Last week I griped about Mental Floss (one of my very favorite blogs) truncating their RSS feed. At the time I wrote:
Enter the most recent source of my web-frustration: Mental Floss. I’ve read the Mental Floss blog (which is absolutely terrific) for about a year and a half. While catching up on their prolific feed after a week of travel, I discovered that in early July they switched from a glorious and full feed to a sloppy partial feed. I’m pissed.
Maybe I’m an atypical feed reader, but I suspect not. The truth is, a partial feed decreases the likelihood that I’ll read something by approximately 100%. [...] When content providers refuse to provide a full feed, they disrupt [my] information flow. As a result, I read less of their material. In other words, don’t be surprised if fewer Mental Floss items end up in my Monday Links or anywhere else on this site. I still receive the (partial) feed, but I’m. Not. Reading. It.
Harsh I know, but hey: that’s why I have a blog. Well folks, it brings me great joy to share this *breaking* news:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE. Birmingham, ALA. Today, at 4:15pm EST, the editorial board of mental_floss magazine kept their promise to readers and turned their blog’s RSS feed back to full blast. The feed had been temporarily disabled due to hacking issues. The gushing stream of full RSS stories hitting inboxes around the nation was quickly followed by cheers heard across America, and the popping of champagne corks distribution of celebratory juice boxes around the magazine’s headquarters.
“This is a great day for mental_floss and this is a great day for our readers!” exclaimed a triumphant Will Pearson, President of the company. “But mostly this is a great day for mental_floss.” The comment was nearly drowned out by the thunderous sounds of high-fiving and back patting taking place.
Well done, Floss Nation. In honor of their editors seeing the light, I hereby shamelessly plug the geektacular shirts available in the Mental Floss store.
It’s a web celebration (a webebration?). Ball’s in your court now, Freakonomics.
Image used under a Creative Commons license courtesy of Flickr user ~Twon~.


However, my passion for social media was reinvigorated last week when I was directed to a web page where a friend was raising money to support her marathon run in honor of her college roommate’s struggle with cancer. I put the link up in my Gmail status and sent an email to some of my fellow classmates to let them know about it. Though I certainly can’t and wouldn’t claim to have made a huge impact, I think a few of the donors that day decided to act because of that simple message and link from a friend. By the end of the day, my friend had raised several hundred dollars, and as of today she has raised over $1,000 from over 25 donors.
The conversation started by Steven Hodson about how bloggers can most usefully fulfill their roles and obligations to their audiences has grown to proportions rivaling some of our
Subscribe by email

