Social Software – Web 2.0

What is it?

What can it do for me?

Social Software Home
Blogs and Blogging
Podcasts and Podcasting/Vidcasts
Wiki's
del.icio.us, FURL, and Online Bookmarking
Flickr and Other Photo Sharing Sites
Content Management Systems
Social Software in the Classroom–PD Class

Web 2.0 is what some are calling the renaissance of the web. It involves the web as a place where applications and information can be delivered and used from anytime and anyplace.

One of the most important pieces of Web 2.0, or the Read/Write Web as some are choosing to call it, is the idea of syndication of content. What this means is that end users can set up applications to pull new content from these syndicated sites as it becomes available. This means that instead of having to check a favorite website for new content every day, when new content becomes available it is pushed down to you. Standardized protocols such at RSS and Atom are the underlying tools that allow this to happen.

This also means that everyone can publish to the web using these same standards and protocols for others to read and subscribe to. Hence the Write piece of the Read/Write Web. Many believe that this is the way the web should have always worked.

Let's look at the protocols involved. RSS and Atom. Basically, these are subsets of the XML language. They create what are called feeds. What makes them special though is that they allow you to subscribe to the content that is put through the feed. When you are subscribed, any new content is automatically pushed to you through the feed. This .pdf file by Will Richardson is a great guide to RSS for educators.

How do you then subscribe to feeds. Well you need some sort of program that will gather or aggregate the feeds you want to subscribe to. This type of program is actually called an Aggregator. There are many types of aggregators out there. There are web based aggregators or application based. What you choose to use is up to you. Here is a list of many of the aggregators that are out there. When you choose your aggregator you then need to populate it with feeds. Once you have done that, all you need to do is check your aggregator when you want to see if there is new content available from your chosen feeds. What you will see in your aggregator is a synopsis of the new content from the chosen site. You can then choose to click on the synopsis to be taken to the site to get access to the complete content.

What types of information can you get from feeds? You can get all types of information. Feeds are available from all of the major news outlets and many other websites. In fact if a site is one where the content changes rapidly, it most likely has a feed. CNN, Fox News, ESPN, USA Today, CBS, and on and on and on.

Blogs, Podcasts, Vidcast can also be accessed via RSS feeds. See the related pages for those topics.