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App idea: RSS reader with built-in comments/replies (sh.itjust.works)

submitted 2 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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Like many, I prefer subscribing to RSS feeds instead of being force-fed by an algorithm. However, sometimes I wish I could comment and/or chat with others about the contents of specific articles in the feed.

I know it's possible to post a link to the article in a link aggregator like Lemmy and have a discussion, but that takes effort to post links and not every article in a feed would be submitted. It also doesn't curate the discussion to only the feeds a user is interested in.

So, my idea is that in a feed, tapping/clicking on the article would show comments people have left and allow the reader to make their own comments/replies. The comments could also be available in a read-only state via api or their own RSS feed, so authors could easily embed them.

I did a little searching and couldn't find anything like this. If this seems useful to anybody else, I think I'd like to write it. So... thoughts?

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago

Another day, another reminder to curse the vacuum left behind by Google Reader. We had built-in RSS commenting 15+ years ago (though no API, I think).

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago

actually seems like it could be a nice fediverse app. whenever any user adds an rss feed to their timeline, it could add the feed to the broader database. then the discussions could be federated.

i'm probably not the guy to do it, but i could see how it working

also just found rss-parrot

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 children)

Part of that is done in my favourite iOS/macOS RSS client News Explorer. It downloads and shows comments left for an article, if that article was posted on a supported platform (Wordpress, YouTube, etc.). But this is read-only so far.

Ninja edit: Also, IIRC, there were some generic comment browser plugins for websites. Basically, similar to Disqus, but for whatever website you're currently browsing. But I guess these fell victim to several laws around mandatory moderation of user comments and stuff like that...

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago (2 children)

I thought about Disqus, but the issue is that each blog owner has to enable/embed it into their blog. Disqus also fully enshittified and isn't used much anymore, far as I can tell.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago

Yep, I wouldn't use Diqus nowadays either.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago (1 children)

How'd Disqus ruin itself? Realizing now I've seen it less and less like you mention, but never saw much talk of what happened.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago (1 children)

They are absolutely stuffed with advertising, tracking, and privacy invasion:

https://supun.io/disqus

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago

Oh ick, thanks for the link!