RSS Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

1. What is RSS?
RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication, is an easy way to keep up with your favorite news and information. An RSS feed contains headlines, summaries and links to stories on MLN - The Raw Feed(tm), our daily grind of press releases. If you click an RSS link, you will see XML (or eXtensible Markup Language) code in your browser. This is to be expected, since you do not view RSS content through a browser. You view the headlines through an RSS news reader (also called an RSS aggregator). Our main RSS page provides links to our feeds.

2. What are RSS Readers?
RSS news readers are small software programs that aggregate RSS feeds and display the story information. They allow you to scan headlines from hundreds of news sources in a central location.

3. Where Can I Find an RSS Reader?
A wide range of RSS readers can be easily downloaded from the Web. Some readers are Web-based while others require you to download a small software program onto your desktop. Most are free to use. (Several readers require Microsoft's .NET framework on your computer. They may be slightly more complicated to install if you do not have .NET.)

Google and Yahoo! both offer comprehensive lists of RSS readers. A few sample readers are also offered below for the purpose of evaluation:

• Awasu (Windows)
• iBlog
• Bloglines (Multi-Platform/Browser)
• Amphetadesk (Windows, Mac, Linux)
• RSS Reader (Windows - must have.NET)
• NetNewsWire (Mac OS X)

4. How Do I Use These Feeds?
The first step, as described above, is to choose an RSS reader. Each reader has a slightly different way of adding a new feed (also called a "channel"). In most cases, here's how it works:

A. Click on the small XML button near the channel you want (MLN's Top Stories, for example, or Baseball - Affiliated). You'll see a page displaying a lot of jibberish. Not to worry. This is just the story trying to talk to XML code. You want what's on top.

B. If you can't see the address bar where the web address (URL) of the page lives, you'll want to go to VIEW in the pull-down menus and make sure that you make it visible.

From your browser, copy the URL that appears in your address bar. For example, the URL you would copy for MLN-The Raw Feed's Top Stories is:

  http://www.minorleaguenews.com/rawfeed/rss.xml

C. Paste that URL into the 'Add New Channel' section of the reader. That's all you need to do for most readers! The RSS feed will start to display and regularly update the headlines for you.

 

5. How Do I Learn More about RSS?
Lots of publications have RSS news feeds available online. Radio Userland has some great resources.