Web 2.0 and feeds

Many Web 2.0 applications generate and/or read feeds. What are feeds? In some ways, they perform similar functions as traditional news wire services or news syndications - broadcasting up-to-the-second news to subscribers. However, in the Web 2.0 age, feeds are not restricted only to news articles or to the exclusive use of large news agencies. Because feeds are so easy to generate and so easy to subscribe to, this technology has greatly empowered the masses and changed the way we get informed.

Feeds notify others when there is a new blog post or a new podcast, magazine articles, products, photos, music, videos, ..., you name it. To the consumer, feeds are useful because you get to keep in touch with what's going on without having to constantly check each and every one of your favorite websites to see if there is anything new. To the producer, feeds allow them get to contact with their consumers the second there is something new.

Technically, feeds are just Web-accessible XML files that come in different flavors - RSS 0.9, RSS 1.0, RSS 2.0, and Atom. If you are interested, you can read more about the current syndication format war. Fortunately, most feed aggregators or readers support all formats. Speaking of aggregators, you need one if you want to take advantage of feeds. Feed aggregators/ readers are to feeds as email programs are to emails; they keep track of feeds you are interested in (have subscribed to) and what you have or have not read in each feed. Popular aggregators include the Google Reader and Bloglines.

Besides aggregators, you can also use search engines specially designed for feeds, such as Bloglines, Blogpulse, Feedster, and Technorati, to name a few.

But there is an even better way to keep track of your favorite feeds plus more - create a personalized homepage with everything you are interested in, all in one bird's eye view. All the big players have personalized homepages, also called personalized portals or start pages, such as Microsoft, Google, and My Yahoo. There are also a lot of interesting software from independents, such as Netvibes, PageFlakes, Protopage, and the newcomer Webwag. Most of these applications provide APIs to allow you to create new gadgets or widgets to add onto these personalized pages.

Don't have a feed yet? Don't worry. You can create one for yourself with programs like feedburner.