State of PubSubHubbub (subscribers' edition)

State of PubSubHubbub (subscribers' edition)

Now that PubSubHubbub evolved toward 0.4, and that what used to be the most popular reader are gone, it’s time to check the state of PubSubHubbub and see which of the new readers support it.

We’ve picked the most popular web based readers from this list and we tested PubSubHubbub support on a feed that supports it, thru the Superfeedr PubSubHubbub Community hub (open to everyone!).

If your reader is missing from that list, please let us know in the comments, subscribe to that feed and let us know in the comments when that’s done. We’ll tell you if your reader supports PubSubHubbub.

Supporting PubSubHubbub

Not (yet!) support PubSuHubbub

  • NetVibes: this is sad because they used to support PubSubHubbub a couple years ago.
  • Digg Reader: I heard from the team at Digg that it’s on their TODO list. The earlier the better Digg!
  • Pulse: they are subscribed to some feeds on some superfeedr hubs, but I could not get them to subscribe to my test feed.
  • AOL Reader: not supported. Could not get in touch with anyone working on it :(
  • BlogLovin: not yet, but we bugged them to add support soon!
  • FeedBin: not yet.

All in all, these are pretty good results. The 6 supporters are also the 6 most popular readers. Since latency is key feature for most readers (who wants to read today’s news tomorrow?), we hope that they’ll add support soon too, and we’re more than happy to help.

Publishers, make your feeds PubSubHubbub!

Readers are not the only apps consuming your feeds. Did you know that search engines consume them too? For example, Matt Cutts said that Google uses PuSH to detect original content faster.

There are also apps like IFTTT or UrbanAirship who support the protocol to propagate updates faster to their users.

It’s simpler than most people think and we would be thrilled to host your hub, for free.

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Previously, on the Superfeedr blog: Independence day on the web.