Quality + Quantity = Information Overload

Posted by Martin Vilcans on 1 October 2008

People say that the key to writing a popular blog is to post often and regularly. If there is truth in this, I guess I'm not representing the typical feed subscriber as I have unsubscribed from blogs with interesting well-written content simply because they posted too frequently and I couldn't cope with the volume. If a feed is never updated, you forget that you're subscribed to it and it does you no harm, so there's no reason to cancel the subscription. Frequently updated feeds on the other hand make you feel stressed when you can't keep up with the information flow. This is a problem with the quality of the posts, but not in the way you'd normally think (that quantity has a negative impact on quality and vice versa). Quite the opposite: If the posts aren't good, you simply unsubscribe. It's unsubscribing to a stream of interesting/amusing/insightful posts that poses a problem. You get the feeling that you'll miss something, so you don't want to press that unsubscribe button. Quantity coupled with quality is what causes information overload.

To avoid information overload from quality and quantity, subscribe to my feed instead. I won't update often, I promise. As for the quality, I'll leave that for other people to judge.

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