contentious.com

What timing!

Earlier today I wrote about how valuable RSS can be to people who access the Net via slow dialup connections. As an example, I showed how, on dialup, it is vastly more convenient to access Google News headlines and summaries via RSS feed rather than by going straight to that Web site. However, since Google – amazingly – still doesn’t offer any RSS feeds, I subscribe to some Google News feeds generously provided by an anonymous programmer.

Then I find out, from a CONTENTIOUS reader, that Google recently sent a cease-and-desist letter to UK programmer Julian Bond who created similar Google News RSS feeds. I kid you not – check out this Internet News article.

OK, here are a few basics I wish news publishers and aggregators really would understand about RSS feeds….

1. People want RSS feeds! More and more of them every day, in fact. For very good reasons. Once people grasp what RSS feeds are and how easy they are to use, they realize that RSS is a much more organized and time-efficient way to keep up with what’s new online. And it’s spam-proof. Beat that.

2. Every online publisher can, and should, offer RSS feeds. I’m serious. There’s no excuse. RSS feeds are easy to create. Plus, if you publish a major online news site that is fed by some kind of content management system, the fact that you already have structured content with metadata means that you are definitely able to publish an RSS feed. So tell your system administrators that it’s now a priority. Make it happen.

3. If you don’t offer RSS feeds, don’t punish people who create them for you! If there’s enough of a demand for an RSS feed for your content that some programmer has gone and created an independent feed for your site, that person just did you a big favor. You should thank her for it, not threaten her. These people are not “stealing” anything from you. They are providing a service that you should be offering. Independent, scraped feeds are a useful bridge for your audience until your organization gets off its butt and starts offering its own feeds. They are delivering readers, and ultimately Web traffic, that you would otherwise lose as your audience increasingly turns to RSS. Work with these creative people. Leverage their labors of love. Don’t bully them. You’ll just end up looking like a pompous control freak.

   …That said, if your organization does offer its own RSS feeds, then I’d agree that it’s acceptable to discourage other people from creating independent feeds. But talk to them first – maybe they’ve spotted a need for a new kind of feed that you should be offering anyway. Also, realize that if your site is popular, then scraped feeds will undoubtedly arise. As long as those feeds only offer your headlines and summaries, with links back to your site (not your full content) what’s the harm?

4. It’s more about audience than syndication. Google’s cease-and-desist letter to Bond said, “…we do not currently permit the creation of a news feed from the results on Google News, nor do we permit webmasters to display Google News headlines on their sites.”

   Keep in mind that syndication (re-displaying feed content on other sites) is only one way that RSS feeds can be used – and I strongly doubt that it’s anywhere near the major usage. In fact, RSS feeds are mainly a personal news-gathering tool. When most people subscribe to an RSS feed, they’re doing so in order to view it in their personal feed reader, so they can easily find out what new content you’re offering. They’re not all rushing to put your headlines on their sites. So realize that RSS feeds mainly represent a valuable way for you to keep and expand your online audience, rather than a threat to dilute your brand.

To sum up, online publishers who fail to recognize the growing demand for RSS feeds, and then fail respond to it by offering RSS feeds, are doing their online audience – as well as their own business – a HUGE disservice.

It’s especially ludicrous for Google, of all companies, to harass an independent programmer who has created a free feed for Google News. Let’s face it: Google scrapes content from virtually every site on the Web, organizes and categorizes it, and displays it on its own site. This is the core of Google’s business. Google does not own the content that they scrape, nor do they ask permission to scrape it. No one complains because everyone wants their sites to be indexed in Google.

The Google News service scrapes headlines and summaries from more than 4500 news sources. Does Google News have licensing agreements with each of these news sources to acquire and display this content? It’s possible, but I strongly doubt it.

So Google – until you can get your act together enough to offer your own RSS feeds (which more and more of your users, including me, are begging for), then please don’t harass the independent programmers who are doing your job for you. Just chill out, OK? If you want to control how your content is announced via RSS, then just create your own feeds. Your users will thank you for it. You can probably make money off of it too, by embedding ads. Thanks.