RSS in the Clouds
RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication and it's a way for people to subscribe to updates to your blog using a client like Google Reader or Bloglines. You may not know what RSS is but chances are people are using it to read your blog. We track over 50,000,000 posts read via RSS every week.
Context & Ripple Effects
RSS had become a core distribution layer by 2007, supporting blogs, podcasts, wikis and persistent search, even as subscribing remained inconsistent enough to be a usability problem. WordPress.com’s reported weekly RSS readership gives its RSSCloud move significance beyond a feature change: it applies a real-time delivery model to an established publisher-to-reader channel.
First-order effects
- WordPress.com publishers gain a real-time RSS distribution option for posts read through feed clients such as Google Reader and Bloglines.
- RSSCloud makes WordPress.com’s large RSS audience a test case for whether real-time syndication can work alongside conventional feed subscriptions.
Second-order effects
- Feed-reader providers must support RSSCloud’s delivery model to offer their users the faster updates enabled by WordPress.com.
- The move raises the competitive bar for blog platforms whose syndication remains limited to conventional RSS delivery.
Third-order effects
- If reader support broadens, feed distribution may shift from clients periodically checking publishers to networked notification services routing updates between them.
- The change reinforces RSS’s role as an open syndication layer, but its reach depends on usability and interoperability—two issues highlighted by earlier coverage of confusing RSS subscription practices.
The trend: Publishing platforms are trying to make established open syndication infrastructure more immediate rather than ceding update delivery entirely to closed social streams.