#8 Make life "really simple" with RSS & a newsreader

Okay...

I'd hate to be a Negative Nellie here...but I don't really like RSS feeds. Does that make me some sort of weird-o? And honestly, I don't know anyone personally who uses them much.

Though that does not mean it isn't valuable to others, though.

I enjoy reading through websites, especially blogs, for information. I like to look at the sites I'm on and explore them. To me, that's the whole joy of blogging and reading them and seeing the entire layout. It's like Christmas morning, bringing up a new web page to read!

But maybe I'm some sort of whack-o girl, lol.

I mostly use LiveJournal for blogging, and they have what is called a Friends Page which basically gives you a short blurb from each "friend" you have (like an RSS but in keeping with your page layout and leaving in the avitars, etc. of the other users) on that page so you can choose which blogs you want to go deeper into and read.

I guess personally I would not find much use for this, basically because I don't read lots of blogs or websites in one day to the point that I would need all of them on one page in this manner. The way Bloglines is set up bothers me...it seems cluttered. I know I know...the links are in alphabetical order. But it just seems like a long slew of links and when you click on them, a whole page full of words.

I miss the graphics, the layout, the links and pics...everything that goes into building a website is missing. It's just words and yes, I love to read and words are great (hence blogging in the first place) but part of what makes using the internet appealing is design elements. I mean, I see that you can see some pictures that go along with the article...I guess I am just not into the whole parsed down look of it all. It's a yawn.

But I PERSONALLY (I'm not talking in a professional sense) only use the internet these days for quick communication and for entertainment, not homework and only for general research like recipes etc.

That said, I do however, think it would be really useful for students and teachers combing the net for information for research. I know when I was in college this would have been very helpful to me (having been a journalism major) in order to keep track of various new sources. I know this could be useful to me with my students who come to the library at South High School.

I can see that it would be useful for librarians (because information from lots of places would be available in one spot which makes for quick searches). I think we will definately be using this at OPL if not now but in the future as another way to get answers to reference questions to the public quickly.

So I guess for at home and for leisure I probably will stick to my old ways (no need for RSS) but in a work or educational environment, I think I would use this tool in the future.