shuttering Google Reader is a major reason for why 2016-2020 happened the way they did, why fake news is such a major problem, and why trust in the integrity of journalism is at an all-time low https://twitter.com/mathowie/status/1299480141760872448

"average people" didn't use Google Reader. But you know who did? Media professionals. Journalists. Political staffers. People with outsize influence on public discourse.

The sheer usage numbers don't tell the full story of how influential Google Reader was.

Google Reader provided a way for journalists, analysts, and professionals to keep tabs on trustworthy sources of information. Without it, they have to rely on algorithmically-driven platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and so forth.

With Google Reader, the user was in full control of the content they consumed.

Algorithmically-driven platforms, on the other hand, treat the user's attention as the product.

The difference is that hardly any of them started using Feedly https://twitter.com/kisPocok/status/1299680347173662721?s=19

We can speculate about *why* Feedly never captured the same base that a Google Reader did (price? mindshare? lack of bundling?), but Google Reader was massively popular with a userbase that ended up using targeted platforms instead after Reader shut down.

It would be a huge mistake to say that this is evidence that they were dissatisfied with RSS readers, or that they would have churned off anyway if Reader hadn't shut down.

That's not how customer acquisition works!