A bit about RSS

Tired of having to constantly visit websites to see if new content has been posted? And, not only new content, but most importantly, content that you're actually interested in reading. With RSS, the content can come to you. With news readers or news aggregators, such as Bloglines, MyYahoo! or Newsgator, you can subscribe to RSS feeds and have the information delivered directly to your reader.

RSS is an application of the Extensible Markup Language (XML) originally developed by Netscape for its browser's Netcenter channels. To publish an RSS feed, such as news headlines or stories, a website creates a description of the content and specifically where the content is on its site in the form of an RSS document. The publishing site then registers its RSS document with one of several existing directories of RSS publishers. As a result, a user with a Web browser or a special aggregator/news reader can receive RSS-distributed content and can read periodically-provided distributions.

News is only one form of content that is distributed with an RSS feed. Other possibilities include discussion forum or blog excerpts, software announcements, white papers or case studies — essentially any form of content retrievable with a URL.