Dylan Greene dot com

7 must-have features RSS needs before becoming mainstream, and 1 nice-to-have

January 22, 2004 7:57 PM

Yesterday I posted 10 reasons why RSS is not ready for prime time. Thanks to the many sites that linked and welcome to the couple thousand of new visitors.

Here is my list of things that we should be doing done before RSS becomes as mainstream as browsing the web:

1) Authentication Standard. Today some RSS readers include support for Basic Authentication. There must be a standard - for both the client and server - for secure authentication. All feeds should at least ask for user name. Like FTP, this could be "anonymous" or it could be your user name and password.

2) Query Standard. Today RSS feeds only have the newest 10-20 entries. There needs to be a standard way to query for entries other than those entries. Here are some example queries that should be optionally* supported:
A) "All new or modified entries since [Date Time]."
B) "All entries from categories [X, Y, Z]."
C) "All entries containing [Search Terms]."
D) "All [Comments | Trackback | Referrals | Etc] for Entries [X, Y, Z]"
*These should be optional because they don't apply to all uses of RSS.

3) Content Format Standards. Today some RSS feeds include partial text, others include all of the text, some include HTML formatting, others include no formatting. There should be a standard way when querying the RSS data to specify which version you are interested in:
A) Text only
B) Partial Text
C) HTML - full web page
D) Partial HTML - just the post
The standard must also support unicode characters for internationalization.

4) New Name. The name for the RSS file format doesn't matter, just like HTML doesn't matter. In general we call them "Web pages" not "HTML pages". RSS needs a word like "Web" that can be commonly associated with the purpose of having RSS files. ("MP3" worked because there was free music involved.) Subscribing/Subscription is a common word that would works except most users tightly associate it with receiving newsletters and eventually spam mail. We need a new word, like TiVo and Google (thanks K.G. Schneider).

5) Ad Standard. None of us want ads in the feeds, but they are going to come anyway. We might as well invent a "nice" standard now before companies like Doubleclick invent something we all hate.

6) DRM and Encryption Standards. Another feature that we rather avoid, but it's going to have to happen, and we might as well create it now before we're all forced to install Microsoft or Adobe Reader just to read a blog entry.

7) Attachment Standard. I've never seen attachments with RSS, but I'm sure we will soon. Imagine subscribing to a feed that, instead of listing latest movie trailers, actually had movie trailers included. Or a new music feed that included sample music. Or a radio station that was just an RSS feed with music included. This means that RSS Readers need to have caching, offline storage, and other features to prevent downloading something you might already have.

A "nice to have":
8) Roaming Subscriptions. In 1998, while working on IE 5.0 (I was an intern), I saw an incomplete feature that let you synchronize your favorites with multiple machines over the Internet. I don't know why this feature never made it out the door, but anybody with multiple machines knows keeping bookmarks straight over multiple computers is not easy. RSS must not follow this path. Using OPML makes life a little bit easier, but it doesn't work at the entry level. I should be able to read a bunch of feeds on my work computer, go home, and then continue from where I left off. Feed I read at work should be marked as read at home. This should not require me to use a web-based RSS Reader such as Bloglines or NewsGator Online. Using a 3rd party service to do the synchronization would be fine. I should be able to use a different RSS readers at work than at home, and of course have the option to not bring my work-related RSS feeds home.

I like to list my ideas in groups of 10, but I've found when you ask for too much, too often you get nothing.

Comments

(1) Mark Hurd
http://www.ozemail.com.au/~markhurd/
Posted January 23, 2004 1:13 AM

When I was introduced to Lotus Notes, I just saw it as Newsgroups with RTF posts (and forms and scripting). I know there are some behind-the-scenes differences, but effectively much of web forums, Exchange Public Folders, Lotus Notes, and RSS feeds could be implemented using NNTP as a base. (Also some Wikis and other web applications.)

Perhaps a standard could be abstracted from these that generalise syndication or 'delivery' (which is where RSS started AFAIK). This could then be used to allow "news servers" to carry (and propagate) RRS feeds and RRS clients can read newsgroups.

