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Do RSS feeds still exist? What’s the best way to have a specific news topic delivered to me instead of me waking up every morning and perusing sites?

HappyDude20

HappyDude20

macrumors 68040
Original poster
Jul 13, 2008
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Los Angeles, Ca
Take for example the GameStop stock craze of last year. I bought a few shares and have usually checked on the stock price and news surrounding the company almost every morning. I don’t need to do that. My plan is to hold for the long term but I definitely like knowing what’s up.

But visiting all these news sites every morning just wastes time so am wondering the best approach to all this.

As an aside, if some sort of RSS feed existed for InstaGram and FaceBook then Id gladly play for that so I could have bikini photos of the girls I went to college with delivered directly
To me instead of endlessly scrolling daily.
 
RSS is still very much alive. I use RSS with Feedly to track 43 different feeds. On the Mac and iOS I use the RSS app Readkit (just released a new version 3).

Feedly Premium ($$) also can track by topic like you want rather than specific sites. See screenshot.

Screen Shot 2022-05-12 at 9.53.10 AM.png
 
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HappyDude20 said:
But visiting all these news sites every morning just wastes time
Click to expand...
Another option, although it feeds into the Google data gathering ecosystem, is Google Alerts (I use disposable email addresses with it).

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ETA: if you're tracking financial assets, most brokers and custodians offer fully featured tools that are better than RSS readers and search engine alerts for monitoring portfolio news and performance.
 
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RSS feeds are still around, and still as useful as ever, if not more. I'd say that because companies focus on what they can commercialize, the quiet and successful simplicity of RSS as a non-proprietary technology just leaves it less popularized – it's up to us users to keep it popular and spread the good word.

I use NetNewsWire too, monitoring probably over a hundred feeds: news, science updates, webcomics. It's also the main way I read MacRumors, since they offer full-format articles. And with personal sites and blogs, it's a great way to take in the considered thoughts of others away from the noise of social media.

I use it partially because the spirit with which Brent Simmons and the team make it matches the spirit of RSS: accessible, open-source, volunteer-powered. And partially because it's excellent: everything syncs with iCloud, it's on Mac and iOS, it looks and works very well, and article themes are even showing back up.
 
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Arctic Moose said:
+1 for NetNewsWire, especially now since iCloud syncing of feeds, favorites and read status between iPhone, iPad and Mac has been added.

I use it all day every day.
Click to expand...

And article themes too - not that many currently, but perhaps some can be ported from Vienna RSS.

Edit.. I again parroted a user when I mention article themes... gosh. I don't mean to
 
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Thanks all! I never used RSS but picked up NetNewsWire based on the feedback here, sorry Feedly, subscription = hard pass.

Interested to see if this works better for me than surfing.
 
Coincidentally, I started using RSS again - actually testing it on Youtube instead of chanel subscriptions.
After some research, I decided on Feedly.
 
I still use Vienna, just feels like it's a no-nonsense type of app.

No idea if that will handle your Facebook "situation", though, that's all on Facebook allowing RSS or not, and why would they want you to load their site less...? Though I have been using RSS to follow Youtube channels without actually needing a Youtube account, so maybe I'm wrong on Facebook
 
Is there a way to browse and read my RSS feeds in Safari? I don't really want to use another app to browse and read internet stuff, I'd like to do it in Safari because I want to use the Private Relay that is built in.
I used to use RSS feeds way back with the Opera browser, it had RSS support built in. I would click on the feed and the linked page would open in another Opera tab. It was simple and quick. I'd like to have the same thing in Safari but how do I do it?
 
DrCC said:
Is there a way to browse and read my RSS feeds in Safari? I don't really want to use another app to browse and read internet stuff, I'd like to do it in Safari because I want to use the Private Relay that is built in.
I used to use RSS feeds way back with the Opera browser, it had RSS support built in. I would click on the feed and the linked page would open in another Opera tab. It was simple and quick. I'd like to have the same thing in Safari but how do I do it?
Click to expand...
Yes... Feedly can be used just in Safari if you prefer.
 
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Netnewswire + Bazqux + several hundred feeds, for me. Can't imagine living without. Such a huge time saver, and i can do it whenever i have a few minutes.
 
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HappyDude20 said:
As an aside, if some sort of RSS feed existed for InstaGram and FaceBook then Id gladly play for that so I could have bikini photos of the girls I went to college with delivered directly
To me instead of endlessly scrolling daily.
Click to expand...
everyone in here responding to this thread like the guy didn't just say this huh
 
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DrCC said:
I used to use RSS feeds way back with the Opera browser, it had RSS support built in. I would click on the feed and the linked page would open in another Opera tab. It was simple and quick. I'd like to have the same thing in Safari but how do I do it?
Click to expand...

Safari used to do that. In fact, Steve Jobs even renamed Safari to Safari RSS:

Apple’s upcoming Safari blesses RSS XML syndication

By giving its blessing to XML syndication, Apple is joining the trend of browser makers embracing Web news feeds and potentially bringing...
macdailynews.com macdailynews.com

Then it was gone.

I e-mail Apple every Safari release asking for it back. NetNewsWire is great, but it is still so much clunkier than having number-of-unread-article badges in bookmark tabs of the bookmark bar that I have in front of me all day.
 
DrCC said:
Is there a way to browse and read my RSS feeds in Safari? I don't really want to use another app to browse and read internet stuff, I'd like to do it in Safari because I want to use the Private Relay that is built in.
I used to use RSS feeds way back with the Opera browser, it had RSS support built in. I would click on the feed and the linked page would open in another Opera tab. It was simple and quick. I'd like to have the same thing in Safari but how do I do it?
Click to expand...
There are several RSS Reader extensions/plugins for Safari. I haven't tried them out myself but it you go to the menu Safari > Safari Extensions and search for "rss reader" you should see several to try out.
 
How do I see the RSS Safari extension? I have tried to do that, but when I search the returns are for standalone apps.
How do I filter the searches only for Safari extensions?
 
DrCC said:
How do I see the RSS Safari extension? I have tried to do that, but when I search the returns are for standalone apps.
How do I filter the searches only for Safari extensions?
Click to expand...
Ah, yes. I hate that the search function is so limited.

The only RSS plugin that I see is one for subscribing but it does not monitor or let you ready them "RSS Button for Safari"

My other daily driver browser is Firefox and there are lots of RSS plugins for it. I had hoped there would be for Safari, too, but not so. You may need to use a reader outside of Safari, I'm afraid.
 
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