

Dear Firefox, please keep the RSS icon - davewiner
http://scripting.com/stories/2011/01/15/mozillaPleaseKeepTheRssIco.html

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51Cards
This may be an old school rant but I'm old school so...

There has been a bothersome trend in software in general lately to strip
things down. It used to mean that a new version of software contained new
features on top of those you already had but lately there has been a push to
remove things that are viewed as used by only a small percentage of the user
base. Sadly many of those things are used by the more 'advanced' segment of
the user base.

FF4 is removing the RSS icon and also the bottom status bar which are the two
that irk me. Not just turning off, removing entirely. The status bar
functionality has to be restored by a plug-in now, which only serves to bog
the browser down. The RSS functionality I'm sure will be the same but again,
more plugins to replace what was native functionality.

I fully understand catering to the bulk of the market but this should apply to
default settings, not removing features entirely. Default them to off if you
want an uber clean interface, don't gut existing features.

I have always avoided Chrome (even with its speed) because I can't stand its
UI but once FF4 ships I may just make the leap since really I'm not seeing
much difference anymore. (though FF does let me put the tabs back down where I
like them) Just a word from one old school guy... if you have features, don't
remove them just for the sake of streamlining. Someone out there relies on
that... and that someone may just be one more rat that jumps ship.

~~~
rsoto
I'm using FF4b8 and the status bar is in "off", but you can easily turn it on.

It's not removed entirely, it's just hidden. And that's what I love about
Mozilla. Even if they remove it entirely, there will always be an extension to
put it back. And that's a thing Google will never let you do with Chrome
because they thing they know better about how you use your browser than you.

~~~
51Cards
I'll be impressed if you can find a status bar in Beta 8 since it was removed
in Beta 7 ;) There is now an Add-ons bar under tool bars that is used to
contain plug-ins that used to sit on the status bar. But the new bar doesn't
have the actual status label anymore that shows you what the browser is doing.

Status-4-Evar plugin restores the functionality in the way it should have been
done from the start. Make the Status bar a full toolbar, and make the Status
Label an element you can drag in and out like every other toolbar element. No
functionality lost, no plugins required, native code, and lots of choice for
the user.

Anyhow, I've digressed enough off the OT.

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codeup
I never found the RSS icon too useful. I think Firefox should keep the ability
to parse RSS but most feed readers have an auto-discovery feature and that's
usually enough.

In sum, the icon is another example of a broken UI for RSS, which is otherwise
a great technology.

~~~
davewiner
But it's only there if the page you're looking at has a feed, and it indicates
the presence of a feed through auto-discovery.

Sites evolved away from having links to the feed in the HTML text BECAUSE
browsers got this feature, led by Firefox.

~~~
codeup
Your point that Firefox led site owners away from linking to the feed is an
important one which I hadn't considered.

I also agree the icon's useful for indicating an existing feed. It's easy not
to think about this use, because most of us probably just notice it when we
need it but rarely click on it.

Other than the icon being an indicator, I don't find the way Firefox handles
feeds too useful (that mix between bookmarks and news feeds).

~~~
simcop2387
You can easily tell firefox to use another program (or even service) to
subscribe to the feeds. I've got mine going to google reader with them. The
icon has been removed from firefox 4 (I'm running the betas). I don't know if
they'll put it back in by default from any amount of pleading, BUT surprise
surprise, there's an extension that reimplements previous functionality.
<https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/rss-icon/>

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daleharvey
It probably doesnt help my case that I never really used RSS, but I do
appreciate Mozilla's effort towards stripping down the the core of the UI (and
entire application)

A browser that lacked unessential features was the original appeal for firefox
and if anything chromes popularity is in a large part because people see it as
a speedy lean alternative to an ever bloating firefox.

I dont see why a plugin is less user friendly than yet another neglected
preference feature, optional value added features is exactly what plugins are
for

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Kilimanjaro
My mother doesn't know what that is or its use. Neither does my brother,
sister, neighbor, dog, ipad, etc. So I'd say only geeks know what a feed is.
Then let geeks use an extension and don't bother +90% of internet users with
that.

It is in a sense like developer tools, if you know where they are you can
easily activate them and use them, if not, they are out of the way.

Good riddance.

~~~
Bud
While it's probably true that geeks make up most RSS users, that doesn't mean
either that it should be this way, or that it will remain this way, or that
there is some obvious and immutable reason that it must be this way.

In fact, of course, using an RSS feed is a very simple concept, which turns
out to be extraordinarily useful to normal, non-geekly folks who just want to
read a lot without being pestered by all the normal encumbrances of the web.

