RSS - Really Simple Syndication (Part 2) or What's the Benefit of All This?

In my first installment of this article about Really Simple Syndication, I showed that your blog content is also available as a structured feed. Melinda asks, "What's the benefit of RSS?"

The Benefit of RSS

Now that blogging has caught hold of all the Melchins, I'm guessing that you all have your daily routine of clicking through to check everyones blog for new posts. Right now you may have only a few blogs that you read, but once you really get into it, you'll find more that just family blogs -- you'll find blogs about blogs about cars, blogs about computers, and news blogs. I read 28 blogs on a daily basis -- only a few of them are the personal blogs of family members. Most of them are news and technology related blogs.

What if there were a way to have all the blogs you like to read, come to you in one place -- without you having to click all around blogger (and the Internet) to get to them. Sort of like subscribing to a blog you're interested in, and receiving new posts as they're made.

RSS Feed Readers

An RSS feed reader is a program that can consume thoses structured blog feeds I referred to, and present them to you, all togehter, in one place. There are dozens, maybe hundreds of RSS reader programs. Some are free, some have a modest fee. My personal favorite is called FeedDemon -- I've been using it for years. Here's a screenshot (click on the image below to see a lager view):


Here you can see a categorized list of all the feeds I subscribe to. Go ahead, download a feed reader, and give it a shot.

In my next installment, I'll show you how to subscribe to a feed.