Note that these applications already exist so what I describe is likely to be feasible. (But perhaps not commercially so -- would Microsoft want Exchange to be able to serve Notes clients and vice versa :-) )

(2) Mark Hurd
http://www.ozemail.com.au/~markhurd/
Posted January 23, 2004 1:26 AM

To further explain my thoughts, I should add that much of the utility of web forums, Exchange Public Folders, Lotus Notes, and NNTP feeds could be implemented using RRS as a base.

That is, most of these are browsed for headlines/subjects that are relevant or interesting. (And many RSS feeds do contain the full content of messages to.)

I use SharpReader and I want most of Outlook Express's news reader features added, like being able to track posts and comments that interest me and replies to comments I make. (Currently the best suggestion there is to set up my own blog and put the comments there.)

Clealy I see/use RSS like NNTP and others probably don't, but I do think RSS should borrow from or work with NNTP in the near future.

(3) Craig Pfeifer
http://www.cpfeifer.org
Posted January 23, 2004 11:22 AM

"A camel is a horse designed by committee". Welcome to the new camel - RSS.

(4) Greg Reinacker
http://www.rassoc.com/gregr/weblog/
Posted January 23, 2004 11:55 AM

On your item #8, NewsGator Online Services will already allow this, and you don't need to use our web-based reader. You can, for example, use NewsGator for Outlook at home and at work, and if you are a NGOS subscriber, you can keep all of your subscriptions (and info about what you have and haven't read) in sync.

Or, you can use Outlook Express at home, and use the POP edition there. It's totally your choice.

(5) Dylan
http://www.DylanGreene.com
Posted January 23, 2004 5:17 PM

Greg - that's great that NewsGator has his feature, but it should be a standard feature for any RSS reader.

(6) Deraj
http://derajdezine.vze.com/
Posted January 25, 2004 9:11 PM

"RSS needs a word like "Web" that can be commonly associated with the purpose of having RSS files"

Isn't that what the word "feed" is for? Also, are #1, 5, and 6 jokes or what? Ads will never happen on the feeds I read (and if they do, I'll stop reading them). There's nothing wrong with an encrypted feed, but only a digital signature would be useful IMO (and such digital signing is really a more general issue that could be abstracted above RSS).

(7) Deraj
http://derajdezine.vze.com/
Posted January 25, 2004 9:17 PM

"that's great that NewsGator has his feature, but it should be a standard feature for any RSS reader."

Standard features for RSS readers? That's like saying you like tabs in Mozilla, so they should be implemented in every browser (which they should not, tabs are a misfeature only necessary under Windows). Additionally, what is stopping you from emailing your subscription in some format (for argument's sake, the horrid OPML format) and then loading those subscriptions up in your RSS reader? Or what about a web-based aggregator that you can access from anywhere (with security over HTTPS and co.)?

(8) Dave
Posted January 26, 2004 9:57 PM

In regard to #5, Don Park just posted about RSSads.com and pointed out some potential problems with the whole idea. Of course, RSSAds' goal is not specifically to define a standard, but if they *are* successful, the simple fact of being first will probably incline everyone else to do it their way...

(9) Dylan
http://www.DylanGreene.com
Posted January 27, 2004 3:29 PM

#7 - Deraj: The problem that NewsGator solved is that you can use a non-web based RSS reader or a web-based RSS reader, and it still keeps track of what entries you have read and have not not look at yet. OPML only keeps track of what feeds you read, it doesn't keep track of what entries in those feeds you've already looked at.

(10) Dylan
http://www.DylanGreene.com
Posted January 27, 2004 3:32 PM

#6 - Deraj: "Isn't that what the word "feed" is for?"

Feed is good, but I'd rather we stop re-using words and create new words. Feed means too much already, from news feed to chicken feed. You can't Google for "feed" to learn what a feed is. Google is a new word. It works perfectly.

(11) Amy Gahran
http://blog.contentious.com
Posted January 29, 2004 2:01 PM

For those of you interested in finding a catchier name for RSS, to help bring it to a mainstream audience, I'm currently running a contest for this. See: http://blog.contentious.com/contest.html

I realize the idea of coming up with a vernacular name for RSS is very controversial, and I've drawn a fair amount of ire from Dave Winer and others in the RSS developer for this effort, but I still think it's worth trying.

- Amy Gahran

Editor, CONTENTIOUS

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