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<div>A 
<a href="http://dannyayers.com/archives/2006/02/03/now-make-it-easier-to-unsubscribe-from-feeds/#comment-42592">comment</a>
from 
<a href="http://eirepreneur.blogs.com/">James Corbett</a> (in
relation to feed-unsubscription) I reckon is worth repeating:
<blockquote>
 I'm actually coming to the conclusion that the whole
 subscriptions mindset is a problem and that in future we'll
 'graze' for the most part instead of subscribing. As Zigbee
 sensors, RFID chips and GPS trackers proliferate we'll be drowing
 in an RSS-everywhere world if we don't change our approach.
 We don't subscribe to all the sensory feed in physical world,
 we sample, nibble, taste, glance. Taskable and OPod (and whatever
 Kosso's working on) are first generation "Feed Grazers" IMHO.
 They allow you to graze feeds without ever subscribing. All we
 need is for static OPML directories to proliferate and for OPML
 search engines (like Gada.be) to improve at building multi-level
 hierarchies on the fly.
</blockquote>
Ubiquitous computing is on its way, and interaction paradigms
that reflect those of the real world certainly stand a much better
chance of working.
I think the last couple of sentences miss the mark a little
though : "static OPML directories"? - it's no harder to dynamically
generate directory data, and they're likely to be much more
interesting in this context. I'd drop "hierarchies" as well - the
world is not a hierarchy, neither is the web. A hierarchical 
view can be useful, but the model just don't fit. OPML is
fool's gold.
Having said that, when I next get chance to play with 
<a href="http://pragmatron.org/docs/sparqlsphere.html">aggregator
bits</a> I think I'll set up one or two "Reading Lists" just to
demonstrate that simple stuff like this can still be done simply,
without having to dumb down your world entirely.
It has to be said that the "Simple" marketing trick is
remarkably effective: "do you want it simple, or 
other?". Who in their right mind would choose 
other? 9/10 this isn't an accurate view of the options (
other may be no harder, simple may in fact be stupid), but
by polarising things the perception is disconnected from the
reality. (This isn't that far from the religious fundamentalist
trick of saying the 
discussion of the arguments of Evolution vs. Intelligent
Design should happpen in schools, it brings a perception of
legitimacy through the back door, and makes any criticism appear
wrong in principle).[Danny]
</div>