theaggregators

there has been some discontent of late with the way thejayfather is blogging. it is understandable, for in the quite correct words to me of one faithful reader, "Your blog isn't keeping pace with the expectations raised during your Taiwan period." this may have sparked the question in some other eager minds that another thoughtful reader recently posed: "Do you intend to maintain the blog, or can I stop checking it every day?"

this last question troubled me somewhat, for why, i asked my second faithful reader, would you ever check a blog--even this magnificent one--every day? should you, or anyone you know, be stuck with this burdensome predicament, thejayfather shall now enlighten you somewhat on the tools available to us in the age of blogs: get an aggregator, and all that mindless checking is done for you. in the words of the Wikipedist:

An aggregator or news aggregator is client software that uses a web feed to retrieve syndicated web content such as weblogs, podcasts, vlogs, and mainstream mass media websites...

Aggregators reduce the time and effort needed to regularly check websites for updates, creating a unique information space or "personal newspaper." Once subscribed to a feed, an aggregator is able to check for new content at user-determined intervals and retrieve the update.

The aggregator provides a consolidated view of the content in a single browser display or desktop application. Such applications are also referred to as RSS readers, feed readers, feed aggregators, news readers or search aggregators.

so to you who are not aggregated yet and are suffering for it, i say aggregate yourself. personally, i use Google Reader (which works nicely inside of Google's handy personalized homepage), but there are dozens of others out there that generally appear quite easy to use. just enter my feed address into your aggregator and sit back and leave the rest to technology.

finally, Dear Reader, do not fear: thejayfather is not going anywhere, so do continue to stop by once in a while, but only when your aggregator tells you to.