When techies got sick and tired of checking websites every other hour for latest updates only to find none, they went and developed RSS? Really smart people have been using it for years to keep track of their favourite websites. Of more relevance here perhaps is that there are now plenty of RSS feeds for your mobile phones.

What’s RSS?
RSS which most tech experts say stands for Really Simple Syndication is a format that delivers regularly changing web content. This format lets sites publish listings of the latest headlines as well as summaries of full stories.

 

Using a simple program called the RSS reader; you can sift through the list of headlines and condensed stories and click on the article you want to read. This will then open the web page containing the full story.

 

RSS makes it easy for people to keep up with their favourite web sites in an automated manner that’s easier than checking them manually. What makes RSS really hot is its ability to aggregate news from different sources, which means that it can automatically keep track of all the websites a person is interested in and bring down the latest changes in multiple websites into one easy to read view. The process is known as news feeds where RSS readers take in various feeds from the different sites.

 

Feeds don’t only deliver breaking-news from online publications like the New York Times, but also anything from Weblogs to weather forecasts to listings of new music arrivals at your favorite record store. RSS helps us to save time, since we don’t have to visit each site individually. It also keeps us informed and ensures privacy, by us not having to subscribe to each site’s email newsletter; thus less spam too!

 

 

Cool, Just how does RSS work?
RSS content is retrieved using an application called a ‘feed reader’. We subscribe to a feed by entering the feed’s link into the reader or by clicking on the RSS icon in a browser which initiates the subscription process. Many sites display a small icon with the acronyms RSS, XML, or RDF to let you know a feed is available.The reader then regularly checks the subscribed feeds for updates and downloads whatever new contents it finds.

 

There are many different types of RSS readers available for different platforms. Some of the more popular ones include Amphetadesk (Windows, Linux, Mac), FeedReader(Windows) and NewsGator(Windows). Many web-based feed readers are also available, these include My Yahoo, Bloglines and Google Reader.

 

 

RSS goes mobile!
The really great news is, RSS is now available on mobile phones too! So you don’t need to have your PC before your eyes to keep updated! RSS on mobile phones functions the same way as in computers. You just need an RSS reader on your mobile phone. Many of the newer mobile phones come with a built-in RSS reader. But for other smartphones that don’t come with built-in RSS readers, a good place to start looking for an RSS reader is by browsing through the humongous list put together at http://allrss.com/rssreadersmobilephones.html.

 

Some of the more popular RSS readers for mobile phones, from what I have learnt, include BuddyBuzz, winksite.com, LiteFeeds, Bloglines mobile, PHONifier, iFeedYou, and FreeNews. Yahoo and Google also have excellent ways to get news onto your mobile phones.

 

Before subscribing to RSS news feeds on your mobile phone however, bear in mind that it is not free of charge. You can find lots of free RSS readers which only mean that you don’t have to pay for the application. But accessing news feeds will incur data charges when the latest news feeds are downloaded into your phone. Unless you are on an unlimited data package, that means a higher phone bill at the end of the month.

 

So turn your phone into your own personal newspaper, weather station, sports announcer, and blog reader, all rolled into one. With RSS, you don’t surf news websites, you get all the information you want in one place - a customizable homepage for your mobile phone.