it. )

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                         homesteadboundposted 12 years agoin reply to this

                         I knew I had lost you as a follower and now I know why. I am so new to all of this, I'm trying to figure it out. It's alot to learn in a short period of time.
                         I had read Ktrapp's stuff earlier and learned some new things as well. I am constantly learning new things. And if people don't spend any time looking at the forums they may not see things such as this to know that they are not doing things correctly.

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       homesteadboundposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       I was sharing hubs that I answered comments on so that the person will see that I did comment, but if they were interested they would follow. When I answer a comment, or when anyone answers a comment, what happens? Does it go on everyone's feed?

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          Giselle Maineposted 12 years agoin reply to this

          OK, when you answer a comment, the comment automatically shows up in the feed of all of your followers AND I think anyone who is following the hub itself (even if they are not following you). 
          
          This is the important distinction: the comment in the feed comes with a blue 'Comment' box next to it in the feed, to show those viewers that it is a Comment that was done.  In contrast, if you shared the hub itself (by pressing 'share... with followrs'), the hub itself will show up in the feed as a hub announcement with a red 'Hub' box next to it.  When it shows up as a 'Hub' (instead of as a 'comment') it becomes very difficult to distinguish from a new hub (which also has the red 'hub' box). This is the issue I was bringing up about sharing, because lots of old re-shared hubs can 'drown out' new hubs on the feed because they look very similar. 
          
          So, if you are 'sharing' your own hubs whenever you comment, then your followers are actually getting 2 things on their feed each time: 1. The comment itself with the blue comment box (it tells you title of hub & author anyway there) and 2.  The red 'hub' accouncement which is more usually used to announce the publication of new hubs.
          
          In contrast, sharing another hubber's hubs does not pose this same problem.  This is because it goes to followers. For example, say you 'discover' a new hubber whose work you like.  You want to share one of their hubs with others.  So you click 'share with followrs' on one of this hubber's hubs.  This hubber's hub is then 'announced' with the red box in YOUR FOLLOWER'S feeds.  Your followers are unlikely to have already received the notification of the new hubber's hub (unless they happen to have followed this hubber themselves - but this won't usually be the case with ALL your followers, anyway).  So this is a good way of using share... with followers.  In contrast, sharing your OWN hub whenever you answer comments on it may be a bit redundant (given that the comment will appear anyway on your follower's feeds). 
          
          I hope I have helped you gain a better understanding of the distinctions between 'comment' and 'hub' appearing on feeds, but please don't hesitate to ask if you have more questions. And maybe other hubbers will have some finer distinctions to add to your Q here - I think I have given the basics here.
          
          We are all learning as we go, and this forum has certainly been a learning experience for me in terms of seeing the very different viewpoints people have, including those who sinply weren't completely sure of exactly what 'share with followers' did.

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       Millionaire Tipsposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       Well said ktrapp!

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    PaulaHenry1posted 12 years ago

    I press share whenever I make a new Hub. I figure that if they are my fan, they would be interested, if not -ignore it-
    I kinda feel bad now for sharing my latest ....
    

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       Uninvited Writerposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       There is no need to do that, they get an email every day.

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          AEvansposted 12 years agoin reply to this

          

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       ktrappposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       No need to feel bad - but when you hit that "publish" button your new feed is automatically shared on your followers' HubPages feed.

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          homesteadboundposted 12 years agoin reply to this

          I did not know this! I will no longer share like this.
          I feel bad too, because I saw other people doing it, and I thought that we were supposed to, but now I see that it is a problem...

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       Giselle Maineposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       Paula - don't feel bad, yes the new hub has automatically been shared with followers so your new ones have been shared twice if you do that - BUT, that's not the problem I'm raising here. 
       
       Frankly, if I got double-sharing of NEW hubs such as you (and a few other hubbers mentioned), that would not be so bad!  The issue I'm raising here is when OLD hubs are getting re-shared repeatedly (e.g. a hub that is 2 months old getting re-shared repeatedly over the course of a few days).

