RSS 101

RSS is a really great tool for keeping up on news, unfortunately not many people understand it or know how to use it. Here's more info to get you started with RSS.

First is the wikipedia entry for RSS.

Next is Common Craft's great video explaining RSS.

Also a video from NCTT -The National Center for Telecommunications Technologies - demonstrating how to use RSS.

And finally, from MakeUseOf - 14 “OTHER” Ways to Use RSS Feeds.

(1)SendMeRSS - A great alternative to feed readers or aggregators - especially for those whose daily workflow is centered on email.

(2) MailBucket - takes the complete opposite approach, generating an RSS feed from you email and sending your email to an RSS reader. CAUTION: This approach is not for the security.

(3) TwitterFeed - I love twitter and have been using it for some time. Twitterfeed - takes content from RSS feeds and sends the content as updates to twitter. Here's a twitter feed for my blog. You can just follow this twitter account and get any new blog postings in yout twitter updates - pretty cool.

(4) Pingie - Feed updates via SMS - great for the iPhone.


(5) FeedJournal - If RSS and email are too techy for you and you prefer your news on paper, this might be your solution. Subscribe to RSS feeds and FeedJournal converts the content to a printable newspaper.

(6) Wigitize - A widget service that allows you to add RSS content to your website. Also consider SpringWidgets.

(7) ReminderFeed - Use your feed reader as a reminder service.


(8) TagMindr - Also a reminder service, but also you to add web links - sort of an feed reader with del.icio.us functionality.

(9) FeedBlendr / FeeDoor - Combine RSS and Atom, video, audio and text feeds into one.

(10) FeedCrier - Feed updates in your chat program (AIM , MSN Messenger, Jabber and GoogleTalk).

(11) ZapTXT -Monitor feeds for keywords. For instance, "Microsoft, Yahoo" to keep up-t0-date on the latest merger/takeover news.

(12) SpokenText - Don't have time to read? SpokenText converts RSS feeds to speech and allows you to subscribe to them as iTunes podcasts. Again, pretty cool!

(13) RSSMixer - Merge multiple feeds into one master feed and accessible from any feed reader.


(14) AideRSS - This is your RSS-assistant. Takes your hundreds and thousands of stories waiting to be read and applies a filter, leaving only the most popular stories. Sort of like your personal digg.