Google Friend Connect is Going Away
This is not my normal subject matter, so bear with me a minute while I *try* to get technical.
It seems that Google has been doing a bit of spring cleaning. Besides doing away with my beloved Picnik, STUPIDMEANDICTATORJERKS as of March 1st Google will also discontinue Google Friend Connect for all non-Google blogs. Since I am a WordPress blog, that means that I will be one of the things taken out with the trash! Talk about making a girl feel good, right?
For those of you who aren’t familiar with Google friend connect, this is what it looks like. It’s usually found in the sidebar of a blog and is a way for readers to follow a blog using their Blogger dashboard.
If you use some other application to keep up with your favorite blogs, you should not be affected…but at this point I’m not really sure how exactly this will pan out so here’s how to make sure you don’t lose me just in case.
If you look in sidebar, this is what you should see.
See these little buttons? They all have a function. The star leads to my Facebook page, the heart to my Twitter page, the square to my RSS feed, the circle to Pinterest, and the envelope is an email form.
Now I’ve had a few people tell me that the links are broken, and that’s not the case. The gray is just a bit confusing. It makes them appear to be “grayed-out”. I know that it throws people off so we’re working on a fix. In the meantime, to click on any option, roll over them with your mouse, and it should appear colored, like so.
This means that it’s active. Click there and it should take you where you want to go.
Now, I will try to keep the rest of this short and sweet because I know it’s boring.
I’m going to skip the whole Facebook and Twitter things because that’s pretty self explanatory…
Today I want to explain how to follow via RSS feed {in the best way I know how}. See the red button? That’s the way you subscribe to my feed.
Click there and it will take you to a screen like this.
Head on over to the subscribe box and click on your preferred reader.
I use Google Reader to keep up with my favorites which looks like this.
If you don’t want to follow via reader you can also FOLLOW VIA EMAIL. For help with that, click HERE.
Now, I’m not even to pretend to be all techy and understand the ins and outs of all this, so, I am pretty sure there are questions unanswered and other options available. So on that note, instead of opening my mouth and making myself look stupid by talking about things I don’t understand, I’m going to point you in the direction of other interesting and informative posts on the subject.
- Ways to follow The Crafting Chicks {Google Friend Connect is going away!} via The Crafting Chicks
- Google Cancels Google Friend Connect & What That Means for You via Independent Fashion Bloggers
- Google Friend Connect is Going Away–But You Don’t Have To via Angela Scott–Whimsy & Writing
As of today, I don’t have Blog Lovin’ and all that, but I am working on it and will let you know what I come up with.
In the meantime, here’s the short version:
Follow me on Facebook HERE
Follow me on Twitter HERE
Follow me via RSS HERE
Follow via email HERE
Follow me on Pinterest HERE
and if you aren’t tired of me by then you can even EMAIL ME.
I hope you will forgive me for this long technical post on a Saturday. I’ll make it up to you with lots and lots of cookies from here on out.
Oh I hate when things change, it is so confusing, I am lost as to what this really means. But I am so lazy I just put the blogs I love on my blog so see when they update. Your there of coarse:P I wonder if they explained why they are making these changes.
It won’t worry me, I never ever figured out what Google Friend connect was in the first place! 🙂
Now, if they take away follow by e-mail, I’m in trouble!
That must be so annoying for you! Luckily for me i’m with Blogger, so it doesn’t effect my blog. Wish it didn’t have to cause yours this inconvenience though. >__<;
I follow you via e-mail and I sure hope I don’t lose you! Thanks for the warning though, the blgs I follow are very dear to me.. I’ll see you in your next post. Happy Sunday 🙂
I also don’t like change and fortunately don’t follow you through Google. However, I love PIcnik as well. What are you going to use as an alternative? Thanks for sharing all your great cookies.
Thank you for explaining this to us! I hate change and I am so made at Google right now for taking away Picnik and now THIS!!! They need to STOP MESSING WITH THINGS!!!!
Ok, rant over! Thanks for teaching us how to continue to follow you and our other favorite blogs!
Thanks for bringing this to our attention again. Just a suggestion for people, go to your http://www.blogger.com/home to get the list of all blogs you follow and search for them on bloglovin’. I did that and there was only one person who has not yet set up a bloglovin’ account. I even found Callye on there, so she’s got that up and running!! You might also look for blogs that you don’t follow by Google. I found a bunch that I follow just by email.
I love blogs. I wish I could get paid to read blogs and Pinterest and Twitter and FB and YouTube! I’d be rich.
On a side note, I don’t see how any of the bloggers can get any of their “job” done just with having to keep up with all the social media. I am sure it takes hours just to do that. But we love them for it!
Oh… and I don’t know what Picnik is – and I probably should not find out.
I know, this is so upsetting:( I am going to follow you by email Callye because I don’t want to “lose” you!!! I am also bummed about Picnik!
thanks for explaining this. I’m on blogspot.com and I don’t know if this affects me or not! I’m not all technical either! I have had trouble with RSS feeds from other blogs and ‘lost’ them. I’m concerned about this, I love your blog.
Carrie
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Sure hope I don’t lose you, cause I look at your blog almost every day! I get so much inspiration from you….and have even bought things that you recommend….just received a big box of cookie cutters from the Cookie Cutter Company…..bought PME tips (what a difference!) and a whole lot of other stuff…..I figure if you’ve already tried it and like it, then I will too 🙂 Thank you so much for all your ideas & recommendations, you have helped me soooo much!!
Have you considered using the new Linky Followers now that the GFC will be unavailable for non-blogger platforms? Stop over to my blog and see it on my sidebar. HERE is a post about it, as well. Your cookies look wonderful, BTW!!!
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