Yesterday, my Feedburner RSS showed 4,444 readers. Today, it showed 3,438 readers. While my RSS readership does go up and down by over 100 per day, a 1,000+ drop is very unusual and requires further investigation, especially when yesterday was one of my bigger traffic days.
I was not the only one affected by a huge drop in RSS subscribers. Both David Lithman and Matt of Net Business Blog were hit as well. It turns out the problem was a glitch in Google’s Feedfetcher.
Here was the breakdown of RSS readers from yesterday.
This is how the picture looks today.
Notice that all the numbers are pretty close to each other except for Google Feedfetcher, which went from 2,081 down to 928. It turns out there’s a hiccup in the system with either FeedBurner not fully reporting RSS numbers from Google Feedfetcher or Google not fully reporting all its Google Reader numbers to FeedBurner.
On the good news side, this appears to a one-day glitch. Having an under reported feed count doesn’t really mean anything in terms of dollars. Matt said it might affect his FeedBurner Ad income since that is paid on a CPM basis. However, the ads are still being served to the RSS subscribers so he does get credit for them. It’s just the feed count that is messed up. I expect the feed count to return to normal tomorrow.
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{ 38 comments }
another example of google controlling the internet
i don’t think it’s google’s fault
Absolutely right!
It’s just a stats reporting problem… Hardly them controlling the planet…
another example of google controlling the internet
Really, what does this have to do with Google’s internet domination?
I experienced a similar drop. Since I’m no inspector gadget, I appreciate the info…puts things in better perspective
That’s why I visit this blog!!! And the free toys of course
I had the same problem with feedburner about a month ago, when all of my email subscribers were dropped (I believe the same happened to you then).
same here
but over 1000 rsscribe, it seems a bit too much
ya gotta give it to John….Mr. Sherlock …investigates everything an dthe writes about it and makes it look so simple..
Yea, down from 123 to 74, It might be google, or it might be that someone has been ddosing my blog for the past 2 days.
I know how you feel now John.
I was just wondering about that. Feedburner has reported odd results like that for me before. Now I just let things lie for a few days. Usually it pops back up plus some.
It’s happened on quite a few occasions. It always seems to correct itself the next day though.
I see lots of fluctuations in my stats, but I don’t really have a big enough base of users yet to tell what is normal and what isn’t. I just figured feedburner was a little wonky, guess it’s to be expected?
I was wondering what happened!
This problem happen to me yesterday! Maybe it’s Google’s problem!
This problem happen to me yesterday. The feedburner number change from 185 to 124; but it is up to 185 now~
John, do people who read your blog via RSS still come to your site?
I am not sure. There is no way to truly measure that. But blog traffic has been trending up.
Sometimes when i advertise I go on how big the RSS number is, but of course those people get an ad-free version don’t they?
I still think its a good indicator
however, for example I read your blog every single day but I have never signed up to any RSS feed.
I am subscribed to the RSS feed and generally view every post on this site to comment. Also, subscribing also helps me view the headlines at about 20 sites and is MUCH easier to manage than physically going to each site. Like Johnchow.com, I usually visit those sites as well (every to every other day) to comment.
not really huge news to report or bother about, doesnt seem matter much
it does matter!
i think that’s why john is so successful now, cos he can dig things up and give a well-researched, well written post
Man, it looks like you’re getting too many views for Google to handle. Don’t break it!
I’ve always seen John’s feedburner in the 4,000′s. There have been several dips in the past though. One time I remember seeing it go down to around 2,000+. Well, anything more than 1,000 has always seemed a lot to me anyway. And regardless what the feedburner says, there’s been a constant surge of traffic coming in this one.
ya it definitely seemed like a system glitch, 1000 people cannot dream of unsubscibing the same day no matter how dry the posts get:)
I looks like your comments are back to normal and it also looks like because you blogged about your RSS feed you picked up a few hundred more subscribers.
Yeah, seems everything is back to normal now, John. 4,695 and definitely rising — looking good.
YEA I THINK EVERY IS NORMAL NOW
AND ITS BETTER THEN B4
going up and up
I experienced a similar drop, I went from 90 to 0!
I didn’t really get hit infact my numbers went up!
Something is really wrong nowadays
dunno why
That happend to me last week. I normally get 100 – 200 unique visitors a day, then it suddenly dropped to 50 a day for a few days, then sprouted back up again.
Ahh, post explains everything. I knew it wasn’t a mass exodus from JC’s blog!
Looks like the glitch was fixed. Plus, you’re 250 subs richer!
I’m sorry, it’s my fault. I forgot to login to a Google reader accounts.
You guys really care so much on the figure? For me, it is not reliable. I only believe on the Traffic Analytic tools for my .
That’s nearly 5000 subscribers…