Who's wrong? antenna or guardian?

One thing to be concerned about with a generic message is that if a publisher keeps getting lots of messages that all just say the same thing may well be less likely to pay it serious heed. More import would be given to a message that included specific details about an instance of the issue

the most recent reply:
“Unfortunately, I don’t think there is anything we do can from our side as it looks like it is only AntennaPod that is experiencing the issue. Apologies for any disappointment.”

btw. isn’t there any online service which could filter such doubles? there are few which (with small help) could convert nearly any web (home)page to rss feed, what looks like more complicated case

Oh well :smiley: Apparently the support person does not know what they are talking about. All podcast apps are affected (as can be seen by looking at their broken feed manually) but AntennaPod is the only one that complains. I don’t know, maybe you can send them a link to this message or something. Alternatively, ask them to paste the RSS link into a podcast feed validator, which will also find that the feed is broken.

W3C validator:

https://validator.w3.org/feed/check.cgi?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.theguardian.com%2Fnews%2Fseries%2Fthe-audio-long-read%2Fpodcast.xml
line 2437, column 56: guid values must not be duplicated within a feed: 601a7b858f0881f52da6a5aa (100 occurrences)

Blubrry validator:

Cast Feed Validator
Found 100 items with an enclosure URL that has already been used in your feed. These episodes will be ignored by Apple Podcasts. […] Found 100 items with a non-unique guid tag.

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I doubt that the masses would start sending emails :slight_smile: And indeed the template should have placeholders for the user to complete detailed info about the issue.

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Ok, here is my first go. I tried to keep it both generic and customisable by each user - improvements are obviously very welcome, especially in case errors are triggered by different situations than those I have encountered so far.

Dear [insert feed provider],

I would like to report an error I encountered while using the feed for your podcast [insert title] (see URL below) via AntennaPod.
AntennaPod is an open source podcast player which relies on open standards to connect listeners and content providers.

Unfortunately, it appears that at least one episode is listed twice in the feed that is currently online. Please find below the technical details generated by AntennaPod, which should help you identify the issue.

You can observe the issue yourself by entering your feed's URL into a feed validator, such as:
https://validator.w3.org/feed
https://www.castfeedvalidator.com

I trust that you will try to address the issue, as it affects all users of this feed, not just AntennaPod users. In case you need additional information to resolve this, please let me know.

Kind regards,
[AntennaPod user]

--

[paste details from AntennaPod log here, including the feed URL]

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hopefully there will be a way to fill some of automatically
let me know if there will be place to localize such message to slovak language (will be initially shown in language of app, with possibility to switch to another translation?)

I was thinking the same - it would be cool. I’ll see if I manage to implement it on our website, after wrapping up the website translations work…

There will be - I’m currently working on making the website (better/more) translatable (see https://github.com/AntennaPod/antennapod.github.io/pull/112) while learning about Jekyll and Liquid at the same time :slight_smile:

Thanks @loucasal! Will make some suggestions tomorrow or later.

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Ok, an updated proposal:

Dear [insert feed provider],

I would like to report an error I encountered while using the feed for your podcast [insert title] (see URL below).
The error showed up while refreshing the feed in AntennaPod. It is an open source podcast player which relies on open standards to connect listeners and content providers.

Unfortunately, it appears that at least one episode is listed twice in the feed that is currently online. Please find below the technical details generated by AntennaPod, which should help identify the issue.

You can observe the issue yourself by entering your feed’s URL into a feed validator, such as W3C Feed Validation Service, for Atom and RSS or https://www.castfeedvalidator.com.

It would be great if you could address the issue, as it affects all users of this feed, not just AntennaPod users. (Some apps might make an automated guess which of the two episodes to hide and which to show, so the problem might not be visible in some apps). In case you need additional information to resolve this, please let me know.

