**Read the update at the bottom***

BoingBoing is questioning their RSS stats provided by FeedBurner:

We frankly don’t believe that nearly two million folks have decided to subscribe to BoingBoing via this relatively new service, and we suspect someone (or more specifically, somebot) is taking advantage of the service for some kind of spammy reasons. We’re looking into it with the folks at FeedBurner and Pageflakes, and will report back once we know more.

That’s a large number and I agree with them questioning their stats. Kudos. Introduction over, let’s get to the meat of my entry…I did not read it on BoingBoing, I read it on TechCrunch. Normally I don’t read TechCrunch because honestly (disclaimer) Mike Arrington isn’t one of my favorite people (compare this, which carried over to this. I’d have a lot more respect if he would have confessed it then) but I do respect him for the effort he puts into his site and how he keeps up with what is going on in his niche. That dedication is why I knew Mike Arrington was going to write about the Pageflakes “problem” two weeks after BoingBoing questioned it, because the problem resurfaced last week [link no longer active].

Update: 1/7/07: Mike emailed me about the issue above and we’ve cleared that matter up.

There is a more subtle reason that I’m sure Mike Arrington won’t admit to. A “competing site”, Mashable a 9rules member and a default feed in Pageflakes, “possibly” has overstated stats. Mashable’s is 4x as high as TechCrunch (yes, even I raise an eyebrow on that one). I think that is why think Mike is wrote about it, because Mike Arrington is kind of predictable.

Think about it: the ego. Seeing a ridiculously high number of readers is cool (if you’re the site owner). Knowing you have more readers and the numbers showing on other sites might be inaccurate is frustrating (if you’re a “competing site”). Wondering the validity of the numbers and wondering when (if) this will be corrected (and what number is accurate), is frustrating (if you are the site owner or a potential advertiser).

Main reason I’m bringing this up: a problem was reported in October about not being able to delete BoingBoing’s feed on Pageflakes. Logically, one would think if BoingBoing is experiencing the problem other default feeds would be as well.

Pageflakes – are these numbers accurate? Yes or no? More important, why is Pageflakes having this problem and not Netvibes? I guess even more important, if the problem has been going on this long, what is FeedBurner going to do about it since Pageflakes is taking forever to fix it?

I have one piece of advice for webmasters: redirect your feed, do not use the burned FeedBurner feed as the primary feed. By using FeedBurner’s feed you lose a layer of reporting. If people are accessing your feed then are redirected to FeedBurner, then you know how many people are accessing your feed. In this space we all have to work together because in the end, once this is solved, no one benefits from inflated stats (advertisers will find out eventually and they won’t be happy). I believe people should have a general idea about traffic, their niche audience, etc., but I do not think people should not get too caught up in statistics because right now, accuracy is one of the biggest challenges.

1. Until Pageflakes says something, if you are a potential advertiser, tread lightly.
2. If you are a default feed in Pageflakes, save your joy until Pageflakes officially says something.
3. Mashable – when the dust settles, I hope that 415k+ holds because that’s awesome.

UPDATE: This is ridiculous:

I can delete mine (so that might have been resolved) but why am I able to add the same feed multiple times? I logged out, logged back in, same feed (multiple times) is still there.

To me it’s not about Pageflakes fixing the error, it’s about FeedBurner doing something for accuracy – and I have no idea what that “something” is, because Netvibes does it too.