RSS War! (As Fought On Twitter, Naturally)

For 99 percent of you, the following will be way too insidery. But that’s part of what makes TechCrunch great, posting about fights about basically nothing. It’s sort of like Seinfeld, it’s just about the characters. We’ve gotten too far away from that under our new corporate parent in my opinion, so it’s time to jump back into the bullshit and fully embrace it in the new year.

This evening I was just minding my own business and doing what I like to do from time to time, look over data. In particular, I was looking over the 2010 TechCrunch data, because we had earlier posted some data given to us by WordPress.com (which hosts TechCrunch) that seemed a bit odd. Namely, Facebook was nowhere to be found as a top referrer to TechCrunch. That’s weird because as we’re all well aware by now, Facebook was the most visited site in the U.S. in 2010.

Anyway, looking at our Google Reader data, I noticed that Facebook was actually (unsurprisingly) a huge source of traffic for TechCrunch. But I noticed something else interesting too: Google Reader had taken a big hit in that regard when compared to 2009. In other words, the most popular feed reader seemed to take a big dip among TechCrunch readers. In fighting words, RSS is dead.

What followed was a war of words about the state of RSS, the state of TechCrunch, the state of AOL, Rackspace, Twitter, the open web, Quora, and even… Sweden.

To be fair, I did kick things off a bit earlier in the day by posting a quick thought about the state of RSS on my blog based on a Dave Winer post earlier in the day. And Winer quickly responded to that. Then started to spiral out of control… (as has happened before).

This will not be over quick. You will not enjoy this.

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22156871813038080

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22173946447134720

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22176173391880192

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22176663123001344

http://twitter.com/#!/arrington/status/22188760032612352

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22189597412827136

http://twitter.com/#!/erickschonfeld/status/22186626868322304

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22191306843361280

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22191710503178241

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22192059620270080

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22192403653861376

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22192872644149249

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22194263802511360

http://twitter.com/#!/arrington/status/22195018190032896

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22195257756098561

http://twitter.com/#!/arrington/status/22196351127257088

http://twitter.com/#!/rwwmike/status/22197056282034177

http://twitter.com/#!/arrington/status/22197327527677952

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22195035176968192

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22195992619122688

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22198188664422402

http://twitter.com/#!/dannysullivan/status/22196094804951040

http://twitter.com/#!/mmccue/status/22199044130476032

http://twitter.com/#!/arrington/status/22199424788729856

http://twitter.com/#!/deanberris/status/22198000575053824

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22198366435807232

http://twitter.com/#!/mgdell/status/22198404725612544

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22198810490970112

http://twitter.com/#!/mgdell/status/22200059437260800

http://twitter.com/#!/arrington/status/22200164315832320

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22199489552982016

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22199751076220928

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22200154392109056

http://twitter.com/#!/arrington/status/22200767058280449

http://twitter.com/#!/alexia/status/22201201336524800

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22201595005505536

http://twitter.com/#!/thetombryan/status/22199183217795072

http://twitter.com/#!/arrington/status/22200903306055680

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22201927894831104

http://twitter.com/#!/arrington/status/22202189837508608

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22202840868982785

http://twitter.com/#!/VeronicaLudwig/status/22202807872397312

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22203189663109120

http://twitter.com/#!/xeyr/status/22203031957274624

http://twitter.com/#!/gregbanbury/status/22202904949555200

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22203449194057728

http://twitter.com/#!/willsmith/status/22203422430199808

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22203762584064000

http://twitter.com/#!/arrington/status/22203642161397760

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22204006981963776

http://twitter.com/#!/campeaux/status/22201643894308864

http://twitter.com/#!/hmkern99/status/22204006759669761

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22204248930390016

http://twitter.com/#!/alexia/status/22205441991770112

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22205793650606080

http://twitter.com/#!/alexia/status/22206842281140224

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22207303113515008

http://twitter.com/#!/parislemon/status/22201295230214144

http://twitter.com/#!/mmccue/status/22204804407238656

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22206055656198144

http://twitter.com/#!/Scobleizer/status/22199503884914688

http://twitter.com/#!/deanberris/status/22207138654855168

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22207542356611072

http://twitter.com/#!/zachflauaus/status/22207631414267905

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22207823655993344

http://twitter.com/#!/zachflauaus/status/22208009069395968

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22208106058481664

http://twitter.com/#!/brookslpowell/status/22208022348570625

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22208750429405185

http://twitter.com/#!/joshuakarthik/status/22209232761786368

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22209574102634496

http://twitter.com/#!/arrington/status/22201226397491201

http://twitter.com/#!/mmccue/status/22208739578744832

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22209069037133824

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22209329876701184

(side note: not sure Winer realizes that McCue is now on Twitter’s Board)

http://twitter.com/#!/Bandrew/status/22208405728919552

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22209895931580417

(that would be the company that Twitter CEO Dick Costolo co-founded)

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22210296504389633

http://twitter.com/#!/technosailor/status/22201579499159552

http://twitter.com/#!/arrington/status/22201829148336128

http://twitter.com/#!/joshuakarthik/status/22210122507882496

http://twitter.com/#!/joshuakarthik/status/22210684280377344

http://twitter.com/#!/davewiner/status/22211035352010752

http://twitter.com/#!/houbi/status/22203531821846528

http://twitter.com/#!/robinwauters/status/22204620805775360

http://twitter.com/#!/davegrun/status/22204182702329856

http://twitter.com/#!/arrington/status/22205096142053376

http://twitter.com/#!/thetombryan/status/22207003636006914

http://twitter.com/#!/ryanchris/status/22202831574409216

http://twitter.com/#!/cap/status/22204629651554304

http://twitter.com/#!/alexhorre/status/22203970097258496

http://twitter.com/#!/alexhorre/status/22206121552908288

http://twitter.com/#!/Bandrew/status/22206192600227840

http://twitter.com/#!/andrewpbrett/status/22206645085937665

http://twitter.com/#!/Scobleizer/status/22206746852331520

http://twitter.com/#!/miguelrios/status/22193226840543232

http://twitter.com/#!/nickhalstead/status/22213254671499264

http://twitter.com/#!/nickhalstead/status/22213438293934080

http://twitter.com/#!/skbohra123/status/22214792324321280