Just because it is hard doesn't mean the companies get a pass for not doing it. If you don't have a brand that users want to "pull" from you, what are you even doing as a publisher? That's almost Publishing 101. It's easy to blame Facebook for the hard work that they should have done all along, is all I'm saying here. ;)

As an RSS fan (and still an active user), I do agree that one of the prime failings here was that publishers in general too strongly backed the Facebook horse instead of, say, training users about the advantages of RSS. But yeah, why do the hard work today when you can wait for the rug to pulled out from under you by a third party and then do the hard work anyway?