Engaged Learning

RSS – Day 2 – Using RSS

Nov 17, 2009 Social Media & Network Challenge

RSS – Day 2 – Using RSS

Now that you have your account set up, you are good to go!  You can now receive updates on just about any information, not only blogs.  For example, you can subscribe to News sites, National Geographic Photo of the Day (I looked for NASA photos of the day, but they didn’t have RSS feeds – ’tis a shame), shows on Frontline, videos on TED.com, and much, much more.

RSS Folders

But it doesn’t all come in a jumble of information.  With folders or tags, you can organize the information.  For example, I have a “Photography” folder that holds all my photography RSS feeds (imagine that!)  If I have some extra time I look at them. If not, I skip them.  I have a “Learning-2.0″ folder – one that holds feeds from sites which talk about learning and the best methods for organizational learning.  This one I make sure I keep up to date one.

These two examples display one of the great aspects of RSS feeds.  Sign up for as many as you want.  If you don’t have time to read them all, DON’T!  With email we feel obligated to read them all.  Since these feeds were not written to you personally, if you don’t have time, don’t read them.  If it bothers you that they all say “Unread” – mark them all as “Read” (as in /red/ not /reed/) and they are gone.   This is dejunking without the guilt.

This does lead to a caution, however.  Outlook and other mail programs have RSS readers built into them now.  I would highly discourage the use of these programs as RSS readers.  What I have found is that when they are used, the user does not make the distinction between an email and an RSS feed and the two are confused.  RSS then becomes just as much of a bother as email and then despised.  When that happens, the user loses sight of the benefits of RSS and misses it altogether.  Don’t do it.  (”It’s just my opinion, but it’s true.“)

Oh, ya.  And another one I would avoid: Internet Explorer’s RSS reader.  Way too confusing.  You can, however, get an RSS readers as a plugin to Firefox (if that just went over your head, no problem – let it fly by).

I have heard some say, “Oh no.  Not another piece of software I have to use.”  This is true.  But on the flip side, you could say, “Oh yes!  Look at all the time I am saving!”  I think the ‘trouble’ of using something new substantially outweighs the time you would waste otherwise.

Remember, once you start using RSS feeds, you won’t turn back!

TO DO – Subscribe to some RSS feeds (Difficulty Level: EASY – Time: 10 minutes)

1. Remember that list of blogs you were to hold on to from Blogs – Day 2?  Go there and subscribe to their RSS feeds.  (Don’t forget to RSS your own blog!)
2. Create subject folders and organize them.

Tags: RSS, social media challenge