BIZ-BANANA.COM

Simply right-click on the orange RSS button on the left menu (control-click for Mac users) for each feed (for example The BIZ-Banana.com News Blog) Next…

Select Copy Shortcut for PC ("Copy Link to Clipboard" - for Mac; "Copy Link Location" if you use Firefox browser) then paste that URL into your RSS Reader. Here is a reader for you to try

For PC (FREE)

http://www.rssreader.com/

For Mac (30 Trial)

http://ranchero.com/netnewswire/

And that's it! You're subscribed.

Before we cover the basics of RSS in much more detail, I’d like to ask you a couple of question.

If you subscribe to quite a few email newsletters (As I USED TO) on the subject of working from home, when was the last time you read about something really interesting that was not already old news?

If you are a webmaster, do you have trouble finding new topics? Envisage this scenario:

You’ve just sent off your monthly newsletter and it’s been a slow month for really interesting articles. Then, just like buses, a few come along together. Of course, by the time the next issue is due, your ‘news’ is a month old.

Maybe you think about doing two issues a month or even publishing weekly – but even that’s quickly outdated. Then if you publish both a text only and an HTML version things could REALLY go sour in a hurry

Enter “RSS”, the solution that answers all your problems.

Well, most of them anyway.

"RSS" stands for "Really Simple Syndication." Or, alternatively, “Really Simple Subscribing” because that’s exactly what it is... a new way for content publishers (And maybe you too!) to distribute their content.

SO WHAT’S ALL THE FUSS ABOUT?

From a subscriber’s point of view:

With RSS you get:

• NO Waiting for the next newsletter.
• NO SPAM messages.
• NO Viruses
• NO Spyware
• NO Need to divulge any of your personal details: name or email address, etc.
• NO Need to go through an annoying “unsubscribe” process as you usually do with email.
  

If you discover you don’t want the RSS feed for any reason, it takes just a jiffy to dump it.

From the publisher’s point of view:

With RSS you get:

All of the above subscriber benefits and in, addition, you don’t need to worry about:

Constantly keeping track of your subscriber list and possibly losing your latest little email gem into the ether due to:

• Anti-virus and Firewall software
• Anti-spyware software
• Any other blocking methods you can think of.

Because of its dynamic nature, RSS is a whole new voyage of discovery on the Internet Sea, only instead of going to EVERY port along the way; you only go to the destinations YOU want to visit.

When a publisher changes content, subscribers know about it right away.

With RSS, new content comes to you, and only your favorite parts of it, and always updated!.

WHAT ARE THE DISADVANTAGES?

None really, other than the fact you need a RSS Reader and that’s no big deal either. There are many free readers and I’ve road tested a few of them (Windows version) including:

For PC users

RSS Reader is a popular choice

http://www.rssreader.com/

BlogExpress is also "free" but ask for a donation.

http://www.usablelabs.com/productBlogExpress.html

The one I use now, though, is FeedDemon

http://feeddemon.com/

From Bradbury Software and I’ll tell you why in a moment.

You can find many more choices at:

http://www.2rss.com/readers.php

For Mac users

NetNewsWire has a free 30 day trial although not having a Mac myself I don’t know anything other than the info on their website.

http://ranchero.com/netnewswire/

Web Publishers

Web Publishers will also need another piece software to actually create their feeds and for this I use NewzAlert Composer from Castle Software.

http://www.castlesoftware.biz/NewzAlertComposer.htm

I have to admit this is the only one I’ve tried and like FeedDemon I’ve used these two specific programs for a very good reason.

Like many of you I used to wonder what those little orange buttons meant. Ironically, it was through Marc Liron’s UpdateXp newsletter that made me want to find out more information.

There used to be a link to his FREE RSS Course but I'm sorry to say in no longer works. I've written to him a couple of times but got no reply

I hope you find this information useful and after a while I hope you will realise, as I did, that RSS is the future of information delivery. I also predict that once the world cottons to the true potential of RSS that email newsletters will eventually be consigned to the cyberspace dustbin!

Finally, to demonstrate my own belief in RSS, I’ve decided to remove my own Biz-Banana newsletter in favour of my News Blog page where you can “read all about it” by subscribing to my RSS feed. Of course you can just visit the site regularly, if you wish, but once you get the hang of it I’m sure you’ll be doing it the quick and easy way.

As usual, I’d welcome your comments on this or any other subject.

Please write to me at John@biz-banana.com