#6 Make life "really simple" with RSS & a newsreader

You’ve heard of RSS? You’ve seen those small funny tags on websites?

You’ve heard co-workers and acquaintances swear by it, but still have no

idea what RSS is?

RSS is revolutionalizing the way news, media and content creators share information, but it also is swiftly changing the way everyday users are consuming information.

RSS stands for “Really Simple Syndication” and is a file format for delivering regularly updated information over the web.

For the websites and news information sources you may visit every day, it takes time to visit those sites and scour the ad-filled and image-heavy pages just for the text you want to read.

You can visit all those information sources and web pages in one place, without the time consuming visit to each site individually now through a newsreader and RSS.

This week’s discovery exercises focus on learning about RSS news feeds and
setting up feed reader (a free online newsreader) for yourself to bring your feeds together.
There are numerous free feed readers.
Bloglines is an alternative that is used in the original Learning 2.0 program. Another feed reader specific to Mozilla Firefox browser is Sage. For this exercise we will be using Google Reader.

Discovery Resources:

• CNET Video: RSS – Feel the Need for Feeds (3:32) – a good over view of what RSS is and the benefits to users.

• Feed Me: A gentle introduction to Internet feeds - a good tutorial from Palinet, a library cooperative

• SLV RSS feeds and information about feed readers
  

Discovery Exercises:

1. Follow the discovery resources above to learn more about RSS and newsreaders.
   
2. Using your blog username and password to login to Google Reader . You can view a good online tutorial about Google Reader here.
   
3. Subscribe to at least 5 newsfeeds to your reader.

Newsfeeds:

• • Read alert - the SLV blog about youth literature
    
  • SLV RSS feeds available to their website
    
  • Recent Australian publications - through Libraries Australia
    
  • ALIA website
    
  • Library Bytes
    
  • Unshelved - Library cartoon feed
  
  

4. Create a post (#6 RSS) in your blog about this exercise.

What do you like about RSS and newsreaders?
How do you think you might be able to use this technology in your work or personal life?
How can libraries use RSS or take advantage of this new technology?