I have been testing Flipboard’s Surf beta for a while. I have been meaning to write about it for a long while but have been busy due to redundancy.
What is Surf? I could go into detail but I would say it’s a way to aggregate a number of sources and share them in a form which others can follow or flip through. It’s all using the fediverse and acts like a first class citizen of it. I gather Bluesky has a similar type thing where you can design and share algorithms to others. I guess it’s like that but so much more.
So I have setup a couple of channels one for digital legacy and dating troubles. For the dating one I have connected up a few dating YouTubers and my own raindrop.io bookmarks using the same scope (dating troubles).
This means not only can I have add things to followers by manually adding posts, media, etc but every time my bookmarks are updated it’s reflected across the fediverse too? Pretty sure this is kind of true but I guess what makes surf more compelling compared to a RSS reader is the client reader. What else do you expect from the team behind Flipboard? Although it’s beta, it’s smooth and well thought out, not just for reading but for creating too.
I wasn’t surprised it supported activitypub, meaning you can aggregate or group from across the fediverse (oh yes and bluesky) but RSS really opens things up a lot more. I can see this being super useful for businesses, community leaders and those into super niche topics. I choose the things which I have been tracking anyway, but been thinking about one for the #pacemkaerdevice #pebblewatch #diabolotricks #eatingoutallergies, etc etc.
I also gather as Surf creates a activitypub feed you could aggregate those back into another surf account created levels piping (something I talked about about 20 years ago)
Generally I like it and look forward to the next update…
By the way if you are interested use the referral code CUBICGARDEN when signing up for the waitlist. Mastodon sign up are the priority right now but Bluesky is still in progress.
