After the experience of doing a (rather thin, but still) blog for the AAUW convention, I’m starting to get the point of “writing” a blog, but the “reading” part was still problematic.

While each blog can stand alone as a web site to visit, the whole point is that all these messages are “syndicated” in a standard way. Software is available that brings them all together into something like a customized newspaper, but I’d never been able to get that software to work correctly.

I’d installed FeedDemon months ago and would bring it up once or twice a week when I discovered a new “feed” (those RSS links that appear on some web pages). But it just never seemed compelling enough to spring for the registration.

I also tried Sage, an extension of Firefox, but that didn’t seem to work particularly well - finding a glitch there was often what sent me over to FeedDemon.

I’d installed RSSOwl, another open source aggregator, awhile ago, put it on the back burner, but tried it again yesterday. I installed an update, and now I’m happy with my RSS reader. This is still a project in active development and an upgrade release is due later this month, so you may want to wait a bit (one of the features scheduled for the new release is one whose lack flummoxed me for a few minutes in this one).

The Aha! moment came yesterday when I heard about the London bombings. I know I’ll need to watch out for the downsides of “instant information gratification,” but I’m looking forward to moving more and more of the information I get from mailing lists into the aggregator. I’m not sure this over 55 brain can cope with the flow of information like the under 30’s seem to do, but I’m willing to give it a shot.

For more about RSS, there’s a meeting of the Society for Technical Communications on Thursday, July 14, 6-8 pm and the topic is Getting Started with RSS. More on the meeting …