Sunday, November 25, 2012

The ABC of RSS


To understand what Really Simple Syndication means, let us start with the basics. Syndication is an activity consisting in re-publishing content that comes from a source other than the website, which is making available such content.

Syndication allows websites to publicize any content change that takes place, including the addition of new articles, and updates or removals of existing content. These changes are broadcast by means of RSS feeds. Content owners can set up the format of the feed and its content, which can be limited to provide only a summary report, or enhanced including photos, the full story or article, as well as other information.

Skimming through the information delivered by an RSS feed is advantageous for web surfers who receive a useful site overview that help them to decide if it is worth visiting the source, which is easily identifiable because feeds usually include a link to the source in the title of each update.

RSS benefits both web publishers and Internet surfers; the first can spread the word about site updates, while the second can easily stay informed without needing to visit the website at first. If you are a website owner that are not delivering RSS feeds yet, what are you waiting for.

RSS is for all and it does not really matter the niche your website belongs in or how often you update the content. Even sites that update rarely can benefit from Really Simple Syndication as soon as new content comes out; hence, there is not need to wait for the next search engine crawling.

As a reader, these feeds are a big saving on surfing time, because once subscribed to a feed service, the surfer receives the updates that he or she wants, updates that can be prioritized, categorized or filtered according each one needs, but an aggregator is required for this task. Aggregators are RSS readers that are available even for free download or used straight from almost any web browser.

On the other hand, with RSS feeds surfers take control of the information they want to receive. Overtime email has not been the effective updating tool that it was in the early days. Fearing a spam avalanche is the main concern preventing people to subscribe a newsletter regardless opt-in lists allow unsubscribing any time.

However, with RSS, the reader keep control all the time, to either subscribe, unsubscribe or make selective choices from the received content, stopping the inbox cluttering that regular email updates cause.

Making Your Own RSS Feeds   How to Get Updates Via RSS   Security and RSS   



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