Kind regards,
[insert your name]


[paste details from AntennaPod log here, including the feed URL]

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Thanks @keunes - your improvements look good to me. I would just shorten + add a link to AP in the second sentence:

The error showed up while refreshing the feed in AntennaPod, an open source podcast player which relies on open standards to connect listeners and content providers.

And slightly amend the following:

(Some podcast players silently guess which of the two episodes to hide and which to show, so the problem might not be evident in all apps).

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I fear that when we mention AntennaPod too much, they will react like the Guardian: Saying that it is a problem of AntennaPod

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Moving down first mention of AntennaPod, and keeping it to one paragraph only:

Dear [insert feed provider],

I would like to report an error I encountered while using the feed for your podcast [insert title] (see URL below). It appears that at least one episode is listed twice in the podcast feed. Please find below the technical details generated by my podcast app, which should help identify the issue.

You can observe the issue yourself by entering your feed’s URL into a feed validator, such as https://validator.w3.org/feed or https://www.castfeedvalidator.com.

The error showed up for me while refreshing the feed in AntennaPod (an open source podcast player which relies on open standards), but the issue affects all users of this feed. (Some podcast players silently guess which of the two episodes to hide and which to show, so the problem might not be evident in all apps.)

It would be great if you could address the issue. In case you need additional information to resolve this, please let me know.

Kind regards,
[insert your name]


[paste details from AntennaPod log here, including the feed URL]

1 Like

Late to the game, I had a similar reaction as ByteHamster. There is really no need at all mentioning AntennaPod when contacting a provider about their broken feed. Anything that might bring the recipients mind away from what is relevant will risk causing confusion. The usable bandwidth is limited, treat it as a sparse resource. A successful message likely needs to focus fully on the point needed to get across.

Any concrete change suggestions to the text I proposed above, @cos? For me mentioning the app you’re using (as a user) makes sense, and I feel in the text I suggested it is not ‘too much AntennaPod’.

Oh yes, it does feel right to mention AntennaPod. If the aim however is to get the provider to act, I believe one does best in suppress expressing ones heart and instead limit the communication to what is strictly necessary.

I’ve attempted to edit what was already written here, with a few changes. Including the complete removal of any reference to AntennaPod, making it clear the sender is only representing him or herself, and an attempt at actually motivating why it is in the providers interest to care. This suggestion could probably use a few more rounds of editing by others.

Dear [insert feed provider],

I am an individual who encountered a technical error which I would like to
report regarding the feed for your podcast [insert title]. It appears that
for at least one episode two variants are incorrectly listed with the same
identifier.

You can observe the issue yourself by entering your feed's URL into a feed
validator, such as <https://validator.w3.org/feed> or
<https://www.castfeedvalidator.com>. Relevant deep links:
[w3.org validator](https://validator.w3.org/feed/check.cgi?url=[insert feed URL])
[castfeedvalidator](https://www.castfeedvalidator.com/?url=[insert feed URL]).

The faulty feed makes it impossible for software to distinguish the correct 
one. While this might work much of the time, it can also break things in
subtle ways. For example, it might lead to some subscribers listening to
the outdated version of any episode you have edited to include a correction,
or it might lead to decreased visibility in search engine results.

Apple is the entity who originally designed the podcast specifications now
adopted by the entire world. The relevant except from their document is
quoted below:

> Each episode in your podcast has a globally unique identifier (GUID).
> It's very important that each episode has a unique, alphanumeric GUID
> that never changes, even if an episode’s metadata, like title or
> enclosure URL, do change.

It would be great if you could address the issue. In case you need
additional information to resolve this, please let me know.

Kind regards,
[insert your name]

A post was split to a new topic: Feeds with items that have the same title and date

I am seeing a more practical issue with the current message. I ran one of my problematic feeds through the linked feed validators, but neither reports the issue identified by AntennaPod (even though they do report other ones). Has anyone else had the same experience? Perhaps we should get rid of that paragraph if it doesn’t help users prove their point?

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