Comments on: The Shyftr debate: If you provide all your content on feeds, does that give permission for anyone to do anything with it?

By: Ross Dawson

Ross Dawson — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 03:01:33 +0000

Hey Louis, great to have you drop by. I have to respect your opinion on this, as someone who is out there exploring the boundaries of blogging. I’m sure you’ll do well, whichever way this all turns. I guess I agree with you on this. However it does everyone a disservice if conversations get fragmented. That doesn’t mean they have to reside solely on the blog, but there needs to be an easy way to see them from there.
ShyftrDebater, yes it’s true that there are individual post link backs, but not at the blog main page level in most cases.

By: Louis Gray

Louis Gray — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 00:20:20 +0000

I’d say 95% or more of the people who reacted negatively to Shyftr had never actually logged into the service. But they are trying to work with the blogosphere, to give clear attribution, and to offer partial feeds with headlines where discussions are taking place, to placate those who had heartburn around it. But in my opinion, they shouldn’t have needed to do that. It’s our responsibility as bloggers to be aware of where the conversation is going, and adapt. Those that don’t will fall behind those who do.

By: ShyftrDebater

ShyftrDebater — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 19:48:27 +0000

After all that’s written about Shyftr I went to sign up to see what the fuss was all about, and now I’m a bit confused, you write this:
” (It’s not quite clear what the system is – for some reason some blogs inside Shyftr have a link back to the source, but only a handful, and there are no links back from individual posts.)”
There are links back from ANY post in Shyftr. Click the title of any article, anywhere, and it takes you back to your original web site where the blog/article was written.
So essentially Shyftr is acknowledging the source, and linking back. They’re syndicating the content, just as you mentioned.