Cathy Nelson’s Professional Thoughts

I have many feeds in my reader and rarely step outside of it unless I want to comment. Part of the lure of what attracts me to so many blogs is the feel that I’m involved with or following a conversation. I have gotten to where as I skim through the newly posted content on blogs, I get mildly irritated at the number of bloggers (many of whom are quite established, those who convinced me that I could become a published author through blogging and develop a readership), who do not provide a comments feed.
I find that the blogs I most enjoy are the ones that allow me to subscribe to their comments feed as well as the feed for new posts. And it is even better when the blogger has a following, as I learn so much more from them and their visitors, mainly because I can follow a virtual conversation that stems from a post. Some of my favorite blogs that also provide a comments feed I read include Doug Johnson, Will Richardson, Dean Shareski, and Vicki Davis. These bloggers provide this service, and Doug Johnson and Vicki Davis both added their “comments” feed recently at my request–thanks y’all!

So here is my challenge. Go back to your blog and add the link for comments. (In Edublogs, the comments feed is the meta widget box and you add it in the presentation area of the dashboard.) I will subscribe to the comments feed, as I enjoy devouring your information from the comfort of my reader, a one stop shop for professional learning from my professional learning community.

So why do  write this today? I have noticed the blog posts from the School Library Journal (SLJ) (where my favorite Joyce Valenza’s Neverending Search now resides), do not have the desired comments feed, and almost disguise the fact that they have blogs at all. SLJ claims to be the home for several feeds and blogs, but my trusty URL box lacks the typical orange feed icon. However, when I subscribe they do show up in my reader. I’m not sure why SLJ wants to claim blogs under their umbrella when they only give you an opening line preview, both in the reader and on the SLJ site, forcing you to link out to another page to read the full blog and posts. Wonder if Joyce Valenza has noticed a decline in comments since moving to the SLJ site for her Neverending Search blog? Hmm, I’ll have to ask her. I’m not complaining of the quality of shared information at SLJ’s highlighted blogs. Just totally frustrated at the lengths I have to go to in order to follow the conversations. It makes SLJ’s blogs almost NOT a blog at all, and a chore to read. Bummer.

Image: ‘elephant talk‘
www.flickr.com/photos/47968145@N00/325235488