News feeds, often referred to as RSS, is a way of customizing and delivering up to the minute information in an online environment. RSS Stands for "Rich Site Summary" or "Really Simple Syndication." RSS is basically a technology that is used to gather and distribute Web based news from newspapers, Web sites, Web logs, magazines and more.
When you see a symbol that looks like 
or 
or 
on a Web site or blog page, you know that up to the minute information from
that site is being syndicated out on a RSS news channel feed. Additionally,
you can subscribe freely to that feed and get breaking news from that site
delivered to your news reader.
News feeds can save you time and simplify your routine online information gathering experience. For example, if there is a site you check regularly for updates, that offers a RSS news feed, you may want to consider subscribing. You will then receive news from that site updated in your news reader. The updates will appear as headlines or summaries. By clicking on the headline you will be taken to the full story or article on the site. Headlines you may have missed will still be available in your news reader as well. Instead of spending time surfing to sites and sifting through material, content is delivered to you, summarized for quick discretion.
There are numerous free and proprietary news readers. What would distinguish one over another is much a matter of personal taste, preference and cost. We have reviewed several of the most popular news readers. Here are some we can recommend accompanied by some basic usage instructions.
Feedreader: A very popular, open source application that you can download and install free.
Bloglines: A Web based application that requires an online login. This would be a good choice if you do a large amount of public computing.
Firefox browser: A simple to use news reader, which is built into the Mozilla/Firefox browser.
NetNewsWire: The lite version is free to download and is composed of a three panel design, similar to Feedreader for the PC. The full version is currently $25.
PulpFiction: Another popular news reader with a three panel design. The current version is $25.
Firefox browser: A simple to use news reader, which is built into the Mozilla/Firefox browser.
Copyright © 2008 by the University of Kansas