Keeping up

So many websites & so little time. A strategy for keeping up.

Chances are there's a number of websites you like to visit to see what's new. But visiting those sites with some regularity just might take more time than you have. Fortunately there are options.

The vast majority of websites provide their recent articles in a version specially formatted for retrieval by software. The specially formatted version is called a "feed" and the software which retrieves it a "feed reader". There are several different versions of feeds available. RSS (Really Simple Syndication) was the first and is still very popular. Another version of feeds is called "Atom".

Irrespective of the format of the feed there's a universal symbol that indicates the presence of a feed. Sometimes you'll find the symbol displayed across the top of your browser; other times it will be on the web page (or both). Once you've set up a feed reader clicking on the symbol will add that website to the list of feeds to which you're subscribed. You can subscribe to web pages, news feeds, weather forecasts, ... (pretty much anything you find on the web).

Most feedreaders provide you with a title and summary of the article. Clicking the title will display the complete article. It's pretty easy - and quite time efficient - to quickly scan a list of titles and only read the few items you're really interested in.

Feedreaders come in all shapes and sizes these days. In fact there's a good chance that your email client includes one. There are a number of stand alone apps available for PC or Mac. Feedemon for the PC is well regarded. On the Mac NetNewsWire receives lots of praise. If you don't want to use a standalone app Google Reader is a very well regarded web based reader.

Update Nov 3: At the start of the month Google changed the way users can share posts in Google Reader with others. That's got some geeks up in arms. You can read more about the furour and check out some further suggestions for alternatives on lifehack.org.

Update Nov 8: Looking a little bit like much ado about nothing. Irrespective of the perceptions of some geeks lifehack readers have voted Google Reader their favourite news reader. Read more at lifehack.