“RSS will change your life.” -Steve Lewis, Web Marketing Watch
Central IT provides a few basic channels of communication to keep campus informed: a website, email listservs, a Tech Partners meeting once every three months.
Now we’re adding new channels—this IT Community blog and a companion IT Announcements blog (coming soon).
We hope the content will be compelling. We think the delivery will be more effective. The improved delivery is made possible by RSS or Really Simple Syndication feeds.
Blogs produce RSS feeds. You can subscribe to RSS feeds (see How to subscribe). That means you don’t have to remember to check the IT website or one of the blog sites for updates. Content gets delivered to you whenever something new is posted.
RSS feeds have advantages over email as well. When people respond to posts, all of the conversation gets archived in one place. You don’t have to save all of those emails on your own computer. And you won’t get three copies of every announcement, or lose it to a SPAM filter.
As the IT blogs grow, content will be organized in categories. You will be able to subscribe to specific categories. If you’re interested in conversations about web development but don’t give a hoot about network infrastructure, you can create customized RSS feeds that meet your needs.
We won’t eliminate the email channel right away. But we think the new way is more efficient and effective.
What do you think? Let us know.
