Chp 318. Bye bye Bloglines

So I just took a short Blogging break – for almost a month (not that anyone would have noticed. lolz). And by Blog break, I don’t mean just my blog alone. I stopped visiting all my favorite blogs. A breather, if I may say so. A much needed breather.

There were a couple of things I needed to be serious about when it came to work. And some of the hard work paid off too! Though I’m not allowed to talk about new accounts and projects on my blog, let’s just say my CV got a little bit longer

Came back to the blogging world only to read a shocking news – My favorite RSS feed aggregator bloglines.com is closing down!!!

Today, Ask.com let our users know that we will shut down Bloglines on October 1. Not an easy decision, especially considering our loyal and supportive (not to mention patient) user base, but, ultimately, the right one given business reasons simply too hard to ignore.

I’ve been using bloglines for around 5 years now. Five years may not mean much to most of us, but in terms of online technological progress, that’s a lot. Barely 10 years ago, how many of us even had email ids?

Although many “better” feed aggregators have come up since then, I’m one of those fanatical loyalists when it comes to technology. Unless there’s a really good reason for me to change, I don’t. I’m still using the same yahoo mail id I’ve been using since 1998, and have only recently opened a new gmail account.

I’ll finally be shifting to Google Reader after I export my OPML file from bloglines. With over 1000 feed subscriptions carefully selected through the sands of time, my bloglines feeds are what made me what I am today.

Bloglines was there for me when I was down and depressed, lent me a shoulder to cry on when I learnt one of my favorite speed metal guitarists had passed away, gave me company during troubled times of curfew and “shoot on sight” order, partied with me during spells of uninhibited binge, showered me with hope when I dropped out from B-School, helped me discover new friends, like-minded individuals and even a job, and assisted me in updating the “Zo bloggers latest blog update” section @ misual.com every week.

In fact, had bloglines been a woman, I would have already married it, divorced it, and then remarried it just to renew the wedding vows and find an excuse to go on a second honeymoon.

But alas. Now the time has come to say goodbye.

Bloglines.com. You will always have a special place in my heart.

Here is my special song dedicated to you, bloglines. “Broken” by Seether, featuring Amy Lee.

'Cause I'm broken when I'm lonesome
And I don't feel right when you're gone away

Oh yeah. Let’s hope Google Reader knows how to mend the broken. [Geek Alert!]




One last screen shot of my bloglines feed before the fat lady sings.



The numbers in bracket are unread blog posts. Yeah, a lot happened during this one month sabbatical! Found out some shocking news about a few blog friends too, but they are way too personal to be mentioned here.

Cheers.