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The importance and need for RSS feeds ties in with the inundation of information that we are all experiencing at the same time that we are all getting busier...especially those of us who are into online and offline social networking.
RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication and the feed works two ways:
Publish an article, podcast or video on a blog or other websites and shoots it out to the feed aggregators. Then they shoot it out to all types of end readers or listeners.
End users choose how info comes to them: RSS feed reader or e-mail,or in the case of podcasts, the Apple i-tunes store. There are Links to content, partial or full text on a page or now can look like website pages right from the inbox.
Here are 5 interesting facts about RSS :
1. Feeds permit you to subscribe to regular updates, delivered automatically via a web portal, news reader, or in some cases good old email. You can even set up readers to let you know when there are articles of niches you are interested in.
2. Feeds also make it possible for site content to be packaged into "widgets," "gadgets," mobile devices, and other bite-sized technologies that make it possible to display blogs, podcasts, and major news/sports/weather/whatever headlines just about anywhere.
3. A typical interface for a feed reader will display your feeds and the number of new (unread) entries within each of those feeds. You can also organize your feeds into categories and even clip and save your favorite entries (with certain applications).
4. If you have a website, blog, audio/video content, or even photos, you can offer a feed of your content as an option.
5. If you're using a popular blogging platform or publishing tool like TypePad, Wordpress, or Blogger, you likely publish a feed automatically. Even other non-blogging sites like social photo-sharing services, video sharing sites, and social networking sites offer feeds of content you produce that others can retrieve.
Thousands of bloggers, podcasters, and videobloggers publish feeds to keep themselves better connected to their readers, listeners, admirers, and critics.
Apple, through its iTunes Music Store, offers TONS of audio and video podcasts for download, each of which is powered by a feed.
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