Really Simple Syndication or Rich Site Summary or RFD Site Summary (or, even better, RSS for short) is a format for delivering changing web content directly to the reader. Many news-related sites, weblogs and other online publishers syndicate their content as an RSS Feed to whoever wants it (often, several different RSS Feeds for different topics so a reader can choose which specific subjects they want to monitor). If you want to keep up on changes at several websites, using RSS can be a great way to do so without having to visit each site one at a time and scanning through it looking for changes (assuming the websites in question have implemented RSS).

To receive RSS feeds, you can use either your web browser or a separate program called an RSS Aggregator or RSS Reader (which usually has more functionality than browsers). Current versions of many browsers support RSS, including Internet Explorer (PC), Firefox (PC and Mac), Netscape Navigator (PC and Mac) and Safari (PC and Mac). For stand-alone RSS Readers, check out http://blogspace.com/rss/readers. Typically, an RSS feed is a headline or brief description of the item.  If you want to read more, you click on the RSS title of the item and go directly to the website article.

To use RSS, you simply "subscribe" to the RSS Feed from the web site of interest, and after that is done, RSS feeds are delivered directly to your browser or RSS Reader without your needing to actually go to that web site. To subscribe, there is often a link or icon at the web site, like the one depicted here, that you click on (sometimes in the same space where you typed the site's address). Clicking the icon creates a "bookmark" in your browser or RSS Reader. After that, whenever you click on the bookmark you see all the feeds from that website.

To subscribe to the RSS Feed for this Bayside Acres web site, click the RSS icon on the top of this page (or any page on this website).

For more information on RSS, go to one of the following web sites:

http://www.whatisrss.com/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RSS_(file_format)

Many news organizations syndicate their news on-line via RSS. For examples (each link will take you to that entity's web page which either summarizes all their RSS Feeds or has an RSS icon at the top of the page):

New York Times
CNN
Reuters
Washington Post
Forbes
L.A. Times
Marin Independent Journal
S.F. Chronicle