How are publishers added?
Most arrive one of three ways:
- Hand-picked. We curate publishers we already know are good, taste-test their feeds, and add them to the directory.
- User requests. You can ask us to add a publisher and we'll usually have it indexed within a day or two.
- Active discovery. When a story breaks, FeedBagel looks for other sites covering it, checks whether they publish a feed, and adds the keepers automatically.
Are all listed publishers actively monitored?
Not quite. Publishers fall into two buckets:
- Actively monitored. We poll their feed on a regular schedule and pull new articles straight in. These are the publishers you'll see in the main reader, on tag pages, and in the "most recent" rails.
- Listed only. We've discovered the feed and added it to the directory, but aren't actively pulling articles yet. You'll find these on a publisher's site page with the feed URL visible, even if no articles have been ingested.
Listed-only publishers can be promoted to actively-monitored when someone asks for them, when they get featured, or when our active discovery process turns them up alongside a story. Hitting Request indexing on a site page is the fastest way to bump a publisher into the active rotation.
How often does content refresh?
Each publisher is checked on a cadence that matches its activity. Busy publishers get checked every few minutes, sleepy ones every few hours. So when a site posts a new article, you'll usually see it on FeedBagel within minutes if they're an active publisher, or up to an hour or so for quieter ones.
How is "active discovery" different?
For sites we already follow, we just check their feed on a schedule. For new sites we don't know about yet, FeedBagel goes looking. When a story is breaking news, we ask the web who else is covering it, taste-test their feeds, and roll the keepers into the rotation. Every well-covered story doubles as a recruiting drive for new publishers.
What does "taste-test" mean?
Before a feed is added, we make sure it actually publishes RSS, the feed isn't stale, and the site is a real publisher rather than a placeholder or a parked domain. Quiet feeds and broken ones are skipped.
How do I follow a specific publisher?
Visit their site page (e.g. browse the directory or search for their name) and you'll see every feed and recent article from that publisher in one place. Bookmark it and check back, or grab their feed URL and use any RSS reader you like.
Can I ask for a publisher to be added?
Yes. If you land on a site page and FeedBagel hasn't indexed articles yet, hit the Request indexing button on the empty-state card. Otherwise email [email protected] with the feed URL and a line about why it matters.