So, your argument strikes me as weak.

~~~
Kilimanjaro
While I agree that feeds are a simple concept, the vast majority doesn't care.
Feeds have been available since the early 00s and its adoption hasn't grown
outside the geek circles. People just don't like to be bothered with the
simplest complexity.

I bet less than 80% of ordinary people even use bookmarks, being way simpler
than feeds in concept.

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acangiano
I'm afraid that in the upcoming years, Chrome will shred Firefox' market share
to confetti pieces.

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jimminy
I haven't played with the latest FF4 beta, but FF4b7 it was pretty simple to
add a Feed button, as it's provided, though defaulted to off. The one issue
with it is that it isn't contained in the awesome bar any longer.

If you want to re-enable it, you just have to configure your toolbars, and
find the feed icon, then position it where you want it. Sorry, this is non-
descript, I don't currently have access to Firefox so that I could provide the
complete steps.

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icarus_drowning
Do we know how many people use the icon, even as something like "% of Firefox
users"?

It does seem a bit silly to remove the RSS icon without any data on its
usefulness. Then again, maybe Mozilla has some data we're not privy to on how
many people actually use that button besides Dave Winer.

~~~
ugh
Yes, we do. Heatmap from Mozilla [1], accompanying blog post [2].

Participants had to opt-in, the study collected data for five days from 9,667
people.

7.3 percent of all participants clicked the RSS button at least once in those
five days. That places it behind the favicon (those seem to be accidental
clicks [3], 9%), the Go button (11.4%), as well as the New Tab button in the
tab bar (12.7%) and in front of the New Tab button in the toolbar (not
displayed by default, 5.2%) as well as the Site Identity button for websites
with SSL (4.8%).

A participant clicked the button 0.3 times on average, the 9,667 participants
clicked about 3,000 times. Since we know that 7.3 percent of all those
participants clicked the button, we also know that those who clicked the
button did so about four times on average.

[1] <https://heatmap.mozillalabs.com/mozmetrics/>

[2] [http://blog.mozilla.com/metrics/2010/07/01/firefox-main-
wind...](http://blog.mozilla.com/metrics/2010/07/01/firefox-main-window-study-
a-heatmap-visualization/)

[3] If a website doesn’t use SSL, clicking the favicon does nothing in Firefox
except displaying a short note that the current website doesn’t use SSL. Since
only 4.8% click when a website actually does use SSL (and when the favicon
turns into the Site Identity button which is clearly identifiable as such) the
majority of those who click on the favicon when it doesn’t look like a button
which will display information about certificates seem to be clicking
accidentally. Clicking the favicon selects the whole URL in some other
browsers (Safari, Chrome, I don’t know about Internet Explorer) so my
suspicion is that many of those 9% expect Firefox to do something similar. (I
would and it drives me crazy.)

~~~
bergie
I'm surprised to see that as many people use the Back button as the
Awesomebar.

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salmonsnide
Why not implement it as an extension, like Chrome does?

~~~
davewiner
Because it's already in there, they have to do something to take it out. But
that said, I don't know why -- I'm just a user of Firefox. Haven't wanted to
switch because of things like this. You get used to the quirks of a product.

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doke01
It sucks that this is being removed. All of the other browsers have it and so
many websites have supported it. By removing it from easy access you
discourage the use of an open standard. It is not just about who clicks on it.
It is about who supports it. RSS is used by all kinds of applications and
services and anything that discourages its easy usage makes the web a less
open place. I can not imagine that there is a significant amount of code to
make this work and I don't see how it is causing a reduction in the usage of
Firefox. It definitely does not impact workflow but actually improves it. If
Firefox is following the road of the bean counter then I think it is time to
move on.

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doke01
Doesn't the RSS icon in Firefox only show up when an RSS feed is present? Has
Mozilla corrected their stats for that?
[https://heatmap.mozillalabs.com/mozmetrics/?os=all&color...](https://heatmap.mozillalabs.com/mozmetrics/?os=all&colorscheme=hsl&skill=all)
Maybe it was only clicked by 7.3% of the users but 10% of the users went to a
site that had an RSS feed available.

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Otto42
I installed the Firefox 4 beta.

It's crap.

I've now removed it and will no longer be using Firefox.

Seriously, it is that bad, and will probably never get any better.

RIP Firefox. We hardly knew ye.

~~~
raster
Care to elaborate? What is so bad about it? What makes it crap?

~~~
doke01
removing the RSS icon

