Lazyfeed's July 2009 debut was arguably one of the most interesting new services to hit the information consumption market in the last few years. Built upon the belief the people wanted to follow topics, rather than feeds, and get updates in real time, the product offers a unique, and lazy, way to see streams of info on topics you like flow into your field of view, while prompting you to find more related sources and topics. Today, after months of incubation, Lazyfeed launched a new interface that brings the product out of the world of solitary RSS feed reading, and into the world of social.True to the product's origins, Lazyfeed still lets you discover new articles, in real time, based on keywords you select. But you can now group those keywords into something called a "Channel", and you can make those channel mixes public. Connect with other friends using the service, and now you have a community building around those terms which you follow - sharing you interests with other connections in your social graph.
The New Lazyfeed With Channels, Followers, Posts and More
For example, I created new channels on Google, Apple and techno music. In time, I could build out my Lazyfeed to include updates for traditional media, sports, blogging and social media, or practically any topic. If it gets blogged, Lazyfeed will find it.
With the added social elements of Lazyfeed, I can now see what topics my friends are following, and what specific posts have caught their eye - and now, every user has a public profile page. For example, mine is http://www.lazyfeed.com/user/louisgray. Is this yet another place to follow the same people? Maybe. But it's a new category of content sharing that hasn't been made possible before - with the possible exception of Google Reader sharing.
Posting from Lazyfeed to Facebook Is Simple
From within any Channel, I can now make new "posts" in response to articles that I have found particularly interesting. These posts, with my comments, will be shared with my new Lazyfeed network. This way, we can discuss topics we both find of note, and can make the once passive approach of real-time feed consumption one that you are now doing with your peers. Additionally, you can send these posts to Twitter or Facebook to alert others to your activity on Lazyfeed.
Lazyfeed has come a long way since its initial debut nearly a year ago. Now that you don't feel you're doing this in a solo environment, it's likely the community elements will spur major interaction and traffic. Find me here: http://www.lazyfeed.com/user/louisgray