Time Magazine posted an article yesterday called "Let RSS Go Fetch," extolling the benefits of RSS.

For those of you who don’t know, RSS most commonly stands for Real Simple Syndication and is a method that blogs, Web sites, and other resources use to syndicate the content on their site.

Reporter Chris Taylor explains what RSS is and where to get a newsreader…the software you’ll need to handle all of these RSS feeds.

Think of it like this: Outlook is to email as a newsreader is to news feeds. The biggest difference is that (so far) you can only receive newsfeeds you subscribe to…no unwanted newsfeeds and thus no spam!

However, the example of how one might use a newsreader shows that the reporter may still be in the grip of a big media mindset:

RSS allows you to play news editor and zero in on the information you really need, even as you expand the number of sites you sample. You can subscribe to just the parts of the Seattle Times, for example, that cover biotech and the Mariners.

The power of RSS and newsreaders isn’t that I can pull in box scores or the same news reports that are repeated ad nauseum on every major news source and played 24/7 on cable TV! (Although that’s nice.) It’s that there’s dozens or even hundreds of people writing in small niches that are often ignored or glossed over by mainstream media.

Business blogging, email marketing, search engine optimization, web design, and small business news are just a few of the categories that populate my newsreader.

The fact that major newspapers and magazines are now offering feeds is great; but when I want to know more about the Red Sox I’m going to the Boston Dirt Dogs.

Rich Brooks
Feed Me, Seymour, Feed Me!

It’s difficult to know how many blogs are out there, according to Carl Bialik of the Wall St. Journal in his article "The Numbers Behind Blogs."

Mr. Bialik states:

First, let’s step back and consider why we’re counting blogs at all. You no longer see articles that attempt to demonstrate the legitimacy of the Web by stating how many Web pages there are. But blogs are still in the process of entering mainstream consciousness, so numerical credibility is important; bloggers themselves cite the statistics a lot.

Actually, only 53% of bloggers cite statistics a lot, and only 47% cite them at least once a day.

The article also mentions that many of the people doing the counting are including abandoned blogs.  You know, those test blogs that have one post that says something like, "Hello, World!" or "This is my first post." And that’s it.

Perhaps we should start a home for abandoned blogs. Someone–not me, I don’t have the time–could start a blog about blogs that haven’t been updated in over a year and/or only have 1 or 2 posts. We could shame people into cleaning up after their blogs! (Blogger Scoopers, anyone?)

Just thinking out loud here…

In any case, some interesting numbers, if you can believe them.

Thanks to Josh Hurley of Hurley Solutions who sent me the WSJ link.

Rich Brooks
I’ve Abandoned Two Blogs…and I Feel Bad About It

D. Keith Robinson offers a few quick tips on being a more productive blogger in his To-Done! blog.

One of his tips is:

Don’t fear failure. Through failure comes some of the most profound learning. Fear can really put a damper on being productive. I’ve found that it’s best just to keep moving forward and tackle the mistakes as they come. And they’ll come, regardless of how much time you spend worrying about them.

I think this would be a lot of help to some business bloggers who are overly concerned about how they might come off. (Alternatively, I can think of some bloggers who should have thought twice before hitting save.)

I’d also add one other tip. Although Keith mentions reading, I’d specifically say use a newsreader. If I can’t think of something to write about, a newsreader gets the juices flowing. If I feel I’m reading the same old blogs, I just open up NetNewsWire’s "Site Drawer" and pick up something new.

Rich Brooks
I’m in the Drawer!