blog.josephhall.com

Don't get me wrong, I like Google Reader. Every other RSS reader that I've tried to use is comprised of at least 90% suck, whereas Reader only seems to be about 10% suck. Most of that suck has to do with its social networking "features".

I was surprised yesterday to find a follow invite from my brother, in Google Reader. This is because a) he hates social networking at least twice as much as I do, and b) I was entirely certain (and later confirmed) that he's never opened Google Reader. As I poked around, I discovered that I was somehow following 27 people. Four of them had apparently accepted an invite from me, and the rest had been sent invites that had not yet been responded to.

Let me be clear: I have never sent a follow request in Google Reader. Google automatically sending invites to people on my behalf feel a little like when I hear people say things like, "Oh sure, Joseph would love to come to your <INSERT EVENT HERE>." Would it kill you to ask me first? One of the people who had been sent an invite was a person who had sent me a business proposition, which I respectfully declined. That was to be the end of my contact with her, but Google was so kind as to send her a Google Reader invite for me. Gee, thanks.

Those who have tried to unfollow have probably found yourself frustrated with the fact that there is no interface inside of Reader to unfollow a person, or to turn off sharing altogether. Worry not, I figured it out.

• From inside Google Reader, click the "Settings" drop-down in the top-right corner.


• Select "Google Account Settings" (not Reader settings). This will open a page where you can edit your profile.


• Click on "Edit Profile". There's nothing useful on this page, so click "Save" or "Cancel" at the bottom (intuitive, isn't it?).


• The next page has a link that says, "<YOUR NAME> has X followers" and another link that says, "<YOUR NAME> is following X". You can't stop people from following you, but you can click that second link and stop following people. These are the ones that Google sent invites to without your permission.

Of course, it would be nice for Google to give you the option to disable sharing altogether, so that you could just use Reader as a regular RSS reader. One day I'll find one of those that doesn't suck.