What is that orange thing on the top of the page?

Lots of folks read blogs by spending lots of time by making individual visits to their favorite blogs to see if there are any new posts. But there are millions of blogs and billions of posts out there. How do you stay current with your favorite blogs and how do you keep track of your favorite ones? Do you have to punch in all those urls every morning or use a bookmark section on your browser? What if you want to cheat your employer by doing a little blog reading at work? (I’ll forgive you!) Maybe you don’t want to store dozens of personal bookmarks on the company computer. There is a better way. It’s called RSS feed. So what does that mean? What is the advantage of using it? Is it fun?

If you are like me, you run into web jargon like “RSS” and try looking it up only to find articles and posts that contain even more jargon that you don’t know. The result is that you feel stupid and overwhelmed. Then you feel depressed. Then you wonder why you didn’t study computers in college like your mom told you to. But you don’t want to ask people you know, because then you feel even more stupid. if you ask a geek, sometimes its hard to tell if they are really trying to help you or just confuse you more.

Well folks, don’t despair. There is a site that can explain technoweenie things in a way that even your grandmother can understand. The simplicity is refreshing and entertaining. Here’s an excellent little video on what RSS is all about. It’s produced by the folks Commoncraft. Bookmark the site. These guys will quickly become your friends. They also have an excellent videos about blogs and wikis, too!