RSS For The Mainstream

Dylan Greene has com­piled a list of 10 rea­sons why RSS is not ready for prime time. Now, I wouldn’t pre­sume to know more about RSS than Greene, but from the posi­tion of what you might call an enthu­si­as­tic con­sumer of RSS feeds, he seems to be miss­ing the point rather.

1. RSS feeds do not have his­tory

   Well, no they don’t, but nor do they need his­tory. RSS feeds are for noti­fy­ing read­ers of new con­tent, or pro­vid­ing them with new con­tent. They aren’t meant to replace a web­site and its struc­ture, they are meant to com­ple­ment it.

2. RSS wastes band­width

   Again, yes, some RSS read­ers poll feeds too fre­quently, and some gulp up too much band­width. But those files, com­pared to a web page, are tiny wee things.

3. Read­ing RSS requires too much work

   True. Even with NetNewsWire’s easy sub­scrib­ing method, sub­scrib­ing to a new feed can be a labo­ri­ous process. With­out going into the pros and cons, it looks like the feed URI scheme might be the answer.

4. An RSS Reader must come with Win­dows

   Can’t argue with that.

5. RSS con­tent is not User-​Friendly

   Erm, no. The lack of for­mat­ting, tables and images makes RSS more user-​friendly, plac­ing total con­trol over pre­sen­ta­tion in the hands of the user. (Not to men­tion the fact that RSS feeds can be styled and for­mat­ted by the pub­lisher, and can include images.)

6. RSS con­tent is not machine-​friendly

   This is a prob­lem, but again, RSS is not a replace­ment for a web­site, it is a gate­way to it. This is rather like the crit­i­cism of Google for overly favour­ing weblog con­tent, since if I’m search­ing feeds and end up on a site quot­ing the con­tent I’m after, I’ll be incon­ve­nienced by the need to click through, but I might come upon valu­able con­text for and crit­i­cism of the con­tent I’m after.

7. Many RSS Feeds show only an abridged ver­sion of the con­tent

   Agreed. There is noth­ing more irri­tat­ing than feeds that cut off con­tent at an arbi­trary point. Feeds that sum­marise con­tent are good, feeds that pro­vide unabridged con­tent are good. Feeds that trail off mid-​sentence are the bane of my life. But this is a prob­lem with the people and appli­ca­tions gen­er­at­ing the feeds, not RSS itself.

8. Com­ments are not inte­grated with RSS feeds

Well, they often are. Many weblog­gers either include a link to com­ments at the foot of each feed item, often with an indi­ca­tion of the number of com­ments. This doesn’t go as far as Greene wishes, but then most weblog­ging appli­ca­tions don’t pro­vide the com­ment­ing fea­tures on his wish-​list. It also seems a mis­take to crit­i­cise RSS for short­com­ings in this area - just because it has been enthu­si­as­ti­cally adopted by the weblog­ging com­mu­nity, who live for com­ments and inter­ac­tion, RSS is not a tool for weblog­gers alone. Why should a format meant to deliver news and updates handle com­ments in such a sophis­ti­cated way?

9. Mul­ti­ple Ver­sions of RSS cause more con­fu­sion

   Damn straight.

10. RSS is Inse­cure

    I wouldn’t know, to be honest.

So, you can’t argue Greene’s points on improv­ing the usablity of RSS. The tech­nol­ogy can’t truly take off until find­ing and sub­scrib­ing to feeds is made as simple as, say, click­ing a link. But most of the points in the list read as if Greene wants RSS to con­form to the modes of pre­sen­ta­tion and inter­ac­tion we find on the web, when it’s strength - again, speak­ing as an avid con­sumer, not a clever expert - is that it does away with that very pre­sen­ta­tion and interaction.

It would be impos­si­ble for me to keep up with the 200 or so sites I sub­scribe to if I had to load each and every one in a browser, check for new con­tent, and read on. RSS makes this easy, not just because the head­line reader takes care of check­ing for new con­tent, but also by pro­vid­ing that con­tent in a format that has no dis­trac­tions, is quick and easy to read, and can be pre­sented in the manner I choose. And if I want to join a dis­cus­sion on a web­site, I don’t need RSS to handle the whole process for me - it’s job is done once it has pro­vided me with new con­tent, or alerted me to it. Adding com­plex for­mat­ting and the capac­ity for track­ing and par­tic­i­pat­ing in dis­cus­sions would turn RSS feeds into… web pages. And we already have those.

So, usabil­ity improve­ments aside, I’d say RSS is ready for the main­stream, if it is pre­sented to the main­stream for what it is - Really Simple Syndication.

Posted at 3pm on 22/01/04 by Jack Mottram to the web category.
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Tags: rss, usability, web