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    Giselle Maineposted 12 years ago

    Ktrapp and Marisa Wright, I found your well thought out points above especially interesting as I hadn’t really thought about the ‘seasonal re-sharing issue’ that Marisa brought up, nor the ‘followers feeds overtaken by shared hubs’ that Ktrapp thought of.
    
    Up until now, I had only been thinking of this issue from the point of view of my own feed (or an individual’s feeds in general), but as Ktrapp said, looking at what can happen to follower’s feeds gives an idea of how big the problem really is.  (For those of us who see this issue as a problem, I mean).   I recognize from the discussion here that some people are bothered by the sharing issue while others aren’t. 
    
    Thanks again Ktrapp and Marisa Wright for drawing attention to these highly impacting yet easily overlooked ramifications.

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    Lisa HWposted 12 years ago

    Pros, cons, etc. aside, I really don't mind what does or doesn't show up in the feed.  If I'm interested in it I'll look at it.  Otherwise, I skip over it.  I learned (after following people who wrote "tons" of Hubs a week and getting e.mails every time they did anything, it seemed) to set my e.mail notifications only on the weekly thing from HP and or any stuff sent out by staff.  I pretty much want to go look for stuff myself.  New comments already show up without e.mails.  If I comment and think someone else may comment back I remember where I commented.  I don't want to follow questions if I answer those, and I come looking for any forum threads I've been interested in. I just like no feeds, and the "I'll-go-find-what-I-want" approach.  I'm my own filter, so it doesn't matter if someone share the same Hub 100 times as far as I'm concerned.

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    Cardisaposted 12 years ago

    I have been thinking that the edit options for the feed could be adjusted.
    
    Currently, you can hide a story from someone you follow but that means you would have to hide each hub they share. How about the option of only newly published hubs showing up in your feed? Can that work?

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       brittanytoddposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       Like I mentioned before, you can edit your feed settings.  I don't know how to do it on the computer, but I edit mine with the iPhone app.

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          Giselle Maineposted 12 years agoin reply to this

          Brittany - I did see your earlier comment, but I still don't know of a way to edit the settings such that re-shared hubs are omitted from the feed.  I even asked it as a question in the Q&A a few weeks ago, but no-one was able to come up with a way of doing it.  I had many responses, but everyone said they didn't think it was possible.
          
          In other words, I can edit my feed settings to avoid certain things  - but I can't seem to edit the settings to avoid self-shared hubs in particular.  If you find a way to do this, please let us know step-by-step instructions when in the edit feed settings menu.

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             brittanytoddposted 12 years agoin reply to this

             Click on "Fliters" above the status bar and click "Edit" next to "Filter by Type" .  You can edit the feed settings there.  I just figured this out.  Hope it helps!

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                Millionaire Tipsposted 12 years agoin reply to this

                Brittany, the way I see it, we can filter the feed to see hubs only, but it doesn't separate new hubs from shared hubs.  Is there something I'm not seeing?

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    Giselle Maineposted 12 years ago

    Cardisa - it is now coming to light that quite a lot of hubbers didn't know that sharing their own hubs will make them show up on their follower's feeds 'looking' like new hub announcements. So most likely, this hubber that you are following is simply unaware that their sharing behavior is causing a problem for you. 
    
    This is why I think that even a 'warning message' would be helpful when pressing 'share... with followers' that informs the hubber something like 'sharing your own hubs frequently with followers is not recommended.  Proceed? Yes/Cancel'.  That way, hubbers are more likely to be aware that sharing own hubs may cause problems - yet at the same time, those who believe they have a strong reason for sharing that particular hub can still do it anyway.  So I think this solution might serve the needs of all 3 groups: those who don't like re-sharing of own hubs, those who do, and those who didn't fully understand what happens.

