Once heralded as the future of digital content consumption, RSS has seemingly been overtaken by more social services like Twitter and Facebook. But, is RSS really "dead" as some tech watchers are
claiming? Igniting a lively debate this week,
UK-based web designer Kroc Camen said exactly that before industry peers convinced him to drop
the word "dead" for "being ignored."
Analyzing the number of referrals and visits coming from RSS, some are suggesting that services like Facebook and Twitter are taking over
the role of content syndication from RSS.
Under the headline, "Twitter And Facebook Really Are Killing RSS (At Least For TechCrunch Visitors)," MG Siegler pronounced: "RSS is slowly dying."
On the contrary, GigaOm's Mathew Ingram insists that RSS isn't going away, but rather adapting to consumers' changing consumption patterns. "Like plenty of other
technologies, it is just becoming part of the plumbing of the real-time web," he insists. "RSS has become a crucial part of how web content gets fed from blogs and other sites into real-time services
such as Twitter and Facebook, as well as aggregation apps like Flipboard."
"I'll write that post about how great RSS is right after I finish going through my feeds as I start my news
shift," quipped ReadWriteWeb editor Marshall Kirkpatrick on Twitter.
Blogging godfather Dave Winer predicts that RSS
as an open system can and will likely outlast popular platforms like Twitter. Once Twitter falls, "What rises to
replace it will either be an open system built around RSS, or something indistinguishable from RSS."
Adds top
venture capitalist Fred Wilson: "While I do agree that Twitter and Facebook have gained significantly in terms of driving traffic across the web, for technology oriented audiences, RSS is still a
critically important distribution platform and is very much alive and well."
Read the whole story at Camen Design Blog et al »