I have a lot of sites that I enjoy reading. Just a short time ago, relatively speaking, I would have to bookmark them all and visit each one independently to see if they had any new content. This can be time-consuming.

These days, though, most sites have RSS feeds. For those of you who are less technically inclined, consider it a fancy way of saying that the site’s content is available in a format available to other programs. You click on the little icon or text link to subscribe to the feed. The icons tend to be orange or green, and look like this.

Never mind the complicated explanations about XML - all this really means is that you can get the site’s content (feed) in special programs or websites that are set up to read it. Personally, I get all my feeds using Google Reader. So anywhere I go, if I have access to the internet, I just go to Google and sign in, and there are all my feeds, ready to go.

Instead of having to check a bunch of websites for new content, I go to one site, and it tells me which of my feeds have new content. I can read it at my leisure. All in one place.

Just sign up with Google (it’s free), and when you see a site you like, click on their feed button, click on the option to subscribe via Google, and you’re done! So easy. It’s still a bit of a hidden gem - a lot of people aren’t very familiar with it yet, but it’s rapidly growing in popularity as more people discover how convenient it is, and how much time they save doing it.

You definitely don’t need to be a geek to appreciate RSS!