Are you clear on what RSS is and what the benefits are? Even if you are, a handy guide to what RSS is all about could be what you need to find out more on how you can gain better business advantage from RSS to keep fully up to speed with the news and information that you need to track and act on.
In July, CNET News produced an easy-to-understand guide that clearly explains RSS and its uses and benefits in the business environment. The guide includes a 3-minute video presentation, ideal for getting a quick understanding of RSS. (Thanks to Common Craft for the links.)
To get RSS information and use it, you need an RSS reader or aggregator (these terms are explained in the CNET guide).
One of the RSS readers you’ll see in the CNET video is Feed Demon, a desktop RSS reader for Windows. Today, the first beta of the next version 1.5 was publicly released.
The most interesting new feature is the program’s ability to seamlessly integrate with Bloglines, the web-based RSS aggregator. In announcing the release of the beta, the program’s developer Nick Bradbury said:
FeedDemon users can create a Bloglines Channel Group from their Bloglines subscriptions. When viewing a Bloglines Channel Group, items you read in Bloglines won’t show up in FeedDemon, and items you download in FeedDemon won’t show up as unread in Bloglines. It’s very easy to synchronize with your Bloglines subscriptions so that FeedDemon reflects feeds you add or remove from Bloglines.
This means you get the benefit of both worlds – a desktop Windows RSS reader and a web-based RSS reader with synchronized information between the two.
To read the full release notes and download the beta, go to FeedDemon 1.5 Beta 1.
If you’re not comfortable using beta software, just try out the current released version of FeedDemon.
RSS Tutorial: The Need for Feeds
CNet has a comprehensive overview of RSS, including a streaming how-to video with editor Rafe Neeleman.