RSS Pad - Really Simple Syndication ... Really!

Microsoft Advises Remove Netscape 8

Looks like the Microsoft / Netscape browser wars of long ago may be revived to some degree as Microsoft is encouraging users of the Windows platform to remove Netscape 8, AOL's browser.  It appears that Netscape 8 breaks Microsoft's RSS / XML rendering engines (I have a hard time believing that this was intentional on AOL's part).  At any rate, Microsoft is stepping up its efforts to get people to remove Netscape rather than release a patch to fix the problem.  (I mean really, they have Microsoft update installed on every machine.  How hard would it be for Microsoft to fix this?) 

Besides, Steve Ballmer is on the record a few days ago saying that RSS doesn't really matter so what's the big deal then?  The bottom line, RSS is important.

RSS and Calendars

Now this would be a cool application for RSS.  It would make it simple to sync calendar events across different devices.  An interesting article about incorporating calendar data in RSS is available here. It is an interesting concept.  One that I wish I had time to pursue.  I hope someone runs with it.

RSS for Internet Explorer

According to its press release on PRWeb, Chrysanth Software has released Chrysanth NETime Channel v. 3.0, an Internet Explorer add-in that makes it easy to view RSS, RDF, and ATOM feeds from inside your browser.  It may be worth some investigation since Microsoft does not currently have anything integrated into its browser.  (I use a Safari and FIrefox on a Mac so I am pretty happy.)

Apple's Jobs Announces iTunes Podcast Support

According to a report at eweek.com iTunes will be a user friendly place for poscasts.  I have wondered on more than one occasion why this was not part of the Mac Tiger OS 10.4 release.  In my opinion it was one of the few things missing from the release.  Glad to see poscast support now.

Microsoft Doesn't See Big Future for RSS

According to the RSS Weblog Microsoft views RSS as nothing special and too simple.  Could it be that Microsoft doesn't like that RSS is a standard that they do not own and control.  And, gasp, it is simple.  Maybe that right there is a concept that Microsoft should latch onto.  Heaven forbid that consumers should gravitate to something simple or things that work.  Microsoft is working on making this more complex and complicated according to Steve Ballmer. "We are working on more existing powerful stuff, around XML/web services [sic] that will address many issues beyond RSS." 

Oh, goody.  I cannot wait.

Gnomedex 5.0

This is the one that we are really looking forward to.  Good people meeting up (Chris Pirillo, David McInnis and many more important industry leaders) in the beautiful Northwest.  OK, so being from Washington state has us a little biased.  Anyway we will be there and provide coverage of the event through this blog.  Register for Gnomedex 5.0 today. 

Feedster to RSS Advertise

Feedster Introduces RSS Advertising but provides no details.  OK, I admit it.  Advertising does serve me at some level.  Advertising has improved my quality of life in many ways.  I just don't think I need them in my RSS feeds. 

It presents a host of problems for the blog owner and/or webmaster as well as the advertiser.  One for example is inclusion of RSS feeds in blogs and on Web sites.  Am I going to be required to maintain the ads in place when including the RSS feed?  It would concern me as a PPC advertiser too.  RSS feeds included in blogs and sites are generally not updated  each time a  page is pulled.   They are usually cached.  As a site owner am I expected to cache the ads too?  As an advertiser am I expected to continue to pay on cached ads.  How does Feedster, for example, limit my impressions?