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How to use Tumblr as a Google Reader shared items substitute

The social sharing world has seemed bleak for those of us who found the shared items in Google Reader to be the single best place to read and discuss the news. But I've found a little light lately in turning to Tumblr as a way to share links and pictures and allow discussion on said articles.

It's easy to set up. Get a Tumblr in shape and then:
  1. Add Tumblr to the Send To button (Reader Settings > Send To). This will take the place of the "Share with note" functionality.
  2. Go get the "Share on Tumblr" bookmarklet at the Tumblr Goodies page. This will let you share any article you find. 
  3. To get the commenting experience, sign up for Disqus, create a new site and then enter the shortcode into your Tumblr.
Those things will let you share to Tumblr as easily as you did to Reader. 

Of course, Tumblr still pales in comparison to Reader, if only because Reader allowed you to have all shared articles AND comments in the same place where you were reading your usual articles. And one of the great things about Reader is that you were usually able to read the entire article without having to leave Reader. But it still scratches that sharing itch, and adds in features that you couldn't get in Reader shared items, like Analytics and the ability to connect external services like Instagram.

As a side note, I've been liking Tumblr a lot, but there's still room for improvement. A better dashboard is sorely needed, the text editor needs a larger window space, and although the templates are among the best of the free blogging platforms, a lot of them are unpredictable and buggy. But I've been liking the ease of posting and ability to customize template enough so that I've started considering moving this blog to Tumblr.

UPDATED to put in the part about adding in your Disqus to allow commenting. An essential part!
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