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       FloraBreenRobisonposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       when I first started sharing my own hubs with my followers, it would show up own my own feed. Now, this does not happen. I wonder if this is why some newer hubbers didn't realize by sharing with followers their new hubs they would show up twice.

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       Cardisaposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       But isn't it common sense that when you "share with followers" you are actually sending it to your followers and they will see it? I mean, come on, I think they know.

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    Mark Ewbieposted 12 years ago

    Not sure if this has been suggested, apologies if it has.
    
    When Sharing, force / suggest the Hubber enters a reason for the Share - tidied up, added new info, better pictures - etc.

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       FloraBreenRobisonposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       that's good idea

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       Giselle Maineposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       Brilliant idea Mark! And no, it has NOT been suggested yet, thanks for thinking of it.That way people would know to share only if there is a good reason for it. 
       
       This new idea you suggested would help everyone, including new hubbers, because it shows there should be a sensible reason for the sharing. I agree with Flora that you have a great idea there.

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       Millionaire Tipsposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       I like this idea Mark.  If I've already read the hub the first time around, it would help me know whether there has been significant changes that could use another look.

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    sunforgedposted 12 years ago

    Ill be devils advocate, I occasionally share old hubs. I do it because I feel like it, I do it because an older topic has become relevant, I do it because I updated, I do it because I can.
    
    Theoretically, with 200+ hubs in varied topics I really doubt anyone has read them all. Someone could have become  follower last week or 2 years ago, I would never know.
    
    Browsers have "bookmark" buttons, each of us have subscribable rss feeds (which will only show "new" publications) .. mechanisms exist to "follow" an author outside of the obvious "follow" option.
    
    I like Paul's response, its the same one he posted nearly a year ago when someone specifically complained about my sharing habits at the time (I believe it was a hub about a trending/changing news story and it was changed as news changes ... but I dont care, I shared it every day for a week and would do it again tomorrow if I was working in a similar topic)
    
    Your requesting a policy change for something that is a simple personal choice ... to follow or not to follow, click, click , its just that easy!

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       rebekahELLEposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       +
       
       I share older hubs at times, sometimes for no reason other than I want to. I don't share 5 in a row like I've seen done, but honestly, I have no issue with people sharing hubs. We gain new followers, topics are relevant.. The feed isn't just about new hubs. It's about our activity on HP.
       
       If I see a certain hubber I follow sharing 3 or 4 of her quality written hubs on the feed, it doesn't bother me at all. Her work is worth reading, and I'm sure hubbers pick up some new views this way. I just keep scrolling to see what else is going through.

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    Hollie Thomasposted 12 years ago

    Exactly, if a hub is shared, be it mature or otherwise, colleagues have the right to read or ignore. I don't see what the problem is.

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    brittanytoddposted 12 years ago

    Hmmm.  I just checked it again and can't seem to find the hide shared hubs setting.  Hopefully they will add one as I am also getting a ton of duplicates in my feed from sharing.  Sorry I couldn't help more.

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    ishwaryaa22posted 12 years ago

    i completely agree with ktrapp and britanytodd as i too faced this similiar problem and i too hoped for a new button where i can adjust my preferences in the feed.

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    Mark Ewbieposted 12 years ago

    I have recently reshared some stuff.  Old stuff that I have revamped, or are timely, such as yet another New Year resolution list - as if we didn't already have enough!
    
    I would really like a reason to be entered, then I can send a message along with the share saying "ALL NEW CONTENT!!!" or "AMAZING REVELATION" or similar.
    
    That's what happens when you FaceBook share something - a chance to add a message saying "Not Spam".

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       cheryloneposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       I think that is an excellent idea.  That way others will know that you are not just trying to SPAM them out. 

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          Pcunixposted 12 years agoin reply to this

          Ayup.  Very good idea.

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    Cardisaposted 12 years ago

    I would also like to be able to place a note when I share someone elses hub. I just shared a really "hot" hub by Martie Coaster and I really wanted to say "hot, proceed with caution!"

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