RSS delivery system wins over Microsoft – "Next big thing"?

Microsoft’s upcoming operating system will make it easier for users to subscribe to online news feeds and for developers to work with those feeds in creative ways, company officials said yesterday.

Microsoft made the announcement at a conference in Seattle dedicated to new communications technologies. Much of the talk centered on RSS, a system that automates the delivery of Web content to e-mail inboxes and other locations.

RSS is mostly used to distribute postings from news sites and online Web logs to subscribers. When a site is updated with new content, RSS automatically delivers it to them.

Only about 6 million Americans — 5 percent of the country’s online population — subscribe to RSS feeds, according to a January survey by the Pew Internet & American Life Project, a nonprofit group that studies the impact of the Internet.

By Kim Peterson

Seattle Times technology reporter

Full Story: http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/businesstechnology/2002347837_rss25.html

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Microsoft bets RSS is next big thing

Basic technology to be part of Web browser in next Windows version

By TODD BISHOP AND JOHN COOK
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTERS

Internet Explorer users accustomed to surfing the Web will be able to use a future version of the program to make waves of information come automatically to them.

Microsoft said yesterday that the Web browser in the next generation of Windows will be able to detect, display and subscribe to streams of news and information in a format called RSS, an increasingly popular method of receiving content online.

The feature, already included in rival browsers, is part of a broader push by the Redmond company to add RSS functions to the next Windows version, known as Longhorn, due out next year.

Full Story: http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/business/230002_msftrss25.html