What's a good alternative for Google Reader?

July 28, 2009 3:23 PM

What's a good alternative for Google Reader? My employer just started blocking Google Reader (via Websense), saying that it's using up too much bandwidth. (Yeah, sounds funny to me, too.) I suspect there's some alternatives that aren't blocked, but I really love Google Reader and miss being able to jump into it at work. I appreciate any suggestions.

Oh, I can't use software like Tor or HTTP Tunnel. That already got me in trouble. Oops.

posted by scottso17 to computers & internet (13 comments total)

Bloglines is popular.

(Respectfully, though, if you've already once gotten in trouble for this once, maybe you should quit messing around on the internet at work. Or, alternately, find a job where they're not actively trying to stop you from doing so.)
posted by box at 3:33 PM on July 28 [2 favorites has favorites]

What about something like FeedMyInbox?
posted by odinsdream at 3:51 PM on July 28

... it's using up too much bandwidth. (Yeah, sounds funny to me, too.)

Chances are that your employer didn't mean "network bandwidth".
posted by effbot at 3:59 PM on July 28 [2 favorites has favorites]

If you're using Outlook 07, pipe them through there?
posted by deezil at 4:39 PM on July 28

Oh, I can't use software like Tor or HTTP Tunnel. That already got me in trouble. Oops.

What about using VNC or remote desktop to your home computer?
posted by delmoi at 5:11 PM on July 28

Chances are that your employer didn't mean "network bandwidth".

That's probably exactly what they meant, actually. Depending on the number of people using it, the frequency with which it is accessed throughout the day, and how many feeds each of those people has, Google Reader could very well sap a (relatively) large amount of bandwidth.

But, yes, I'd second just doing your job and leaving your feed reading at home. As someone who has worked in the department responsible for web monitoring and filtering at a major corporation before (75,000 employees came through our firewalls), I can tell you that if you're a big google reader user and a prior "trying to get around the rules" offender, you're probably on a list (whether formal or informal) of people whose habits will be checked in on from time to time.

The powers that be are trying to accomplish something that they know will be unpopular. Whether that's reducing personal bandwidth usage, cutting down on screw-around time at work, or both . . . they're going to be looking to make sure that the methods they tried worked.

You do not want to be that department's poster-child for frivolous web usage because, if you are, when time comes to cut bandwidth again, you can bet that your usage is going to be examined for places to trim the fat.

By way of example: we had a very strict "no fantasy sports at work" rule. We had a couple of folks who were just notorious for finding every new fantasy sports site around . . . so at the start of each new fantasy season, we'd pull their usage and add the new sites they'd found to the block list. We also found a goodly number of new web proxies that way.
posted by toomuchpete at 6:00 PM on July 28 [1 favorite has favorites]

To clarify... while some of what I have in Google Reader is personal, much of it is business -- feeds from trade journals and the such. Ordinarily, I get emails from these sites or visit them directly -- but I find it so much easier to use a feed reader.

Despite this, the IT department isn't willing to bend. They cited bandwidth concerns, not business or productivity concerns. So, I assume that an alternative might not consume so much bandwidth. Or am I wrong?
posted by scottso17 at 8:19 PM on July 28

I use NetNewsWire, which is essentially an application frontend to NewsGator Online.
posted by joshrholloway at 10:04 PM on July 28

I use google reader on my iPhone 3gs. If you have one I recommend it.
posted by dfriedman at 10:05 PM on July 28

It's not likely that ONE person using Google Reader is creating bandwidth issues. It's likely an aggregate issue.

Using a different service will work . . . until everyone starts using it, at which point it will likely show similar bandwidth usage as Google Reader will.

I'd advise three things:

1. If this is really business related and important, go up the chain (not through IT) to see if you can get some backing from the folks above you (and above the IT person making this decision).

2. Find an alternate webservice. Bloglines is used pretty heavily, I think.

3. Find a desktop aggregator that you can either a) install on your computer or b) install to a flash drive. This will spread your used bandwidth out among the servers that serve the RSS feeds.
posted by toomuchpete at 10:08 PM on July 28

They cited bandwidth concerns, not business or productivity concerns.

Would it be ok with them to repeatedly visit the sites in question, or to subscribe to a large number of mailing lists?
posted by effbot at 11:55 PM on July 28

I bought Fever recently. You have to install it on your own webspace. It's fucking awesome though.

Also, if you are already on notice for surfing on the net too much, you might want to not do that. They might not care about your surfing habits now, so long as you are getting your stuff done, but if at some later point in time they need to start letting people go, this might be a good excuse. I know when I worked at XYZ following the dotcom bust, when they needed to let a shit load of people go they basically checked who was on the net too much and told them to go home.
posted by chunking express at 7:36 AM on July 29

I use Bloglines and it seems OK, as far as the office goes. However, I find it really buggy when loading and checking/unchecking "keep new", so this may not be a good solution.
posted by Kurichina at 9:24 AM on July 29