Whatever the linguistic details, one of the main roles of RSS is to supply directly to you a steady stream of updates from a website. Every new article published on that site is served up in a list that can be interpreted by an RSS reader.

Unfortunately, RSS is no longer how most of us consume “content.” (Google famously killed its beloved Google Reader more than a decade ago.) It’s now the norm to check social media or the front pages of many different sites to see what’s new. But I think RSS still has a place in your life: Especially for those who don’t want to miss anything or have algorithms choosing what they read, it remains one of the best ways to navigate the internet. Here’s a primer on what RSS can (still!) do for you, and how to get started with it, even in this late era of online existence.

  • PrincessLeiasCat
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    10 months ago

    Does anyone have a list of sites with good RSS feeds? News sites preferably - I’m having a hard time finding some of them.

    • Evkob@lemmy.ca
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      10 months ago

      Somebody else in this thread linked a Github repo listing “Awesome RSS Feeds”, they have categories by country and by topic.

      Otherwise, this is the method I use to find RSS feeds from websites that don’t have a link/button to their feed (copy/pasted from my other comment in this thread):

      You can often find RSS feeds by checking the page’s source (on Firefox: right-click and “View Page Source”) and using Ctrl+F to search, there’s usually a URL somewhere. Keywords to search for: “feed”, “RSS”, “xml”, “atom”. For example, if I go to this community’s page on lemmy.world, I can Ctrl+F “feed” on the page source to find https://lemmy.world/feeds/c/technology.xml

    • ominouslemon@lemm.ee
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      10 months ago

      I don’t know what client you’re using, but Inoreader usually finds the RSS feed even if the webpage does not link to it

    • Elle@lemmy.world
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      10 months ago

      I realize you’re asking for a list of sites with RSS feeds, but I wanted to highlight an easier method of sometimes finding feeds than that mentioned by Evkob: Feedbro add-on for Firefox.

      You can click the icon for it while browsing a site to check for whether or not any feeds are available. Unfortunately it doesn’t always find them, I think depending on the part of the site you’re browsing or how the feed is being provided, perhaps both, but it’s been a pretty useful tool in my experience, especially for sites that seem determined to bury them.

      • PrincessLeiasCat
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        10 months ago

        Thank you! This is great! I used to use an RSS feed on a regular basis, but it’s been awhile. I’m definitely getting reacquainted, but it’s just not as easy to find sites with an RSS link at the top like it used to be. These tips are definitely helpful so I appreciate it :)