I’ve noticed that many sites serve RSS as content-type text/xml, though some people (Sam Ruby & Mark Pilgrim) advocate using application/rss+xml. Syndic8 uses the latter. Ironically, even though he advocates it, Mark Pilgrim’s site apparently does not use it. Same for Ben Hammersley, who shows an example of its use in his book.
Anyway, the reason I mention this is I’ve noticed many non-technical users don’t “get it” when it comes to subscribing to feeds via an aggregator. They see the XML icon and instinctively click on it, but then don’t know what to do when their browser shows them a bunch of XML.
(This observation comes from a couple email lists I’m on that are populated by semi-savvy Internet people. They’re technical enough to have their own web businesses, but not enough to quickly grok RSS, XML and all the other buzzwords coming down the pike.)
So it got me thinking: maybe during installation the aggegator should register their products with the operating system/browser as the default handler for the application/rss+xml content-type? That way, clicking on an XML icon would be akin to clicking on a PDF link, or a Real Audio feed. The browser asks you if you want to load the file and, if so, hands it off to the aggregator.
NewsGator allows you to do this via right-click in Internet Explorer, and NewsMonster offers the same thing in Mozilla. But frankly I’d like the process to be even simpler than that. My goal is to make this even easier that signing up for an email list. One click and you’re done.
I did a quick test of a couple of aggregators in Mozilla via Preferences|Navigator|Helper Applications. Mozilla handled it easily, though the aggregators didn’t actually do anything besides load. I ran this idea by a couple of friends on the mailing lists mentioned above, and they all agreed that a no-brainer, common approach to subscribing would make RSS a lot easier for them. (One said it was a “yummy idea.” 
Andy Bourland is back in the game, which I’m glad to see. I thought he (along with Ann Handley) did an awesome job of turning ClickZ into a must-read — not to mention profitable — content site about online marketing. It will be interesting to see what he can do with Adventive and MarketingFix. Ann has been back in the game for a while with MarketingProfs, which is a very solid “How To” site..
For those of you not getting enough PowerPoint, just Click To Add Title. And while you’re at it, check out (warning: PDF file) Absolute PowerPoint, which discusses what a profound effect PowerPoint has had on the way we think. This was originally published a couple of years ago in The New Yorker.
Okay, I’m definitely unsubscribing from the Moreover Online Marketing channel, which really should be called the SPAM channel. Check out this screenshot. Of 13 unique items (there’s a duplicate in there – not sure where that came from), only 2 of them are not about SPAM. What a joke.
Boxes and Arrows: Ten Quotable Moments: Challenges and Responses for UI Designers – good stuff. One thing I’ve learned in sales training is that (often) “the issue is not the issue.” In other words, people don’t always say what they mean. This article helps you understand what the customer really means when they say “I don’t like [feature x]”.
This is exactly why I think RSS is the future. Subscribing to a feed is still too technical for the average user (i.e. my Mom), but I’m working on ways to make it simpler…
I subscribe to the Moreover online marketing feed, but I’m, about to unsubscribe because it might as well be called the spam feed. Every other article is about spam. This is not the kind of info I get (or desire) when I search Google for online marketing.
As a follow on to the Qlogger.com post below, I think it would be great if they added tools like those you can get at DailyDiary.com. I like the basic idea of Daily Diary – it periodically emails you questions like “How was your day” for you to answer on a scale of 1-10 – but feel it’s somewhat limited in scope. Combining it with blogging would be a Very Good Thing.
I say this because I’ve been reading a lot of history lately and am repeatedly amazed at how much information historians are able to glean about people from scant records like real estate documents and letters – especially letters.
Email has pretty much obliterated letter-writing as a historical reference point. Wouldn’t it be great if people started documenting their lives in blogs? Some people already do, but it’s kind of voyeuristic.
It doesn’t have to be that way. I’d love to keep a private diary online that captures my random thoughts (like this one) and also documents the fact that, say, I went through a period where I listened to Madonna’s “Ray of Light” a lot. (Don’t ask. That’s probably one of those things that I would’ve wanted to keep private.
This is not to suggest that I think my life/blog will be especially interesting to future historians, but maybe my great grandchildren will get a few grins out of it.
TextAmerica looks like a good step in that direction.
I just stumbled across qlogger.com, which was linked from this excellent post by Phil Wolff. I’d been thinking about the idea of extending the basic idea of blogging into specialized applications like photoblogging, but I think Phil goes one better (and nails it) when he says:
You should be able to define your own structure. The most common use of Microsoft Excel is making lists of things. No reason blogs can’t give similar freedom to define a new package.
Qlogger.com is on the right track. I hope they are planning to expose their API and allow third parties to make specialized blogs of all types. IMO that would unleash a revolution (not to mention become a money machine for Qlogger.com).
href=”http://www.marketingfix.com”>MarketingFix was kind enough to
href=”http://www.marketingfix.com/archives/outlook_plugin_makes_rss_feel_a_lot_like_email.php#001537″>blog
the latest
eViews, which inspired a good comment from
href=”http://sippey.com/”>Michael Sippey. Here is my
response:
Yes, there definitely
needs to be a shift in user behavior for RSS to take off, and that could take a
long time. But he correctly points out that support for RSS by the major inbox
providers could speed up the process. I think that will happen sooner rather
than later because there are benefits to inbox providers is at
least as high as the benefits to long-suffering email marketers.
Hotmail, AOL et al spend enormous amounts of money blocking spam and
unblocking legitimate email after the publisher complains.
(Anyone who’s ever tried to get on AOL’s ever-shifting whitelist can relate to
this.)
Part of the reason I
wrote the article in the first place is to get marketers to start paying
attention to this new technology and start asking the “big guys” to support it.
It may take some time, but then again, if Microsoft bought NewsGator (or
alternatively came out with their own version), I think things would speed up
considerably. Come on Microsoft! Join the revolution!
